Booker is great, but we miss our veteran point guard. Book doesn't have the experience to calm the team down and get them re-focused. Plus no one can guard a little, speedy point guard.

Final 2024 Rivals 250

List of Texas Signees

#10 Colin Simmons
#23 Xavier Filsaime
#27 Brandon Baker
#32 Kobe Black
#48 Ryan Wingo
#73 Wardell Mack
#83 Jordan Johnson-Rubell
#122 Aaron Butler
#154 Parker Livingstone
#161 Jerrick Gibson
#181 Christian Clark
#182 Daniel Cruz
#191 Zina Umeozulu
#202 TyAnthony Smith

I just got laid off this week and was given a severance package.
They marked it as a 12 week and years of service amount.
Can I get on unemployment with this?
any help would be great as this is new to me after 23 years with this Emergency Department

Because...here's where I am for a couple of weeks, just arrived today. 5th trip here, got married here November 2021. Life es....Buena 😁
#hotelESCONDIDO

Login to view embedded media

Harbaugh to Chargers. And so the portal goes

I woke up this morning feeling like hell. I tested for covid, and I'm positive. Buddy called in some Paxlovid for me. Does this stuff help, just looking for any guidance. Feels like someone hit me with a bat.

Coach Sark is one of the coaches in college football.

I've got a reservation for a flight coming up in the next 10 days, right now it shows I'm supposed to fly on a 737 Max 9, i.e. the ones that have been grounded. Alaska agent says that they are trying to re-position planes to take place of the 737 Max 9's, but there is a chance that the flight will be cancelled.

My question is, have any of you that have flown recently on Alaska notice that your plane was swapped out for a different one and you were able to keep your original flight that was scheduled?

A buddy of mine in a similar situation said his flight got cancelled 2 days before his scheduled flight and offered him an alternative schedule with layovers.

TIA

Le’Veon Moss is out that bih.

Bottom of the pic for the resident olds who don’t social media.

THREE THINGS WE LEARNED

1. Raycine Guillory fulfilled a childhood dream by committing to Texas

New Texas commitment Raycine Guillory was able to break the dreaded “dream school” curse. The standout running back from Aledo grew up a Longhorn fan, and on Saturday he turned his dreams into reality by giving Texas a verbal commitment.

“It feels good. It’s been a dream since I was a little kid to be committed and to become a Longhorn,” Guillory said. “To finally be able to decide on the school I want to and for it to be the Longhorns feels great.”

Guillory said he and his family all grew up as Longhorn fans and “always had Texas orange around.” Coming into last weekend’s junior day visit, he didn’t necessarily have a plan to commit, but once he got to Austin he knew he wanted to be a Longhorn.

“I had an idea, but it was just an idea. I didn’t know I was going to do it until saw the coaches, got a feel for the energy, feel for the coaches and the program,” Guillory said.

The 5-9, 177-pound Guillory had previously been to a Texas game, but this was his first time to really spend a lot of one-on-one time with the UT staff. He got a chance to sit down with Steve Sarkisian in his office, and that’s when he officially decided to make a commitment.

“I committed to coach Sark. In his office, we were talking one-on-one and the conversation going great. He’s just a down-to-earth person,” Guillory said. “He’s been watching me for a minute and I just said Texas is home, I loved everything about Texas. I just knew Texas was the right choice.”

As a member of the 2026 class, Guillory has nearly two full years before he can sign his letter of intent. He’s thrilled with his decision, but said he’ll keep his options open to some degree in case there are any changes in Austin.

“I’m going to keep the door open a little bit. Coaches move around and things like that,” he said. “Anything can happen in two years.”

Guillory may keep an open mind to protect himself, but he said he’s pretty locked in with his commitment to Texas.

“Honestly it feels good. It’s a dream come true. I’m still trying to wake up from the dream, realize I’m committed to one of the best programs in the country,” Guillory said. “It’s a lot. It’s still going through my head right now.”

2. File away the name of QB Will Griffin

Quarterback Will Griffin is a new name for Longhorn fans but he could be a guy we keep a close eye on over the next 18 months or so.

A bit of background on Griffin … out of Tampa Jesuit, he’s a 2026 prospect and is regarded as one of the top quarterbacks in the country for his class, checking in at No. 72 on the Rivals100.

Griffin said he came to Austin with lofty expectations of the UT program as a whole, and Texas exceeded those expectations in every way possible.

“I was truly impressed a lot. I came in here expecting a lot of things and boy did they show me that and much more. I was very impressed,” Griffin said. “I got to sit down with Coach Milwee. Coach Sark gave an awesome presentation, roughly about 45 minutes, just took us through everything. I love the way he handles practices, games. I also sat down like I said with Coach Milwee. I was very impressed. They have everything scheduled out through what they do through the winter, through the spring, even the whole year, 365 days actually. The stadium's also very impressive, the players, just the way that they get them ready for the future, for the NFL, obviously academic wise as well and just being a man. So I was very impressed with all of that.”

Griffin doesn’t yet hold a Texas offer because Texas is usually very selective with its quarterback offers, and he said he’s fine with the way the UT staff is handling things.

“We've had talks about it. They like to take their time with it, make sure they offer the right guys and I'm totally cool with that,” Griffin said. “Right now I'm just building a relationship with Coach Milwee Coach Sark, so I'm not bothered by that at all.”

Following the Saturday visit to UT, Griffin hit Texas A&M on Sunday. He said following his Texas visit that UT definitely measured up with some of the other big schools he’s seen so far in his recruitment.

“Texas and Texas A&M are both big-time programs. I just really wanted to come see them. I haven't seen them and I've seen a lot of the other ones and just wanted to see how they compare. Texas compares great to huge schools and I definitely think they're ready to play some SEC ball,” Griffin said. “I’ll say it again, I'm very, very impressed with the way that they just came off. Very impressed with the schemes and just the way that they handle things here at Texas. I can't wait to get back, obviously, and just continue building relationships with Coach Milwee and Coach Sark.”

3. Alabama is once again a player for wide receiver Ryan Williams

When five-star wide receiver Ryan Williams decommitted from Alabama on January 10, the immediate thought by some was that the Tide was pretty much out of the race. A lot has changed in two weeks.

Williams took an unofficial visit to Alabama early last week and was in Tuscaloosa last weekend for an official visit. Per one source, the Alabama buzz on Williams is growing coming out of his official visit. Whereas this one looked to be an Auburn-Texas battle when Williams first decommitted, there’s some thought in Tuscaloosa that the Crimson Tide could now be tied at the top … with Texas.

Texas quarterback commitment KJ Lacey also popped in at Alabama for an unofficial visit. Technically, Lacey doesn’t hold an Alabama offer from the new staff and he really wasn’t on their radar before last week. The Bama staff indicated it will continue to evaluate him this spring and an offer could be presented then.

Both Williams and Lacey will be in Austin this weekend for visits.




TWO QUESTIONS

1. How excited should fans be about last weekend’s commitments?

Along with Raycine Guillory, the Longhorns also picked up a commitment from 2025 defensive end Lance Jackson during last Saturday’s junior day. Both moves were celebrated by the UT fan base, of course, but I’m not sure people realize just how good those pick-ups are.

Guillory is a 2026 kid so I can understand having a somewhat reserved reaction to that one, but if you put on the tape you’ll quickly realize that the Longhorns snagged an early pledge from a player who won’t just be one of the top overall players in the state of Texas in his class, he could very well rank among the nation’s top runners in that cycle. He’s a bit undersized by some standards at 5-9, but he has a compact build that allows him to run through tackles and his home run ability make him extremely appealing. Rankings for the 2026 class haven’t been released, but I’ll be shocked if Guillory isn’t a Rivals100 type of player, possibly even in the upper half of that ranking.

In Lance Jackson, Texas landed a highly-coveted prospect with a ridiculous offer sheet, and a guy whose upside stacks up with just about anyone in the state in the 2025 cycle. Jackson tells OB he’s up to 6-6 and 260 pounds so he has an easily projectable NFL frame. Though he’ll play on defense for Texas, he’s athletic enough that he’s a legitimate tight end take for a lot of schools. Interestingly, the highest ranking I’ve seen for Jackson comes from Texags, which has him slotted at No. 11 in the state. By the time he signs with Texas next December, I won’t be at all surprised to see all the services have him as a top-10 player in the state of Texas.

2. What are UT’s chances with offensive lineman Jackson Christian?

Port Neches-Groves offensive lineman Jackson Christian was at the Texas junior day on Saturday, and he’s a guy who feels like he could wind up in the Texas class at some point. The message from the UT staff to Christian was that he’d be a perfect fit in the program, both as a player and in the culture.

“They pick special people, and they said, I'm a special person. I really like what they do here,” Christian said. “They have a lot of culture like my school. They're great people. They really are. Coach (Kyle) Flood and Coach Sark are great people, everybody there is great people. It will be one of my options in the coming future.”

Christian said he might hit TCU’s junior day this coming weekend and then will be at Texas A&M on February 3. He added that he loves the trajectory of the Texas program under Sark, which is important for a guy whose team just won a state championship.

“They get better each year. I think the first year Sark was here was 5-7, then 8-5 and then they made it to 12-2. They’re getting better each year,” Christian said. “If you look at it, they’re going up. The only way is up.”

Christian picked up a UT offer last summer. The fact that the Longhorns were the first big school to take a chance on him does carry some weight with the 6-5, 300-pounder.

“They're really the only school, before the state championship, they offered me. Some other schools did but they were the first big one to offer me,” Christian said. “We were talking about it and everything, all these schools are coming in now because I won a state championship and everything, and they came in before winning the state championship.”

Christian said he wants to wait a bit before committing so he can get a look at some other options, but he noted that “Texas is a really great school” and he didn’t rule out the possibility of an early commitment in favor of the Longhorns.

“It is an option. You never know,” he said.




ONE PREDICTION – Texas nabs at least two OL commitments from last weekend’s junior day visitors

The number of potential offensive line commitments from Saturday’s junior day is certainly well over two, but I really like the Longhorns’ chances with two guys in particular - Jackson Christian and Byron Washington. Jackson, as noted above, loved his visit. Washington has been quiet since his trip but in talking to him last week, it’s pretty clear that the Longhorns are in a good spot. I’ll be entering Texas FutureCast picks for both.

Double post

Have had a couple of people reach out in the last hour to tell me that it's not happening.

I'll work to get a more complete update, but it looks like this is going to go in another direction.

Forgive me for not knowing the history. I know she had some issues with her family, but when did she completely lose her marbles? I just saw that she posted this video of herself pole dancing. How could she have thought this was a good idea? She was a mega star ~20 years ago. I don't get it.

I’d be okay with their d tackle coach

Login to view embedded media

Login to view embedded media
Five-star wide receiver Ryan Williams will no longer be visiting Texas this weekend, per Rivals.com sources.

Williams took an official visit to Alabama last weekend and he'll visit Auburn on February 2. This one will almost certainly come down to an in-state battle.

Williams to Texas was always a bit of a longshot, but he's a good enough player that he's the type that you bring in if he wants to visit and swing for the fences. That will no longer happen.

The question now is whether or not Texas QB commitment KJ Lacey will still visit Texas this weekend? I've got a message out to Lacey but haven't heard back yet. Honestly, I'd be surprised if he came in. There doesn't really seem much reason to come in without Wiliams being in town. A visit later in the spring, for a practice, seems much more logical.

Had to be disappointing for more than a few OBers.

Are you…

• Ready to leave the corporate Rat Race for the American Dream?
• Looking for a side hustle while working your current job?
• Wanting to diversify, build wealth, and/or leave a legacy?

Andy can help!!!
Andy is a franchise consultant (as well as franchise owner) and helps people find franchises that fit their skill sets, financial requirements, time to commit and more….
His services are 100% free and he’s here to help if you have any questions about business ownership.


Learn more about Andy and franchise ownership through these resources:
Andy's Story
Why a Franchise
Service Based vs Brick and Mortar
Semi Absentee Ownership
The Process and How It works


Andy Luedecke
www.MyPerfectFranchise.Net
p: 404-973-9901
e: andy@myperfectfranchise.net
Book time with me at: Andy's Calendar





For as many additions Texas has been able to accumulate in the transfer portal this cycle (S Andrew Mukuba, WR Matthew Golden, EDGE Trey Moore, WR Isaiah Bond, WR Silas Golden, LB Kendrick Blackshire and TE Amari Niblack), the program does still have a need for interior defensive linemen.

We've discussed before how the loss of Byron Murphy and T'Vondre Sweat (while not ideal) is not a program-killer for Texas given the beefening up of other units on the defense, yet still, Texas can't have the interior DL be a liability coming into its first year in the SEC. One player that has emerged as a potential transfer portal target is Tiaoalii Savea from Arizona who played under new co-DC Johnny Nansen last season. (Note: Savea announced his commitment to Texas on Tuesday morning.)

Savea is listed at 6-4 and 305 pounds and he was an effective player for an Arizona defense that improved greatly in 2023 from its 2022 form. Originally committed to UCLA as a pretty high-profile recruit in the Class of 2021 (Rivals 4-star), he transferred to Arizona in 2022 and played sparingly. Even in 2023, he wasn't a starter for the Wildcats. It leaves you wondering if he's a take.

Which brings up another, related question: was Trill Carter last year technically a "take"?

If you were to listen to Pro Football Focus (which I typically don't), you'd find that PFF had Savea "graded" as the team's best interior DL, despite the fact that he was clearly among the team's second platoon in the defensive trenches. Why was he on the second team? I'm really not sure. The first team nose tackle (No. 45) is doughy and can't move but therein may lie the problem -- and a question Texas will have to answer when addressing the line's interior: do we really need more interior DLs in general, or do we need specifically players who profile to possibly play nose tackle?

And here's where we get back to Trill Carter, who will not be returning to Texas after one season as a meager-at-best contributor in the actual production department (as very easily predicted) but was at least a 26% snap-count guy. He played at Texas if nothing else, the only problem was, on those 26% of snaps, he generated a truly awful 17.11 snaps/production caused efficiency metric.

Looking back at the study linked above, we see that in watching back two games of Carter (versus Illinois and Michigan State) in 2022 for Minnesota, he:

- played 95 total snaps

- played 9.47% of snaps at the nose tackle or 1-shade, 6.32% head-up on the guard, 77.89% at the 3-tech, 5.26% head-up on the tackle, and 1.05% at the 5-tech

- in all of those snaps, had one assisted tackle, one pressure, 1/2 TFL, 2 run-stuffs and one missed tackle for a truly pathetic 29.23 snaps/production caused

Let's compare that to Savea, who I watched back two games of yesterday (better teams than Trill Carter faced, in fact, it was the only two teams who beat Texas last year in Oklahoma and Washington). In those two games, Savea:

- played 62 total snaps

- played 4.84% of snaps at the nose tackle or 1-shade, 8.06% head-up on the guard, 69.35% at the 3-tech, 11.29% head-up on the tackle, and 6.45% at the 5-tech

- in all of those snaps, had 2 tackles, one assist, 2 QB pressures, one TFL, 4 run-stuffs and one missed tackle for a very good 6.89 snaps/production caused -- a number that would have been third-best on the Texas DL for last year behind only T'Vondre Sweat (5.44) and Byron Murphy (6.09) and light years ahead of the next man up (Alfred Collins - 11.09)

Now, I'm not saying that I think Savea would come in and be the real, ultimate difference-maker Texas would need to completely round out the unit and take away all worries. He played well in these two games, but he needs to work on his pad level in the run game as well as controlling his body better than he has shown. He can be a really good, violent penetrator, especially when slanting across a guard or tackle's face, but he can become unwieldy and fail to break down properly once he gets in the vicinity of his target to actually make the play.

All this said, if you were happy to land Trill Carter last year, you should be doing cartwheels about the possibility of landing a player like Savea. The nose tackle conundrum still exists, though. Carter did play a good bit of nose tackle last year at Texas, but as you can see above, Savea doesn't profile in exactly the same manner. The farther out you get from the center, the more the longer and more slender Savea would be deployed in comparison to Carter, although 3-tech play dominated the alignment mix for both players.

Have had some high level discussions about the possibility that Sark might just pass on hiring a DL coach.

He doesn’t like the options. All of them are overpriced and less accomplished than the guy who just left. Turd of a hiring pool that will be better next year.

Nansen is good enough to coach DL and ILB for one year if we only have douches to choose from. Not ideal butt Sark won’t compromise his standards.

Zverev serving 90% on first serves. Thought he may win, but certainly didn’t expect this score line.

They lose to unranked teams and beat ranked teams.

Hope they are peaking to get in the tourney (and then keep going!)

Feckless Republican Governor overriden:

31 Days away from the opening night of Texas Baseball at Disch-Falk. Team practices begin in 10 days, which of course means it is time for the pre-season Top 25.

As a programming note - look for the Big 12 Conference breakdown and projections to come out later this week.


Quick thoughts on the rankings.

• I have zero issue at all with the top 9 teams, on paper they have collected the most talent and experience and all could be poised for deep runs in the tournament
• Teams 10-17 are all very close and in large part could be rearranged in a number of ways. Each of these teams has solid talent and experience, but may be missing one component or have questions that have precluded them from being higher - that decribes Texas well.
• I did expect Texas to be ranked closer to 12 than 16, but the Horns will certainly have plenty of early season chances to rise quickly
• I am a bit surprised that Texas Tech is ranked higher than Kansas State
• I am also surprised that Alabama is not higher ranked than they are
• Kudos on putting Northeastern on there - love some mid-major madness

The Horns will face the #4 (LSU, #5 (TCU), #6 (Vandy), #8 (A&M), #21 (Tech), and #24 (Kansas St) this season. Horns will square off against #4 LSU and #6 Vandy on March 1st and 3rd in Houston at the Astros Foundation College Classic. They will immediately turn around and play a Tuesday night game against #8 A&M at home, before traveling to Lubbock to face #21 Texas Tech in the opening Big 12 series. Exciting times!


Here are the Top 25 Rankings from D1Baseball

1. Wake Forest
2. Florida
3. Arkansas
4. LSU
5. TCU
6. Vanderbilt
7. Oregon State
8. Texas A&M
9. Tennessee
10. Clemson
11. East Carolina
12. Duke
13. NC State
14. Virginia
15. North Carolina
16. Texas
17. UC Santa Barbara
18. Coastal Carolina
19. Alabama
20. Iowa
21. Texas Tech
22. UCLA
23. Northeastern
24. Kansas State
25. South Carolina

As a bonus:

Login to view embedded media