What happened to that 6'7 WR? Justin Smith I think

Just overhyped due to St. Louis factor. He came into college already physically maxed out and has just been passed by better players, IMO.

Definitely the least experienced unit, but the freshman class and sophmore/redshirt freshman class have a lot of talented players in them.

I think Wes Leftwich's injury is a blessing in disguise... getting younger, more deserving players a look.

I'm excited about Justin Smith/Emmanuel Hall/Jonathan Johnson from the 2015 class, and the 2014 class has several intriguing guys, too (Keyon Dilosa and Ray Wingo stand out, especially).

I think Dilosa - if he's fully recovered from that Achilles' injury - could be a really, really explosive player. Best bet to be the next "unheralded" superstar on the roster, IMO.

Waste of a scholarship.

It's too bad Johnson's ankle is so badly damaged. He was going to play this year.

I'm ready for football!

http://youtu.be/OTfBpZ3wuO0

Looking at the depth chart. This is a really young team. Bodes well for the future.

Locktober has a nice ring to it.

Nice piece on Charles Harris. Think you have to be a PowerMizzou member, though.

https://missouri.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=1797964

Press Guide for the SEMO game:

http://sidearm.sites.s3.amazonaws.co...EMO_update.pdf

Mizzou has endured some injuries to the receiving corps (Dilosa, Johnson, etc.) over the past few years and lost a ton to graduation, but they still have a LOT of good, young talent at the position. We should be looking pretty good at WR over the next few years.

The same argument could be made for the D-line (with Brantley injured and many others graduating).

It's going to be a fun year, win or lose.

Nice Nate Brown story in the tribune. His parents are freaking geniuses.

Tigers look for Brown to be playmaker in the slot

http://www.columbiatribune.com/sport...116202c43.html

By BLAKE TOPPMEYER
Wednesday, September 2, 2015 at 2:00 pm

Nate Brown isn’t entirely comfortable being cast as a veteran in the Missouri football team’s receiving corps. After all, he does have just 45 career receiving yards.

“We all kind of just see each other as equals,” Brown, a sophomore, said of MU’s receivers. “We all go out and compete and try to get each other better. We’re all young.”

Although MU’s receivers are young, they showed pretty well in three scrimmages during fall camp — especially Brown, who caught eight passes for 89 yards and a touchdown.

Coach Gary Pinkel said his receivers’ inexperience isn’t a crutch.

“It’s a great opportunity for those guys,” Pinkel said. “You’re never going to hear me say that we’re young. We’re not going to do that.”

After dipping his toe into the water last season as a true freshman, Brown will have the opportunity to put his talents more fully on display this season. He’s slated to be MU’s starter at slot receiver, with fellow sophomore J’Mon Moore and redshirt freshman Keyon Dilosa starting at outside receivers.

MU’s entire wide receiving corps has only 10 career catches. Five of those are from Brown, and two are from Moore. The other three are from senior Wesley Leftwich, who is sidelined with a knee injury and won’t play in Saturday’s season opener against Southeast Missouri State.

Put another way, Missouri’s receivers have 89 fewer career catches than SEMO senior wideout Paul McRoberts, who is one catch shy of the century mark.

Brown began his MU career as an outside receiver. He started taking reps in the slot during Missouri’s preparations for the Citrus Bowl because the usual starter, Jimmie Hunt, was out after shoulder surgery.

Brown liked his new spot, and Pinkel kept him there.

Quarterback Maty Mauk has shown a preference for slot receivers in the past. During the 2013 season, Mauk targeted the slot a higher percentage of the time than James Franklin did. Mauk threw more passes to slot receiver Marcus Lucas than to any other receiver. Outside receivers Dorial Green-Beckham and L’Damian Washington were Franklin’s favorite targets.

Mauk didn’t target the slot as heavily last season, when outside receiver Bud Sasser became his top option. However, Brown became the favorite target in MU’s three fall camp scrimmages. He was targeted 16 times while working with the first-team offense.

“He’s a big body,” sophomore safety Thomas Wilson said. “He’s quicker than people think he is, and he has great hands and is a great route runner.”

Slot receivers draw blocking responsibilities against linebackers and safeties. Brown, at 6-foot-3 and 205 pounds, is the biggest receiver on MU’s two-deep depth chart.

“He’s got to do some blocking in there, and he certainly has the size to do it,” Pinkel said. “There’s more things going on in there than out on the perimeter. He’s the most experienced receiver we have right now out there, and so we put him in there because of his experience.”

Even back in his days playing youth football, Brown “was always a lot taller than everybody,” Wilson said.

Brown played youth football with Wilson and Wilson’s twin brother, Terrance, who is now a cornerback at Buffalo. That team was flush with talent. The Wilsons were running backs. Caleb Scott played wide receiver, his position now at Vanderbilt.

Brown played quarterback.

“I used to sling it back then. That was cool,” Brown said. “That was a really fun team.”

Brown’s QB days ended after he enrolled at North Gwinnett High School in Suwanee, Ga., where the coaching staff converted him to a wide receiver. Brown wasn’t a fan of the idea at first, but he grew to like his new position.

“He really worked at his trade once we made the move,” North Gwinnett Coach Bob Sphire said. “He really worked great in the weight room. Physically, his preparation was spot on, and then, of course, from a technical standpoint, he made tremendous progress.”

Brown became a starter his junior season, when he made a remarkable catch in a televised playoff game against Johns Creek. Brown adjusted to a ball that was tipped by a Johns Creek defensive back. Brown reached out with his right hand and tapped the ball back to his left hand before corralling it with both hands and coming down in the back of the end zone for a touchdown.

“He had had his coming-out party prior to that, but that may have been one of the signature things that the media got the clips of that may have gotten the buzz going a little bit more,” Sphire said.

The next year, Brown’s 61 receptions — including 21 TDs — and 1,041 receiving yards helped North Gwinnett finish as Georgia’s Class 6A state runner-up.

“We went all the way to the state championship, and I mean to tell you, buddy, he was huge in that deal — his ability to make explosive plays down the field or to turn tunnel screens into big plays,” Sphire said.

Brown performed well in the classroom, too, and he had offers to play football at Vanderbilt and Yale. Brown’s parents, Rob and Wanda, are engineers who graduated from North Carolina A&T. Wanda went on to earn her MBA from Penn’s Wharton School of Business, and Nate Brown said his mom “always preached academics.”

“Nathan has always known that, growing up, academics came first, and assuming that he took care of what he needed to in the classroom, then he could play football,” Wanda Brown said. “What I’ll tell you is, Nathan is just one of those kids that he has been so driven and so focused that he did a great job balancing both football and academics.”

Brown narrowed his list of suitors to Missouri and Vanderbilt, and he committed to MU in September of his senior year after visiting campus with some high school teammates. Two months later, Georgia offered Brown a scholarship, but he didn’t waver in his decision.

“When Nathan came back from his weekend at Mizzou, there was just like no other school,” Wanda Brown said. “It was like everything fit. … It was like a glove fit.”

Nate Brown feels the same way about his role as MU’s starting slot receiver. It fits his game perfectly. But much like his hesitance to accept the label of being a veteran, he thinks it’s a little early to declare himself Mauk’s go-to target.

“I don’t know about favorite,” Brown said. “I mean, hopefully. Any receiver wants a lot of balls, so whenever they come my way, I’m going to make a play on it.”

I've got zero expectations for this season. Pinkel coached his ass off last year to win 11 games, and it was a freak series of events away from being 12. This year is just setting the table for next year.

The more I look at it, I think we need to be 6-0 going into the GA game. I know we shouldn't expect too much this year, but which one of those first 6 should we be comfortable losing? If we lose to that SC team at home I'll be pissed, same with FL, they need to do something before I can be scared of them at home.

If we do get to 6-0, does that change expectations? I really think 10 wins is doable again this year, and really, anything more than that is possible as well just looking at the schedule.

Of course expectations change if we go 6-0, but I just don't see it. I've been watching replays of our past games, and Mauk is a real cause for concern. He's a guy who can make plays, but he's just as likely to make them for the other team than for us. Given the complete lack of anything resembling a proven WR on the team, I just don't see where our offensive production comes from.

Had a reply typed up and then my laptop ****ed itself.

Go Tigers!

**** kansas.

That is all.:)