As mentioned yesterday, Austin Aaron and Carlos Strickland have left the Cal football program. Strickland made the decision to move back to a team that is closer to Texas so he can be with his ailing grandfather more often, and Aaron retired of his own volition.

Sonny Dykes had this to say about Austin Aaron’s retirements.

Best of luck Austin!

Two other Golden Bears are leaving the program. Caleb Coleman is retiring due to concussions. We wish him the best of luck healing up from his injuries.

Cal does have a deep secondary, so Coleman’s loss won’t hurt the Bears too much on the field. Cameron Walker and Trey Turner are expected to duel it out for nickelback snaps. Coleman had a few nice moments for the Bears, particularly against Oregon State.

Additionally, offensive lineman Michael Trani has medically retired due to back issues. Trani was unable to play a single snap at Cal since signing with the Bears in 2014 due to his injury problems. Trani was not mentioned on the depth chart, so this is to be expected.

One injury note: A.J. Greathouse had shoulder surgery a few weeks ago. He’ll be out for several weeks but is expected to return to the team soon.

Football season is approach fast, folks. Urban Meyer spoke to the media Sunday afternoon, less than a month away from the season opener against Bowling Green in Columbus on September 3.

Here’s the important notes on what Meyer had to say:

*The 2016 mantra is The Edge, “where average stops and elite begins.”

*Meyer said that he won’t know what type of team he’s got until the 12th practice of camp.

*The first scrimmage will be on Saturday.

*Meyer says they have a good idea of who is going to play, added that they have a lot of good young players.

*Meyer would like to announce people as starters next week.

*Meyer says there’s no conclusions he’s come to about the team yet, but said that the team is very athletic.

*Meyer says he has to think like an 18-year-old. He said he has to do uncomfortable things to appeal to the younger guys and keep their “human spirit” up and get them to try their hardest.

*Meyer said this year is going to be a lot like 2014 based on the experience of the players on the roster, not as many vets.

*Meyer said last year’s freshmen weren’t very mature, and that this year’s group is more mature because they see opportunity to beat out other players.

*Meyer said this camp feels different, and says he doesn’t want to “screw it up.”

*Meyer was glad to see the formerly injured players back today and mentioned Noah Brown, Cam Burrows, Dontre Wilson, and Erick Smith.

The Wisconsin Badgers took part in their local media day on Sunday. Head coach Paul Chryst addressed the dozens of reporters and correspondents inside Camp Randall Stadium’s media room on the south side of the end zone.

The second-year Wisconsin head coach noted there were some players finishing up summer classes last week, but said the team is now in their “fourth phase” heading into fall camp. He believes the 37 freshmen who joined Wisconsin’s roster have assimilated themselves well in the short time they’ve been in the program.

Injury-wise, Chryst acknowledged inside linebacker T.J. Edwards is the only one he doesn’t know when or if he’ll be able to do anything in camp. There are a handful of players who have had surgeries — safety D’Cota Dixon, offensive lineman Dan Voltz as noted by Chryst — but right now the team’s fairly healthy.

“He’s progressing but don’t quite know when he’ll be ready, but he’d be the only guy who might not do much in camp,” Chryst said of Edwards.

Here are more highlights from today’s press conference:

Michael Deiter to start at center

• “Dan’s played a lot of center, but Michael’s also done a lot at center and I think that most years, we’ve gone through it wanting to have two or three centers. Michael’s starting at center, and Dan will end up doing both. It’ll be determined how practices go for him. Dan’s coming off a season-ending injury last year, and he’s done a ton of stuff and worked at it, and yet we’re going to be more cautious than pushing him. What I appreciated form Dan is that he’s smart and he cares and he works at it. So the number of reps he will need will be different than a younger guy.”

Wide receivers stepping up

• Regarding Robert Wheelwright and Jazz Peavy as the leading receivers — believes Wheelwright needs to stay healthy. Chryst said they’re working on some things to make sure he, among other players, get through camp. Peavy did a “heckuva job” last year as a complimentary receiver and has the chance to jump into another role. With Alex Erickson leaving, Wheelwright, Peavy and Reggie Love have game experience, but Chryst also noted it’s George Rushing time to step into a new role.

On Corey Clement:

• Answering a question where Clement is mentally, Chryst said you have a lot of discussions with players and noted how Clement has taken last year’s experience and is applying it. Said sometimes you learn by making mistakes. “He’s taken that all to heart and wants to be the best player he can be — but also the best person he can be,” Chryst said of Clement. “I think he values this team and he wants to be a good teammate.”
• Chryst said he likes where he’s at, and he will have new challenges to face.

On David Edwards’ position move

• “For David, it might be the best position for him. I think it’s an area we certainly want to and need to have depth.” Said you have to look at it from what’s good for the individual and what’s good for the team.

Offensive line talk

• Noted how Deiter played every game as a redshirt freshman, and that was impressive. Also noted the coaching staff was “excited” for Ryan Ramczyk, the former walk-on who transferred from Division III UW-Stevens Point.

Transfer Talk

• The coaching staff knew both running back Chris James and defensive back Nick Nelson prior to their transfers to UW — James playing for Chryst at Pitt, and former defensive backs coach Daronte Jones coaching Nelson as an assistant at Hawaii. Mentioned with the year off, they can work out on Friday and be sore on Saturday. “I think there’s some growth with Nick and Chris. They’re young, and so they can still develop. They need to maximize — and we need to help them — but there’s a lot of growth that can happen.” Mentioned the kind words from Joe Schobert and Vince Biegel regarding Ramczyk’s play on scout team Tuesday-Thursday each week when he had to sit out last season.

Defensive adjustments to new defensive coordinator

• Chryst mentioned a lot of the terminology has stayed the same, some of it’s different. Said it takes time for adjustments. “It’s our job to make sure that they get it and feel comfortable. Once again, it’s always evolving. The learning and the growth is always evolving, so I hope it doesn’t stop at the end of fall camp.”

What’s crazy about college football recruiting is the fact that everything can change with one commitment. One way might be a guy attracting a bunch of his high school friends, or possibly its someone filling up the remaining spot for a certain position.

The Arizona Wildcats now have 25 commitments for the class, with 3-star defensive end Jalen Harris being the latest member to join the class. A school can only sign 25 recruits per year, but that number can be adjusted with early enrollments and gray shirt candidates. I also think Rhett Rodriguez comes off of a scholarship, opening up another spot.

So far the early enrollees will be Braxton Burmeister, Tony Fields, Darrian McNeal and Delshawn Phillips. This gives Arizona four open spots for the 2017 class if scholarship numbers allow, as those listed above can be shifted back into the 2016 class.

It’s been a while since I did a recruiting roundup, so now here’s the latest in the past week:

More on Jalen Harris’ commitment

This is one that was to be expected over the last few weeks. While he is a Desert Swarm legacy, he wanted to make his decision entirely on his own, with Oregon looking like a strong candidate.

But over time he started leaning closer and closer to Arizona, now ending his process just before the high school season starts. He is currently ranked 519th overall in the nation, Arizona’s fourth-highest ranked prospect. I think he’s in line to bump up to 4-star status. He finished his junior season with 70 tackles and 17.5 sacks at Desert Ridge.

This also helps recruit his brother, Jason, who could end up being even better than Jalen. Jason Harris, a freshman at Desert Ridge, already has an Oregon State offer and checks in at 6-foot-4, 245 pounds.

Hunter Echols commits to USC

So this is a prospect that the staff was very confident in landing. When I said Arizona will land a 4-star defensive end in this cycle, this seemed to be the guy.

After decommitting from UCLA a few weeks ago, he has flipped to the USC Trojans. He says he is 100% committed to USC and will not take any more visits, but there is still a long time until National Signing Day.

I still think the staff can flip him, but for now it does allow Arizona to pursue two more in-state prospects, 3-stars Odua Isibor and My-King Johnson, who I will talk about in the next section.

I got a question about Harris’ commitment potentially bumping out Echols. I’m going to say there is no correlation. Echols is a top 100 player and top seven defensive end, meanwhile Harris figures to have more of a linebacker role in the defense.

Defensive end options

There are two defensive ends that come to mind, both in-state. Johnson and Isibor are two extremely intriguing options. Both seem to have Arizona State, Arizona, USC and Oregon in their top list of schools, with Johnson also holding high interest in Texas A&M and Isibor really considering Stanford.

Honestly, I don’t see ASU landing either of them, the same goes for Oregon. Isibor is high on academics and really loves what Arizona has to offer with the medical program, but a Stanford offer — once they see his test scores — might trump all.

Still, Arizona has options. There is still a lot of time for decommits and guys who haven’t even received an offer from U of A. Knowing how this staff closed on a few guys towards the end of the 2016 class, the 2017 edition is going to end on a high note.

Tucker Robertson commits to Nevada

I had Arizona in my Crystal Ball for Robertson, although this was one that I had said could easily change. However, if I had the chance to change, it would have been to SDSU. He never really spoke about Nevada; it seemed to be Arizona, Boise State and SDSU, so this is a surprise to me. With a limited amount of spots, I’ll be interested to see and hear how heavily the staff pursues another offensive lineman to join Cody Shear and Edgar Burrola.

Remaining 2017 recruiting class

Echols was a guy I was anticipating the Wildcats landing, but most of the remaining class seems to be intact. I had four guys in my last recruiting round up who I had coming to Arizona. With Echols now off the board and Harris now officially on board, there are still two guys I am still confident UA will land.

• 5-star Joseph Lewis
• 4-star Thomas Graham

Guys still in the mix

• 3-star defensive end Odua Isibor
• 3-star defensive end My-King Johnson
• 3-star offensive tackle Jonathan Nathaniel

In my last Q&A roundup I did say that of the three — Lewis, Graham and Echols — Echols was the least likely of the three, which should show how confident I am in this staff closing on Lewis and Graham.

I think Isaac Slade-Matautia could be getting pushed out, with Harris having the ability to play linebacker as well and Delshawn Phillips committing just a few weeks ago. Slade-Matautia also has a smaller posted frame at 6-foot-1, 205 pounds, which isn’t exactly ideal. Still, after speaking with him a while ago, he’s someone I would like to have for the future of the defense if at all possible. Michael Eletise has played a huge role in his recruitment thus far.

As of now, there aren’t too many left on the big board, but as mentioned above, there’s still plenty of time for decommitments and future Arizona offers.

Last week, the preseason edition of the USA Today coaches’ poll was released, and Oregon checked in at No. 22 overall, their lowest preseason ranking in the poll since 2007.

Almost every year this decade, the Ducks have been ranked in the top five in the coaches’ poll to start the year. But this year, the Ducks barely cracked the top 25 after their Alamo Bowl collapse to TCU caused them to miss the 10 win mark for the first time since 2007.

But as history shows, the Ducks have no reason to panic. I stumbled across an article from The Big Lead that discusses why the Ducks are the most underrated team in this year’s preseason poll.

They included an interesting table at the end that shows just how little preseason rankings mean. Below is a list of every team since 1990 (not including Oregon) that finished in the top 10 every year for at least four straight years before finishing outside the top 15.

As you can see, the 2009 USC team was the only one to finish the year outside of the top 15 in the nation. I think if you spoke to any Ducks fan, finishing in the top 15 this year would be a huge win considering what people are expecting this season.

In addition to holding the first practice of fall camp on Saturday, the Texas Longhorns also hosted several visitors, including Texas A&M Aggies outside linebacker commit Devodrick Johnson, who apparently enjoyed his time in Austin:

The 6’1, 210-pounder plays quarterback for Dallas Kimball, but will make the move to defense in college as a hybrid linebacker/safety capable of dropping into coverage and covering a lot of ground. As a result of that unique skill set, the Texas coaches have been trying to get Johnson on campus for some time, and finally succeeded.

Johnson committed to Texas A&M in the middle of July on a visit to College Station, but it appears that he hasn’t quite completely closed down his recruitment, as few prospects do who commit at this stage.

An offer from the ‘Horns hasn’t happened yet for the Aggies commit and it may take some movement with other players before Texas would make a move, as there are plenty of linebackers on campus and plenty of big targets at the position, including Dylan Moses, Baron Browning, and Anthony Hines.

The recruitment to watch as it concerns Johnson is that of Fort Bend Elkins product Kenneth Murray, who is similar in size to Johnson, likely to play a similar role in college, and set to decide on August 10.

If Murray commits elsewhere, say, to Oklahoma, which may be the current leader, there’s a chance that Texas could offer Johnson.

Johnson and the True Buzz Athletics group out of the Dallas area also brought along 2018 West Mesquite cornerback Dayven Coleman, a 6’1, 186-pounder who has the height and length preferred by head coach Charlie Strong and defensive coordinator Vance Bedford.

That’s Coleman on the left and Johnson on the right.

Coleman is still looking for his first offer and the early rankings for him aren’t spectacular — he’s a low three-star prospect ranked No. 54 nationally at his position, but there’s not exactly a lot of consensus out there right now with only one service having yet released rankings for that class.

So file the name away for later with Coleman, as the ‘Horns are still pretty early in the evaluation stages for that class.

Another visitor on campus was 2018 San Antonio Marshall wide receiver Stanley Lambert, who burst onto the scene and earned an offer from the ‘Horns at the Under the Lights camp back in July:

Texas likely isn’t pushing for a decision from Lambert any time soon, as per the usual tactics by the staff, but the early offer and multiple visits seem to have the Longhorns in a good initial position with Lambert.

Let me start out by saying WOW!

After seeing season ticket sales dipping from around 45,000 to 31,000 and listening to certain media types talking about the decline of fan interest in the football program, you would think that a small event like Fan Day would suffer in attendance.

Not so fast my readers!

This was my third straight experience in the Nutter Training Facility. Each year it has grown quite a bit and being way early is always key. I got a late start this year and arrived around 8 o’clock to see that I there were around 100 people between me and the door.

By the time the doors opened the line wrapped all the way back to the new training facility. A good judge of attendance is always how long it takes you to get through the lines at each position.

The fact that an average fan can’t get through all positions during the time allowed has always bothered me. It takes around 20 minutes to get through an average line, some positions take a bit longer.

Where you start is always important because by the time you get out of your first line you have hundreds of new fans filling other lines. This year I started with the fullbacks and tight ends. Vince Marrow was scheduled to sit with this crew but hadn’t made it to the table yet by the time I got there.

I asked CJ Conrad and Tanner Fink where he was, and they said he was running late, and I made sure they would give him a hard time about it, but something tells me the players don’t mess with big Vince much!

I moved on to the receivers, and this group has always had a bit more fun during the event than other groups. The music was more subdue this year and didn’t allow them to dance in their seats as much. Lamar Thomas had just set down when I got to the table, and I immediately asked him about a tweet I had saw not too long back where Stoops was ribbing him on beating him on the course.

He responded with, “There’s times where you gotta let the boss man win! I don’t want a bad work environment; I just left that!”.

LT may be my favorite person ever associated with Kentucky Football! I did get to talk to a few of the players and had a couple of them put some wins down on the schedule portion of the poster. Ryan Kendall and Charles Moushey were quick to put the letter W on Louisville and Florida.

Freshman receiver Dakota Holtzclaw, who stands at 6 foot 7 inches tall and “You can’t teach that”, had a few noticeable tattoos and I asked how many he had. He told me “four at the moment” only pointing to ones on his left arm. He then went on to say that he is planning on an American flag to take place on his right arm.

From there I got in a very long line stationed around the great stable of running backs. I got to the table and asked Boom how bad he wanted to beat Louisville. He shook his head and laughed a bit before saying “Very bad”!

I then headed over to the quarterbacks line with about 30 minutes to go in the autograph session. Barker was first, and I asked him what we were going to do to Louisville, and he quickly and simply said, “beat em.”

I moved down the line and talked to everybody and had to ask Davis Mattingly if “today was gonna be a good day”!

All the quarterbacks within earshot had a good laugh at that one!

I got in the linebackers line and only hoped I could get through it before the time ran out. I approached the tables with about 5 minutes left and was pretty happy that I would get another groups autographs, little did I know I would get much more than that!

I worked myself down the line and marveled at Josh Allen and even made the comment that if they made a football version of Space Jam, he would be on the Monstars squad. I asked a few players who had the biggest arms on the squad and Courtney Love and Kash Daniel were mentioned.

Speaking of Kash, I asked him the same thing I asked Barker, “What are we going to do to Louisville.” His answer was simple, “Whip their….” Well, you get the point!

I didn’t hang out after the autograph sesso.n for the practice portion of the day because, well, you can’t “Catch em all” if you don’t go hunt!

No, but, seriously, the autograph session went well. It would be nice to come up with a way where all fans could get all the autographs they wanted without running out of time.

I’m also in the mindset that being a season ticket holders should have as many perks as possible to encourage sales and early entry to these kinds of events could help.

Do yourself a favor and go to this event in the future and keep an eye out for other fun and free events the athletics department offer.

On Sunday morning, the Texas Longhorns held an open practice for all the “godless heathens” among the burnt orange faithful as part of Fan Appreciation Day and the passing game was perhaps the biggest story — on both sides of the ball.

The quarterback position, as it has been for years, is of course the most important element there and for the second straight day, freshman Shane Buechele and senior Tyrone Swoopes split the first-team snaps, with sophomore Jerrod Heard working with the third team.

After watching practice on Saturday, even redshirt freshman Kai Locksley was able to see a limited bit of action and completed an impressive deep pass:

However, the big storyline remains the ongoing competition between Buechele and Swoopes that head coach Charlie Strong wants to resolve early in fall camp. By all accounts, Buechele has been impressive over the first two days.

Buechele hasn’t been perfect, as he was intercepted by sophomore cornerback Davante Davis on a jump ball in the end zone intended for sophomore wide receiver John Burt:

Still, there’s at least one beat writer who believes that Buechele is clearly the favorite after connecting with Burt on a touchdown that beat Davis and making other positive plays:

One of those plays had the fans buzzing — when Buechele hit fellow freshman Devin Duvernay down the sideline with a nice touch pass:

Swoopes got the first reps with the first-team offense and worked some with the 18-Wheeler package.

Offensive coordinator Sterlin Gilbert has even put in a throwback pass to Swoopes, but the big senior dropped a good throw that hit his hands before launching a towel into the stands.

Maybe he’s not a tight end after all.

One interesting note on Heard — he’s been wearing gloves to throw in an effort to solve his persistent issues with the ball coming out poorly. It’s quite unusual to see quarterbacks wear gloves, but it has always worked for one of Strong’s former quarterbacks, Teddy Bridgewater.

Whether or not the change will ultimately benefit Heard is still inconclusive after two practices. However, he did have a nice touch pass on the day, so perhaps it will make a bit of a difference.

Mostly the sophomore and former starter has been working as a player who may have a situational package like the 18 Wheeler, as he was mostly running the zone read on Saturday.

Along the offensive line, the starting group was the same as Saturday (from left to right) — Connor Williams, Patrick Vahe, Zach Shackelford, Kent Perkins, and Tristan Nickelson.

Behind the starters, freshman Patrick Hudson got some run at right tackle while redshirt freshman Buck Major worked at guard.

At wide receiver, Burt expectedly drew some rave reviews:

As a whole, the wide receivers and tight ends did a good job of avoiding dropped passes on Sunday, a potentially large development.

On defense, the secondary was once again impressive, prompting the notoriously compliment-averse Kirk Bohls:

Indeed, it was a young group last season that lost only nickel back Duke Thomas and added some extra talent in addition to the seasoning of experience.

For instance, sophomore cornerback Kris Boyd isn’t good enough to start for this team, but he can still make plays like this:

Even the linebackers got involved, as freshman Demarco Boyd intercepted a pass from redshirt freshman quarterback Matthew Merrick and The Shark, freshman Jeffrey McCulloch, read a rollout from Heard and was able to jump the short route for his own interception (a play initially incorrectly attributed):

Sophomore Anthony Wheeler also deflected a pass that sophomore cornerback Holton Hill intercepted with a diving play.

Considering that the pass defense ranked No. 20 last season in pass defense S&P+, the sky truly is the limit for Strong’s group in that area of the game.

It was also a positive to see graduate transfer kicker Trent Domingue connect on a field goal that was at the edge of his effective range:

Strong had put Domingue’s Saturday effectiveness at 5-of-6, exactly what the ‘Horns need from the 2015 Lou Groza Award semifinalist.

Also of note is the fact that Texas is no longer wearing the burnt orange and black practice uniforms that are so divisive, but continue the tradition of not earning the helmet decals until the season starts.

Do you like the practice uniform change?