DGB to get blanket coverage — from media
http://www.columbiatribune.com/news/...ia/?tigerextra
By DAVE MATTER
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Heads will turn, cameras will click and pens will bleed ink when Dorial Green-Beckham practices for the first time as a Missouri wide receiver tomorrow. The freshman will wear his new No. 15 along with impossibly high expectations.
Will the country's top-ranked recruit feel the pressure of being … the country's top-ranked recruit?
The man who knows him best doesn't give the stock answer you might expect.
"I don't think there's any way he can't" feel the pressure, John Beckham said yesterday.
John Beckham coached Green-Beckham at Hillcrest High School in Springfield. In 2009, he and his wife, Tracy, legally adopted the player, along with his younger brother, Darnell, rescuing them from turbulent childhoods that caused them to bounce from home to home, with few stable stops in between.
In the months since Green-Beckham wrapped up his much publicized recruiting process by picking Missouri over Arkansas, Alabama and others, dad and son have talked about the expectations that will follow him to Missouri.
"I think he understands it," Beckham said. "And he's always had high expectations, and people have always placed high expectations on him. But he's never verbalized it. He's quiet about it. We talk about things, and basically he can only control what he can control. He can't control people's expectations. All he can do is be the best player he can be and be the best teammate he can be.
"The expectations are just, I don't know, out of this world. So I wouldn't want him to focus on that."
The amplified media coverage of recruiting and rising popularity of social media played a role in the Green-Beckham buildup — he has nearly 19,000 followers on Twitter — but no more than his production at Hillcrest and an NFL-ready physique. The 6-foot-6, 220-pound 19-year-old set national high school records for career receiving yards (6,353) and touchdown catches (75).
When practices begin tomorrow, Green-Beckham will be at the bottom of the depth chart like all freshmen, but his dad expects him to respond well to something he never truly experienced in high school: competition for playing time.
"He's got a lot to learn," Beckham said. "When the recruiting was going on, Missouri probably had the most depth at wide receiver of any school that was recruiting him. There were a lot of other schools where it would have been a lot easier road to start. But that really wasn't a focus. We wanted him to go to a school where he'd be really comfortable … and there's no doubt Missouri is that place."
Green-Beckham spent the last few days in Springfield but was in Columbia most of the summer for workout sessions with his new teammates. Senior receiver T.J. Moe was struck by the freshman's humble approach.
"Everybody loves him," Moe said. "A lot of guys come in feeling like they own the world. That's not him at all."
Gary Pinkel has been careful not to publicly gush over Green-Beckham's potential this fall. In fact, for the first time, Pinkel is limiting interview access to freshmen to a few designated days during the preseason.
"I expect him to come in and compete and be the best he can be," Pinkel said at SEC media days. "He's got to just focus on himself in terms of learning the system and putting himself in position to compete. He's like any other player in the program: He starts out at the bottom. Jeremy Maclin did. Chase Coffman. I can go on and on and on.
"Obviously, he wants to play and help us win. We'll see where it goes."
Green-Beckham is Pinkel's third recruit to earn the maximum five stars from the top recruiting services. The first, Blaine Gabbert, was widely rated the country's No. 1 quarterback when he came to MU in 2008. In 2009, Sheldon Richardson was the top-ranked defensive tackle coming out of high school and two years later among the elite junior college transfers.
But Gabbert joined an MU team with an incumbent star quarterback in Chase Daniel. An academic hold-up delayed Richardson's arrival last August, tempering the expectations for his instant impact.
Green-Beckham, meanwhile, plays a position where MU returns a mix of veterans and underclassmen but prefers to rotate players liberally. The buildup officially ends tomorrow, and the next story begins.