FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas will practice in full pads Wednesday morning and that has Razorbacks head coach Chad Morris and his players looking forward to the contact.
“I’m excited about starting full pads tomorrow,” Morris said Tuesday after Arkansas’ fourth practice of the preseason. “I think that’s going to be huge for us. We’ll do a little good-on-good and two-on-two we call 'Razorback Drill.'”
Morris is interested to see how his newcomers handle the pads and the contact they will face.
“We’ll get out there and see what our young guys have got,” Morris said. “We know the guys that will get out there that are experienced and have played and hit. I want to see a lot of competition going on tomorrow. I want to see a lot of excitement, guys flying around.”
Of Arkansas' 14 scholarship offensive linemen, only nine were healthy and able to practice Tuesday.
Morris announced senior Deion Malone is out for the season after having knee surgery on Monday. Meanwhile, Jalen Merrick, Dylan Hays, Colton Jackson and Ryan Winkel are all injured and unable to practice as of now.
“It’s just part of football you go through,” Morris said. “Outside of the ones we’ve already mentioned that were major injuries, I think you deal with some bumps and bruises and knicks along the way and you try and adjust your practice with these guys. Fortunately, we’ll be getting them back.”
Merrick is out due to headaches he began experiencing during the summer months.
“We’re rolling a lot of guys in and out and moving guys around,” Morris said. “We’re just kind of doing some precautionary things (with Merrick), getting things checked out with him.”
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Redshirt freshman safety Montaric Brown (6-1, 200) jumped a Ty Storey pass early in Tuesday morning’s workout and batted it down.
Brown, the state’s top player in the 2017 class who chose Arkansas over Alabama, Auburn, LSU and others, had to redshirt last season after getting cleared to practice late.
He’s currently running as a second-team safety behind senior starter Santos Ramirez.
“He’s actually having a really good camp through four practices,” Morris said. “The play you’re referring to early on in practice just reaffirms the type of camp that he’s having. Obviously there’s things you’ve got to do to continue to get better and improve, but he’s having a good camp so far. We’ll see how it goes.”
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Receiver Deon Stewart was one of the new additions to the injury list along with defensive tackle Austin Capps.
“It was a hamstring or something minor,” Morris said of Stewart. “We expect to get him back. … It’s early in camp and guys get really sore. … DBs don’t have hamstring problems because they do a lot of back-pedaling, as opposed to wide receivers, where you’re accelerating and you’re bursting.
“Back-pedaling really helps build the hamstring up and you’re constantly keeping it loose as opposed to sprint straight ahead as a wide receiver. So that’s when you see some guys that have a tight hamstring. So, for precautionary reasons, we’ll hold them a little bit.”