With the news on Dalton today , who else joins him??
Bumper Pool?? I think he will come back … what about y’all ??
Ricky S….Not a super senior, but I think he needs to and should come back … I think he will… what about y’all ??
Montaric Brown … I’m 50/50 on if he should come back, don’t get me wrong I’d love for him to, but if he gets a good grade and can make that BIG Money, he might should go… I think it’s 50/50 on him going or staying…. What do you all think ?
If we can get all three to come back with Wagner, we will be ahead of the curve …… also need to add some key transfers in, so some will need to leave… going to be a very interesting off season….
Ridgeway is the most important recruit left for Sam. They need him to come back to boost his draft stock and then get one defensive end to come through the portal. That along with an off season boost to Gregory, Williams, Stewart, & Nichols and we will be OK in the D-line next year.
I’d lean toward Pool returning more than Ridgeway, but wouldn’t count out either. I think Ridgeway is more of an NFL prospect.
Stromberg is going to have a decision to make. I think he is NFL ready now. He might benefit by coming back, but there is always the possibility of an injury that could hurt his prospects.
I can’t guess who I think will come back until we hear about draft grades. But I can see where Pool, Brown, Ridgeway, Stromberg, Catalon, and Burks could come back. However, I seriously doubt Cat and Burks come back. I think any player with a serious draft grade of round 3 or higher should go, unless there is a great chance of staying and moving into round 1.
Everybody who was on a roster in 2020 gets the extra year. You get six years to play five instead of five to play four. The complicating factor is that in 2022 and beyond that extra year has to fit into the 85 scholarship limit.
But stuff happens and life intervenes. Maybe people are starting to get tired of football. Maybe they want to get married and start a family and begin the rest of their adult life. Stromberg may have to decide between playing for (almost) free and taking his crack at the NFL, which is certainly not guaranteed.
I’ve written before about my dad’s decision to stop playing for the Hogs. But I found out some things recently that he’d never told me before. I thought he quit after the 1959 season because of marriage and a bum knee. He didn’t. He went through spring ball in 1960 and planned to play that fall. But he darn near tore off a finger on his summer job (which is a problem for a center who is snapping the ball on every play), wasn’t going to be able to start the season healthy, and was consequently put in what amounted to the basement of the football dorm. That wasn’t going to work for an engineering student (no place to study without interruptions), he was married with a pregnant wife (with me), and because of the injury, there wasn’t much chance of working his way up the depth chart to get to play. So he went to JFB and gave up his scholarship, and borrowed money from his father in law to support them/us until he graduated.
We remember that we got Lance Alworth because Ole Miss had a strict no-married-players rule. Dad said UA had a similar rule, that players couldn’t get married once they were here. The coaches knew he had gotten married (one of them had seen the wedding announcement in the Gazette), but they ignored it until the finger injury forced the issue.
He’s shared a few. I don’t think he was exceptionally close with Barry, especially since Barry was one of the people who was keeping Dad down the depth chart (they both played center/linebacker in one-platoon days).
But there were some interesting people on that team. Switzer. Alworth. Jim Mooty. Joe Paul Alberty, whose medical office was next to mine at Mercy in Fort Smith for a couple of years. Wayne Harris, who also was ahead of Dad on the depth chart for good reason. Mom swears she once heard Thumper say “if Jim Necessary wanted to play football, nobody would have heard of me.” Dad doesn’t believe it, and certainly Harris showed he belonged on the field at UA and in Calgary for all those years.
I never got to meet Alworth or Harris, but I did meet Switzer in the press box at a Hog game. I told him whose son I was, he looked at me and said, “Yeah, you look just like him.” Which is true. He told me a couple of stories about Dad that I can’t remember now. I also met Jarrell Williams, the longtime Springdale football coach who was also on that team, while covering high school football. He remembered Dad quite well. Of course he was only about 40 at that time…
Couple of others I’d forgotten: Billy Kyser, who went to dental school and returned to his native Camden, where he knew the restaurant owner whose daughter later became my wife. I think he came to my wedding. She definitely had the home church advantage.
And of course, Harold Horton, who was so good to me when I was working at UA and who got Dad back involved with the A Club after many years. Dad got to attend the 50-year reunion of the '59 team in 2009 (53 players were able to return, according to a UA release) and I know that was special to him and to Mom. I was jealous that I didn’t get to go and meet some of those people.
Paul Dudley and Jimmy Collier went on to the NFL. Collier was the wide receivers coach on the LSU team that ended our 22-game winning streak in the Cotton Bowl.
Great stories Jeff! Thank you! I have probably made it obvious on this board how close I was to my mom and dad. Mom played basketball at little Leslie HS and then Arkansas Tech. A 5 foot 90 lb point guard. She must have been lightening quick. Sadly I have never met anyone but her sister and best friend that could tell me what Mom was like on the court. Of course, they and Mom say she was the quickest player out there!
And my Dad was a conductor. Sylvan Hills High School. Then Mountain Home High School and Mountain Home Methodist. Had one of the best tenor voices I’ve ever heard. Could have had a career in opera OR as a singer of jazz classics. But he had awful stage fright. He was an abused kid and just never quite got past it. But He was a wonderful dad to me.
Sounds like your parents were very special Jeff. Thanks for sharing man.
Gosh, you are very fortunate to still have you parents! I lost my dad when he was merely 61. Mom past away at 77 in 2015. Despite playing basketball at Tech, she also picked up the habit of smoking–which she never kicked. With asthma from birth, smoking just devastated her lungs over time.
Give your parents a hug…even on a day they are infuriating!! ha! You are a good man Jeff…so I know they are good folks too.
I just asked Dad who his best friends were on the team. I had kinda guessed that there weren’t many (Dad can be kinda standoffish), and I was right. He mentioned John Nix and Charlie Moore, who was his roommate.
Haven’t seen them in a year and a half. I left Arkansas to return to NC in late June 2020, and haven’t been back. I’ve tried to plan a couple of trips back, including this weekend for the Misery game, but life and work kept getting in the way.
I wonder how many people realize just how important to the overall JFB program that '59 team was. That was a special group that did special things. It was also the first team that I could really follow as a kid. All of those names mentioned were special to me.
Yeah that team was the start of our prolonged success under JFB. I’ve often thought that the Akers field goal that beat TCU 3-0 in '59 was one of the most important plays in Hog history because it gave them confidence to begin that run, that they could beat the big Texas teams (although Frank’s first team did upset #15 SMU the previous November).
For a long time UA had the Lettermen’s Club, and if you didn’t play enough to letter, you weren’t eligible. Dad didn’t. They eventually transitioned to the A Club and all former players were welcome. After I left UA, I eventually ended up working with Coach Horton at the Foundation on the WebHogs as an officer and briefly president, and it was during that time that Harold dragged Dad back into the program. He knew where to find me, I knew where to find Dad, and he asked me to put him in touch.