While the NFL dawdles away another perfectly good early fall weekend with yet another round of essentially meaningless pre-season exhibition games, college football gets underway in earnest gets underway later tonight with a slew of games, perhaps the most interesting of which has #2 Texas Christian playing at Minnesota on ESPN at 9 PM ET. If nothing else this game gives folks the opportunity to remind themselves just what a good college player is TCU QB Trevone Boykin (#2, 6-1, 205), a legitimate Heisman Trophy candidate who would likely be the runaway consensus favorite for the award if he played for a more fashionable program. Boykin, though, isn’t necessarily more than a late-0round pro prospect as he isn’t very tall at barely 6-1, while scouts have lingering questions about his arm strength and accuracy. However, nobody doubts Boykin’s effectiveness running the high-octane TCU offense as he threw for 3,900 yards, while running for over 700 last fall when he lead the Horned Frogs to a 12-1 record and within a whisker of making college football’s initial 4-team playoff round.
In fact, the most interesting reason to tune in the Frogs-Gophers’ match-up, at least from a pro draft perspective, may be the potential match-up between TCU receivers Josh Doctson (#9, 6-2, 195) and Kolby Listenbee (#7, 6-0, 185), both of whom have at least some second-day potential for the upcoming draft, and Minnesota corners Briean Boddy-Calhoun (#29, 5-10, 190), yet another second-day prospect for 2016, and Eric Murray (#31, 5-11, 200). Meanwhile, other TCU Horned Frogs to watch include RB Aaron Green (#22, 5-10, 205), OT Hala Vaitai (#74, 6-5, 310), OG Brady Foltz (#65, 6-3, 320), C Joey Hunt (#55, 6-3, 295), DT Davion Pierson (#57, 6-2, 305), and FS Derrick Kindred (#26, 5-10, 210), while Minnesota players on pro scouts’ radar include OG Josh Campion (65, 6-4, 310), DE Theiren Cockran (#55, 6-5, 260) and LB Da’vondre Campbell (#26, 6-4, 245).
Bonus coverage: ESPN actually has a pretty good doubleheader to kick off the college campaign with North Carolina playing at South Carolina in the opener at 6 PM ET. That one could feature some decent one-on-one match-ups between star UNC OG Landon Turner (#78, 6-3, 325) and emerging USC DT Gerald Dixon (#92, 6-3, 325). Pro scouts also want to see where UNC QB Marquise Williams (#12, 6-2, 220) and WR Quinshad Davis (#14, 6-3, 210) are given both have health concerns heading into the season. Also keep an eye of South Carolina junior WR Pharoah Cooper (#11, 5-11, 210) and hulking RT Brandon Shell (#71, 6-5, 330) … One of the great things about some of these early games is that one gets the chance to see players whose programs otherwise would never make it onto any kind of TV and that’s the case when FCS Alcorn State plays at Georgia Tech at 7:30 PM ET on ESPN3. That will give Alcorn State QB John Gibbs (#3, 6-6, 210), a poor man’s Colin Kaepernick who threw for 2,500 yards, while running for over 1,000 on the ground), the chance to show his stuff against FBS competition.
Have a great day
