LITTLE ROCK — Provided more than 10,000 words from Chad Morris, the read and review was stopped dead by a four-letter doozy.
T-H-U-D.
At first, I thought it might be an acronym that had supplanted RPO in popularity in college football. Turns out, quarterbacks occasionally will be thudded under Morris.
Before exploring Morris’ use of the term, know that in three lengthy sessions, Arkansas’s new football coach did his dead-level best to answer every media question and provided a slew of nuggets along the way.
Even though the words forwarded in three e-mails were in cold black and white on a laptop screen, they whet the appetite for what is to come and what Morris expects — make that, what he demands. ‘Frenetic’ best encapsulates Morris’ approach.
Those of us who questioned the conditioning of some of the 2017 Razorbacks and wondered about their response to an opponent’s big play on occasion will find encouragement in what Morris had to say about appetite and attitude. In particular is his emphasis on “finish,” a sore spot with Arkansas fans who never got past the second-half collapses against Missouri and Virginia Tech at the end of the 2016 season.
Meanwhile, “thud” is part of what Morris calls a 50-50 day — somewhere between practicing in shorts and in full pads.
“Half the practice would go live, the other half would be a non-live practice, a ‘thud’ practice,” he said. “That’s when we say, ‘Keep them off the ground.’”
The past tense of “thud” came up when Morris was asked about quarterback contact during scrimmages.
“There are in-the-pocket rules and out-of-pocket rules,” he said. “If you’re in the pocket, you do not touch them. You break through, you keep going, you stay low, and you get by them.”
Whistle or none, “the quarterback needs to play it like he’s escaped it,” he said.
When coaches choose to run a quarterback, “… he’ll be thudded in the pocket or in the box.”
“If it’s a quarterback power or quarterback zone, whatever it is, then just thud him up,” he said. “Keep him off the ground, give him a good pop.”
He made it clear he wants the quarterbacks to run some, to check their ability in the open field.
The quarterback competition will be front and center throughout spring practice and Morris detailed explanation of splitting up the reps offers an insight into the unrelenting go-fast atmosphere.
Usually, he said, during a five-minute segment, the reps will be divided between three quarterbacks — first guy gets four plays, second guy gets four plays and the third gets two. Ten plays in five minutes with two changes at quarterback is a pretty snappy pace.
Miked up and connected to the public address system, Morris is on the move at practice, providing a one-minute warning near the end of a period and exhorting the athletes to squeeze in one more rep in the final seconds.
High energy, he said, starts at the top.
“If I’m asking my coaches to do something and I’m not willing to do it, then I’m not going to get as much out of it,” he said. “… This is what our program is about. If you’re going to coach for us, then you’re going to be about it too or you’re not going to coach for us. Same way if you’re going to play for us.
“That’s all I ask,” he said. “Sometimes, you’ve got to act different than you feel. So, hey, there may be days I don’t feel like giving it out there, but I’m going to. That’s just who we are.”
The message to players is clear.
“You’re going to get knocked down,” Morris said. “That’s part of the business. But if you can get back up and sometimes act different than you feel, then you’re going to be all right. It doesn’t matter what’s happened in the past.”
Often, coaches cite the ability to “finish” or the lack thereof to explain a game decided in the fourth quarter.
Personally, attitude and “finish” are inseparable and Morris’ comments indicate a similar persuasion and a conviction that learning to finish carries over from the practice field to Saturdays in the fall.
“If we’re running four reps with our 1s and four with the 2s, when the 1s are done, they’re sprinting off the field,” he said. “What does that mean to finish off the field? It means to run through the white line. It doesn’t mean stop at it. It doesn’t mean that’s the finish line.”
Little things add up, he said, whether it’s finishing a rep or a meeting or a drill.
“… Everything we do is about the finish. I can get anybody to come start a football practice, I can get anybody to come play a quarter of football, but can you … sustain that energy and that excitement level the entire time and finish?”
Whether veteran media members think alike or the topic was obvious, it was encouraging when someone else in the business a long time asked about conditioning and Morris called it a great question.
He said somebody who sees the players every week or so told him the overall flexibility of the athletes had improved dramatically.
“They are leaned up,” he said. “We’ve got guys that have lost 14 pounds, 15 pounds. Not only that, but they’ve improved their eating habits. Some that haven’t lost weight, maybe they’ve gained weight, they’ve gained good weight.”
He said the players told him they’re in the best shape ever and, at one point, the athletes applauded strength coach Trumain Carroll and his staff.
To an observer with reasonable expectations, Morris’ take on creating the atmosphere conducive to winning football games is smack-dab on the money. So, too, his cherry-picked opinions on each phase of the game:
• Offense: “I’m going to put in and get in what they can retain and do well.” If it’s 20 percent or 50 percent, so be it. Getting to 80 percent or 100 percent of the playbook installed, he said, could take two years. “… It makes no difference what I know or the coaches know. It makes all the difference in what our players know and what they can execute.”
• Defense: When a game is over, no matter the score, “ … I want people to say that team tackles extremely well. Well, how do you learn to tackle is you have to practice tackling. You have to be physical at practice.”
• Kicking: Currently, there is one specialist on scholarship. Down the road, Arkansas could have three. “ … You don’t realize how valuable those kickers are until you don’t have one.” Arkansas has partnered with kicking camps and will have one of its own. “And that’s one thing I do know, if you do have a scholarship to offer, you have a chance to go get a great kicker.”
Physical tackling drills and scholarships for kickers, sign me up.