The Champs Are Back
Spring Practice Preview 2008

5-11-08
By: Brian Vaughn

The three-time defending State Champion Greenwood Bulldogs will take the field on Monday afternoon to start their spring practices.

For us at the website, the beginning of Spring Practice marks the beginning of the 2008 football season, but for the Bulldogs they've been preparing since January for another return trip to War Memorial in December. 

Bulldog head coach Rick Jones was pleased with the how hard the Bulldogs worked during the off-season program.

"The off-season has gone really well," said Jones. "We've never tested and shown the improvement we have this year. A real testimony to all the hard work from all our coaches, especially Coach Poole and Coach Holcomb. That's one of their primary responsibilities. We tested really well, the kids worked really hard and had great attitudes. We were very pleased with the effort they have given."

During the off-season program, Coach Jones brings in special guest from time to time to talk to the team in a number of different issues including the proper way to lift weights, proper nutrition and proper use of suppliments.

Along with the regular training and special guest this year Greenwood also hosted two specialized camps. The first held back in January was the Darin Slack Quarterback Academy. The quarterback school held by Coach Slack is held mainly at big cities across the United States and was a big deal for Greenwood to host. The camp was held over several days and goes over a number of fundamentals of the quarterback position.

"Coach Slack does this camps from coast to coast," said Coach Jones. "Our camp in Greenwood was sandwiched between, Orlando, Florida and Las Vegas, Nevada, so we're in pretty good company there. "We 30 kids at that camp, but it's a very exclusive camp. It's a very specific. Coach Slack flew his coaches in from Ohio, Louisiana and Florida. We had kids from California, Kentucky, Illinois, Nebraska, Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas. It was quite a camp. Really good work with the quarterbacks. We had a number of coaches here to visit to watch Coach Slack and watch what he's doing. It was really an excellent camp. We had six of our guys take part, which was really great, by hosting it here."

For more information on the Darin Slack Quarterback Academy, visit his website; www.quarterbackacademy.com .

At the end of April, Greenwood also hosted an offensive line camp with Will Shields, the 12 time Kansas City Chiefs Pro Bowl Guard. Shields was a former player of Greenwood offensive line coach Clarence Madden, when he was the head coach at Lawton, Oklahoma and Bulldog head coach Rick Jones coached him in an Oklahoma All-Star game.

"We had 50 kids from 8 different schools here for the line camp," said Jones. "To have a guy of his caliber to come in and work with our guys, you just can't beat it. We plan to do the line camp every year as we do with Coach Slack and the Quarterback Camp. Hopefully we'll create a couple of traditions that will just keep growing and building in the future. Because the bottom line is, it's just good for our kids to be exposed to those kinds of teachers. Both camps are great opportunities for the kids in Greenwood."

Coach Jones will have to replace 17 starters this season and with that challenge, he's going to run the spring practices different than in previous springs.

"We're obviously less set at the 22 starting spots then we've ever been," said Jones. "We lost 17 starters last year and we have a lot of work to do. Main thing we we're going to do differently this year is, we're going to divide up into blue-white and divide the teams as evenly as possible. We'll have 44 on one team and 43 on the other. We're going to compete everyday. The main focus of this camp is going to be competition. We're going going to try and find the best 11 guys on offense and defense and 11 guys in the kicking game that are ready to play. I think it will give us an idea where our strengths and weaknesses are and give us an idea where to point to the start of fall practice in August."

This year the Arkansas Activities Association is allowing ten days in pads opposed to the five days in previous years. Coach Jones expects to get the most out of his days.

The Bulldogs will be in full pads on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday the first week and shorts on Friday. They will scrimmage some on Thursday.

During the seconds week, Monday & Tuesday will be in pads, Wednesday in shorts and Thursday and Friday in pads and will scrimmage on Friday.

"We haven't done that (scrimmage ourselves) before," said Jones. "I just didn't felt it necessary to do it. This year we weren't able to get a pad camp that fit everybody's schedules, so we're going to do our pad camp on ourselves."

Going into the season the most talked about topic around the 2008 Bulldogs is, "Who will be the starting quarterback this year, replacing Tyler Wilson?"

Coach Jones says we have four players competiting for the starting position. Junior Tyler Shook, who quarterbacked the Junior Varsity team last year. Sophomore Tony Sandifer, who quarterbacked the 9th grade team last year. Sophomore Stephen Hogan, who played receiver for the 9th grade team last year as well as backup quarterback for the team, and Senior Grant Trotter, who played quarterback earlier in his prep career.

"It's going to be interesting," said Jones on the quarterback competition. "One of the big pluses for doing the spring practices the way we are is that we'll be able to see these guys in competitive situations. We'll be able to evaluate them in full speed drills as opposed to a scrimmage practice pace. This will give them an opportunity to compete. We'll get to see who can move the team. Because the quarterback is not all about just throwing and running, it's about moving the team and leadership skills as well."

As always, practice is open to the fans and they are welcome to attend. The team will be on the stadium field around 3:00 PM each afternoon for the next two weeks. Be sure and take a look at Coach Jones Football Calendar on the home page of the website to see what all the Bulldogs will be doing over the summer as the countdown to Kickoff against Springdale Har-ber has begun. 

 

 

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