Sloppiness gets coach worked up

FAYETTEVILLE — First, a succession of defensive backs gave up long passes for big plays: Nathan Dick to Rod Coleman down the left sideline for a score; Casey Dick to Marques Wade down the right sideline for huge yardage; Nathan Emert hitting Wade again for a touchdown.

Then the WildHog package resulted in botched handoffs on successive plays. Finally, another snap from under center hit the grass, and Arkansas Coach Houston Nutt had seen enough.

Nutt ordered the Razorbacks to the turf field for a series of gassers and up-downs to finish off a sloppy workout Thursday evening.

“Not much good to report today, because I know we’re better,” Nutt said. “And I know it’s hot. I know you’re tired. I know it’s towards the end, but it’s not time.

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“ You can’t fake toughness. You can’t fake a sacrifice. So we just tried to send a little message today, and hopefully we’ll turn this around quick.”

Nutt said the conditioning drills cost the team 15 to 20 snaps in team periods. The punishment came the day after the team was given an afternoon off to swim and relax.

“I’m trying to help you with your legs, trying to help you with your soreness, but don’t try to take advantage,” Nutt said.

“Coach rewarded us yesterday by letting us go to the swimming pool and we didn’t give it back to him today,” center Jonathan Luigs said.

“This was probably one of the worst practices we’ve had in a long time,” guard Robert Felton said. “We had to stop practice early to go run and get some discipline. We don’t have time for that.”

Defensive tackle Malcolm Sheppard had a no-nonsense take on the extra running.

“We deserved to run, no doubt about it,” Sheppard said.

“I felt it coming a little way through practice, that it was sluggish,” said quarterback Casey Dick, who threw multiple balls well out of bounds. “We got some good conditioning in today.”

Freshman lineman Grant Cook talked about how the easy afternoon Wednesday helped.

“Guys were pretty tired and nicked up, so we just chilled out,” he said. “We talked about not letting that affect us today and we just didn’t come out and get it done. We deserved it.” Injury report

Offensive tackle Nate Garner (concussion ) missed a third consecutive workout Thursday, and the Razorbacks continued to practice without players expected to make key contributions.

Others who did not dress were receiver Marcus Monk (knee ), tight end Ben Cleveland (stinger ), Peyton Hillis (hamstring ), defensive end Adrian Davis (concussion ) and kicker Jeremy Davis (foot ).

Cornerback Shedrick Johnson fell on his back Tuesday and though he dressed in shoulder pads and shorts Thursday, he’ll likely be held out of contact until next week. Defensive tackle Ernest Mitchell cramped up near the end of practice and rolled off on a cart. Receiver London Crawford tweaked a knee, had it rubbed down, but still ran a little gimpy. Parcells factor

Tim Horton didn’t join Arkansas’ coaching staff until July 18 as running backs coach, but he already was up to speed with the passing game implemented last spring by first-year offensive coordinator David Lee.

Call it the Parcells factor.

Lee came to Arkansas in January from the Dallas Cowboys, where he was an offensive assistant the past four seasons for Coach Bill Parcells.

Horton came from Air Force, where he was hired as offensive coordinator last January after being Kansas State’s running backs coach in 2006.

Kansas State Coach Ron Prince previously was offensive coordinator at Virginia, where he coached for Al Groh, who coached for Parcells with the New York Giants, New England Patriots and New York Jets.

The passing offense Prince ran at Virginia and brought to Kansas State last season is the same one Lee learned in Dallas, so it isn’t new to Horton. The passing routes and protections for Arkansas’ running backs now are what Horton coached at Kansas State.

“One of the things that excited me the most when we hired Tim was his knowledge of what we’re doing in the drop-back passing game,” Lee said. “I haven’t had to coach him up. He’s been ready to go from the start.” Another cover

Arkansas tailback Darren McFadden has yet to be featured on the cover of Time or Newsweek, but he seems to be popping up on the front of just about every sports magazine in print.

Add the latest edition of ESPN The Magazine to McFadden’s cover portfolio. He’s pictured in his Arkansas uniform, holding a football in his left hand.

McFadden’s posed shot for ESPN The Magazine is one of three regional covers for the publication’s college football preview. The others were Louisville’s Brian Brohm, Harry Douglas and Mario Urrutia and California’s DeShaun Jackson.

McFadden has been on 12 magazine covers this year. Worth noting The Razorbacks were ranked No. 13 in Sports Illustrated’s college football preview issue, which hits newsstands this week with McFadden on the regional cover. Jim Mabry, an All-American offensive tackle for the Razorbacks in 1989, watched practice and visited with running backs coach Tim Horton, a former teammate. Mabry lives in Little Rock and sells surgical equiipment.

Arkansas will work out at 10 a. m. today, its final practice before Saturday’s 6 p. m. scrimmage at Reynolds Razorback Stadium, which is open to the public.

Freshman quarterback Nathan Dick took a rising number of snaps with the first offense Thursday. Nathan Emert took a few as well.