FAYETTEVILLE — There are few college football players who like to take kidding from teammates about taking it easy in spring drills. Frank Ragnow is one of them.
There was a misconception that Ragnow, perhaps the nation’s top returning center, sat around throughout spring as his teammates went through a five-week grinder. Teammates did give him some grief for sitting out a couple of scrimmages.
“Yeah, we did,” said Austin Allen, quarterback and an offensive captain along with Ragnow.
“We’d go on the field before the first snap (in scrimmages) and be sure to mention that there stood Frank because he’s special.”
But the reality is that the 6-5, 319-pound Ragnow took plenty of physical reps in practice. He might not have scrimmaged, but everything a lineman does in practice is live, even the first two practices in spring without pads.
“We get after it,” Ragnow said. “You take a regular practice in the spring when we are not tackling backs or receivers, you check and see the linemen, it’s live. It’s full speed, full contact between the offensive and defensive line. Plus, you have the individual drills, inside drills and pod drills. They are all live for linemen. We hit almost every play.
“I didn’t like sitting out the scrimmages. Not at all. But I understood it.”
Arkansas coach Bret Bielema has a policy of taking high NFL Draft prospects out of spring scrimmages after they turn down a chance to go pro the previous winter. Most understand when backs are held out of a scrimmage. It looks a little different when a lineman like Trey Flowers (three years ago) or Ragnow doesn’t scrimmage.
Allen did come to Ragnow’s rescue, though.
“It was sort of a myth that Frank didn’t practice this spring,” Allen said. “He did. He snapped to me all spring with the ones and it was just those two scrimmages that he wasn’t out there. It just about killed him. He’s my best friend and I heard about it. But we still kidded him a little bit.
“What linemen do in practice is all live. They have the toughest practices of anyone on the team. They have tough days every day. They can be in shorts and no pads, they still get after it. We don’t.”
If there is anyone who knows Ragnow, it’s Allen. They do more than just execute the snaps in practice after practice. Typically, during the season, they take Mondays off after getting in some tape study. Then, they load up in Ragnow’s vehicle and find a local pond or stream to test their fishing skills.
Allen doesn’t need any gear. Ragnow has all sorts of fishing rods, both spin and fly fishing.
“That guy just loves fishing,” he said. “It’s his way of getting away and I understand it. It’s his safe haven. He could live on a lake or a stream. If he’s not thinking football, then he’s thinking about fishing. We’ve got good fishing here, but it’s a little different from what he’s used to back home.”
Back home is Chanhassen, Minn., not far from Minneapolis. Minnesota is the state of 10,000 lakes, but it’s not just what’s there. Ragnow’s family also has a fishing cabin on a lake in Canada. It’s about nine hours by car north of home.
It’s been in the family for years.
“The lake doesn’t have a name,” Ragnow said. “There are about six cabins there and we have one of them. A few years ago, the government put down a rule that said no more could be built. So it’s pretty neat to have one of the few places there.”
The family goes there about once per summer for a week or two of fishing. It’s a chore to haul in provisions, but mainly they just eat walleye. It’s one of the best eating fish in the world.
When Ragnow finished finals this spring, he loaded up for the trip home. He was taking younger brother north for the fishing trip. It would be the first time without dad Jon, who passed away last football season.
Ragnow did the interview for this story the night before heading out of town. It was clear he was excited.
“It’s just one of the greatest places in the world to go,” he said. “You are going to catch fish there. The cabin we have doesn’t have any windows. We’ve got bears. You can see the marks each year when you go back where they tried to get in.”
The goal is to catch a trophy walleye. There are a few old ones on the wall. The jumping off point to get to the cabin is Emo, Ontario.
“There is one on the wall my grandfather caught years ago that is 28 inches and it was about 11 pounds,” Ragnow said. “There is one my dad caught that is 28 that was 10 pounds.
“My brother caught a 30-inch walleye, probably 13 pounds. It didn’t get mounted. The biggest I’ve caught is about six pounds, plenty that were 25 inches.
“We catch them to eat them. They are so good. We’ve had a lot of good days up there. You can catch them just standing on the end of the dock.”
Ragnow will find some fishing in the Ozarks when he returns. His pictures can be seen on his Instagram account, GrizzlyManOutdoors.
“He’s proud of that,” Allen said. “After he’s done with football, I expect him to be hosting a show on fishing.”
Ragnow is a tag-along for other stuff around Fayetteville. He’s seen some heated battles between the Allen brothers, Austin and Brandon.
“They go after each other hard in everything they do,” Ragnow said. “You talk about competitive, that’s them. They are intense in golf. I’ve been there for that and it’s serious and intense. Neither one of those Allen brothers like to lose.
“They are like that in basketball, too. We had the shooting competition two years ago for the NBA game when we went to the Liberty Bowl. That was serious between Brandon and Austin.”
It may not be like brothers, but there is good competition on the offensive line. There are six returnees with starting experience. The lone loss to eligibility was left tackle Dan Skipper.
No one is about to take Ragnow’s spot, although backup center Zach Rogers has developed into a quality player. It’s the other four spots that are seeing great battles.
Returning left guard starter Hjalte Froholdt is perhaps the player with the second most secure position on the offensive line, but he saw a push this spring from redshirt junior Deion Malone.
Johnny Gibson was the clear leader at right guard, but only after he escaped Bielema’s doghouse. Gibson was not on the top two units when spring started although he eventually passed Jake Raulerson on the first unit midway through April.
Gibson, a physical 330, was praised for “doing everything right” by Bielema and line coach Kurt Anderson over the final three weeks of spring drills. Raulerson, with 20 more pounds to reach 315, did good things during the spring, too. It was a heated battle there throughout the spring.
The tackle spots were hotly contested, too.
On the right side, Brian Wallace held the spot he won last season, but Jalen Merrick made a push in the final two weeks. Both are considered extremely talented. Merrick’s physical skills might be as good as anyone on the team, but he’s always lacked consistency and knowledge of the system.
Colton Jackson held off Paul Ramirez at left tackle. Jackson tried both sides at tackle last year, eventually giving way to Dan Skipper at left tackle and Wallace at right. But he’s gained strength in the offseason. He’s always been among the most athletic line prospects on the team. He may finally be reaching his potential. Ramirez made a push in the spring, but a knee injury slowed his progress at the end after he missed a week to return to California for a death in the family.
“We’re better in the offensive line,” Allen said. “I think you’ll see these guys really do some great things this year.”
Ragnow said it’s just a matter of maturation of a unit. He said the whole team has that look, too.
“We are a different team,” he said. “We are more focused. The team wants to prove that we are not the team that people saw at the end of the year.
“It starts with leadership. We have a lot of leaders, some in every area.”
Ragnow called being voted a team captain “a dream come true. I think if you really check, about 90 percent of the players on this team were captains for their high school. So to be voted a captain from this group, it’s as big of an honor as I’ve ever had.”
It’s a different focus than last year.
“We definitely made some changes after the bowl game,” he said. “We had guys step up to be vocal leaders. The leaders took control of the team. You saw it from a lot of people. Austin was one of them who was really vocal.”
The development on offense in pass protection was a big focus over the winter and in the spring. Ragnow said the move by the defense to a 3-4 scheme with a variety of blitzes was helpful.
“It was good for the offense,” he said. “Alabama plays a 3-4. Some other teams are switching to a 3-4. It’s crazy to see how much improvement our defense made from the second practice to the 15th. They got comfortable with what they were doing and helped us on the other side of the ball.”
There was a huge focus in improving the run game, too. Ragnow said the line wanted to control the ‘A’ gap, something that wasn’t always happening last season when there were new guards on either side of him.
“We take pride in the ‘A’ gap,” he said. “It sets up everything. The power, the zone and everything we do is set up by whether or not we can run there. Those ‘A’ gap runs are the heart and soul of our offense. It’s an alpha male thing. If you can run there, you are ripping out the heart of the defense.
“When I made the decision to come to Arkansas and play for Coach Bielema, I knew that was a big part of what we would do. I came here for that. I wanted to be a difference-maker in that area of what we do.”
That’s interesting because Ragnow was an offensive tackle in high school. He’s played only guard and center with the Hogs. There has been a hint that he might get to play a little defense, perhaps in goal line situations, at some point next season. He played tackle and end on defense in high school.
There was none of that in the spring. Defensive coordinator Paul Rhoads laughed about the entire concept.
“I knew I wasn’t getting Frank anytime this spring,” Rhoads said. “I’ll say this, I will believe that when I see it. I promise, though, we won’t turn him down.”
Ragnow’s eyes dance when the idea is mentioned. He’s up for any kind of contact. He wants to make up for the few times that he didn’t get to hit anyone this spring. For sure, it wasn’t as often as some have suggested.
This article originally appeared in Hawgs Illustrated