Safety Position: Big News

Usually this site does not deal with things of this nature, but of course there are always exceptions to general rules...

According to various sites, Michael Ricks has qualified, and will report for Fall practice for August 3rd.

And hey, even us nerds have to celebrate once in a while.



At bottom, this is pretty big news. If you recall from my earlier prognostications on starters for 2007, you know about our safety situation. I said that that Ricks, if he qualified, could take one of the starting jobs. Rivals.com, and I'll be doing an in-depth analysis in the next few months on recruiting services (just a little FYI), rated him as one of the top five JUCO prospects in the country, and he could make a huge impact.

In a worse-case scenario, Ricks will see a good bit of playing time in 2007 if he can stay healthy ("good bit" means somewhere in the range of 300 snaps), and will more than likely get a starting job.

This is big news for us. Ricks' presence could, and should, have a very tangible impact on the overall quality of our defensive production in 2007.