Ask Mike: Defending Taylen Green, Mr. Freeze Gets Ripped & Where Are the Hogs’ T.E.’s?

Q. We start off with three questions about Taylen Green.

parallaxpig asks: Do you think Petrino will start evolving to a Matt Jones style offense to get Green on the edge and run play action off that? SEC defenses are just gonna get tougher.

A. I don’t think Petrino will change the offense much. His goal and Green’s goal is to develop him more fully as a passing quarterback. That development could go on the entire season. But if Arkansas is going up against an opponent that is better at stopping the pass than the run, I could see Petrino using Green more on the edges.

Q. Eddy Lynn asks: Do we have some of the dumbest fans in football or what? They’re still pushing that bench the quarterback garbage. Well he got benched and we went three and out. He came back in and threw the longest TD pass of the season.

A. He wasn’t benched but it is a dumb argument. Arkansas was able to get Taylen Green in the first place for one reason. He needed development in the passing game and Bobby Petrino went up to Boise and convinced Green that he was the right QB coach to do that. If Green were further developed in the passing game Arkansas would probably not have gotten him. He’s still a work in progress. It’s going slower that I thought it would but it’s not even close if you ask if he’s the best option right now. Last week a boat load of Arkansas fans along with Clint Stoerner were stating emphatically that Green’s improvising would not fool SEC defenses. I’ve got news for them. Arkansas does not beat Auburn without Green’s ability to scramble and make something big out of nothing. That third quarter bomb he threw to Isaiah Sategna after Auburn had tied the game was amazing. Green will get tested again against the Aggies. He’ll likely make some mistakes and he will do some things that will make fans without an agenda against him say WOW.

I don’t know how long it will take for him to become more consistent throwing the ball but he is the best option they have at QB.

Q. Marty Byrde’s Proxy says: I had no problem with Bobby/Sam putting in Singleton for a series. If he moved the chains, I wouldn’t mind it occasionally as a change of pace. In this case it seemed to settle Green maybe.

A. I understand the strategy but I’m not sure that Singleton has the experience to come in to relieve Green for a series just to give him a rest. If they have to do it, then they have to do it. But I wouldn’t mess with something like that if the game is on the line unless they don’t have a choice.

Q. “The Hawk” Hawkins wants to know: Does Bobby have a blind spot when it comes to some of our receivers? Sategna needs more touches. I’ve heard you say that Harrison needs to get on the field. I agree. Replace Broden with the older than dirt freshman.

A. I don’t know it it’s Petrino or Green when it comes to throwing to Sategna. To me he looks for the tall guys. That’s not Sategna. I do think it’s why he keeps throwing to the 6-7 Broden when he can’t catch the ball. As for Monte Harrison, unfortunately he plays behind the best receiver on the team, Andrew Armstrong. I wouldn’t think it would be that difficult to move Harrison to the other side of the offense but I’m not Bobby Petrino. Maybe there are issues I can’t see about such a move. I’m hardly an X’s and O’s guru. But I would like to see Harrison involved more in the offense.

Q. Mousetown asks: You’re going to get mad at me again but how good is Auburn? Not very I say. They made more mistakes than we did against Oklahoma State and we struggled to beat them.

A. I think Auburn is gonna get trashed in the SEC this season. Hugh Freeze in is trouble. I don’t like the guy but I give him credit for getting his players to go all out against Arkansas. That game may have been big for Sam Pittman but it was also big for Freeze. I watched Auburn against Cal. They were soft compared with the way they played against Arkansas. The game on Saturday was an all out war. Lots of head knocking. Auburn ended up with some injured players while Arkansas seems to have come out okay.

J.J. Meadors, the Arkansas wide receiver who beat Alabama with a last second catch back in the Barry Lunney days, said it best. People don’t understand how hard it is to win a game in the SEC. So yeah, Auburn is down right now but that doesn’t mean that you can go into Jordan Hare Stadium and they’re gonna roll over for you.

That was a big win for Arkansas program.

Q. KyHog asks: Are the tight ends hurt? We’re not throwing the ball to them. If they’re not hurt is it Petrino or Green that doesn’t want to throw the ball to them?

A. Sam Pittman was asked about that today. Referring to Luke Hasz he said: “I think we need to protect a bit better. We know how valuable he is.. We’d be silly not to use that value. On plays where he’s the first read, for some reason we’ve had protection breakdowns.”

Q. Hawgredneck says: With about 2 minutes left in the game Auburn went for it and didn’t make it. We were up by 10 points and it looked like Sam told Bobby to sit on the ball. He didn’t look happy about that and neither was I. Gotta go for the jugular.

A. I saw that but I’m not a lip reader so I don’t know what was said. I certainly would not have thrown the ball in that situation. The last thing you want is a turnover plus an incompletion stops the clock. One thing they could have done is have Jackson go wide with the ball and pull the offense line on that side to block for him. Have Jackson take his time getting close to the sideline and then go down with the ball. You might burn up another 20 seconds or so in three plays. Auburn would have had maybe 40 seconds left when they got the ball back instead of a minute.

Q. Hotdogger wants to know: Can we fix the center snap situation? This is the 3rd game where it’s caused problems.

A. Addison Nichols has been battling an ankle injury. Sam Pittman said on Monday that Nichols wasn’t able to go full speed much in practice before the Auburn game. He also said Nichols snaps the ball with too much velocity. He compares his snap to a Nolan Ryan fastball. Clearly Addison needs to work on his snapping.

Q. Randy Allison says: Russell’s straight-ahead runs are monster-like.

A. I’m wondering if the Sam Pittman haters will give him points for that decision. He said after the UAB game that Russell needed to play more. He said it again the following Monday and it happened. I think getting Russell more touches is gonna turn out to be a big decision now that SEC play is underway and Pittman gets the credit for that.

Q. tophawg19 says: A lot of fans expected Bobby to have the offense perfect by game 3. He didn’t do that his first year as H/C either. I think by game 6 it will be rolling. What game do you expect to see the offense really hitting on all 8 cylinders?

A. I have no idea. We’re not there yet. Petrino has said that he doesn’t think he has the luxury he had here in year one as the head coach. He thinks it needs to happen now. We’re a quarter of the way through the regular season and there’s still a lot of work to do. It could turn out that next year is the year. Let’s say they win six games, go to a bowl and win that game. Pittman will be back, so will Petrino and probably Green.

Q. RazorJae asks: Will we ever see the Hogs play 4 quarters of good football?

A. They played four quarters of good football in the season opener. I would argue that Arkansas won three of four quarters against Auburn. Technically it was 0-0 when the first quarter ended but Arkansas had dominated the game statistically. They took the lead one play into the second quarter and held that lead at halftime. So the 2nd quarter was a draw.

Auburn tied the game in the 3rd quarter but Arkansas immediately took back the lead on a ball control drive so they won that quarter and they outscored Auburn 10-7 in the 4th quarter. To me this team answered the complaints that the Pittman haters have been throwing in his face. Arkansas took the lead first and never trailed in the game. They played better in the second half than the first half. They didn’t give the game away with mistakes. Technically Arkansas did not win a one possession game which is another big talking point with these fans but they did win a game that was very much in question in the 4th quarter.

Q. AlabamaHog says: I thought the D-Line was going to be the strength of the team but they don’t seem to be able to pressure the QB. After 4 games they have 2 sacks. Is it the scheme, personnel or something else?

A. It was a lot better this week. Auburn’s QB’s were sacked twice. There were three picks with numerous QB hurries. We don’t get to talk to Travis Williams so I don’t know if he did anything different but the D-Line was fine in that game.

Q. Steve Brown says says: Coach Hugh Freeze, Tell your Punk QB thanks for “dominating” Arkansas.

A. This is in reference to Auburn QB Hank Brown who apparently tweeted on his phone about winning the job at quarterback and being excited for the challenge to dominate Arkansas. Hardly. He lost that job back to Payton Thorn, the original starter after throwing three interceptions and finishing with a QB rating of 9.5. But I blame his bulletin board material quote more on this coaches than him. Players sometimes say stupid things. It’s up to the coaches to make sure they don’t.

Q. Armon Abbe says: Did you see the rip job Bo Wallace did on Hugh Freeze? If I’m recruiting against Freeze for a player I’m sticking that tweet in the kid’s face and saying, Look at this.

A. I did see the tweet. Actually there were a whole series of them. Wallace, who played QB at Ole Miss for Freeze and who was hurt his senior year accused Freeze of having him injected with pain killers to keep him on the field. He said he would have accepted that if it was done for him but he said Freeze did it for himself. This was part of a huge rant where Wallace accused freeze of always blaming losses on the players and accepting none of the responsibility for himself.

You would think this would hurt Freeze in recruiting. He currently has the top 2025 class in the SEC in terms of commitments. We’ll have to see if Wallace’s rip job changes that. Auburn fans mostly went after Wallace who is currently the offensive coordinator and quarterback coach at a junior college. But if the loses start mounting for Auburn those quotes could end up more damaging than they appear right now.

Q. The_Bionic_Pig says: The Agricultural and Mechanical school hasn’t had a QB surpass the 200 yard passing mark in any game this season. Is this the game you put 5 on the defensive line?

A. Well you have a point. The Aggies are 2nd in the SEC in rushing at 256 yards a game and 15th, next to last, in passing at 161 yards per game. Clearly Travis Williams will make some adjustments to deal with that running game but I have no idea if that will entail going to a five man front. I seriously doubt that Arkansas would talk about it even if they do. This is another reason why practices are closed now that the season is underway. In the old day it was not uncommon for coaches to tell us, hey we’re going to change this or that and you need to keep that to yourselves. If you don’t, practices could end up closed to you.

Q. havok asks: Does the team still get sequestered together night before at a hotel, & the coaches do bed checks? The team plays at home like half the team stayed up all night/out running around with no sleep.

A. They have the same arrangement at home as they do on the road. They are sequestered. They have assistant coaches and grad assistants who monitor the hallways to make sure that nobody leaves the hotel and they aren’t up half the night in their rooms, on their cell phones or whatever. Believe me if players were running around in public in NW Arkansas late on a Friday night or early Saturday morning they would be seen and the way social media works, they would be busted. Whatever is going on to cause Arkansas to be a better road team lately is not caused by players running amok the night before a game.

Q. WVHogfan says: F. Broyles prided himself that he ran a clean program. Eric Dickerson said all teams including Arkansas bought players. Is this true and did Frank and the coaches condone this practice?

A. First of all Eric Dickerson, who played at SMU during the NCAA’s only death penalty case, has always accused other SWC teams of doing what SMU did. There were a lot of cheating going on back then. A former Arkansas running back during that period told me that Texas cheated but was a lot smarter about it that SMU. There were rumors that the Aggies, TCU and Baylor could have been involved too but SMU is the school that got caught. I tried for years to find out if Arkansas cheated. I was always told that there is almost no way to stop boosters from helping players with small amounts of money after games.

Maybe some boosters would fix a player’s car for free if it broke down. But buying of cars and large cash payments didn’t happen. The only thing the NCAA ever got Arkansas for was players getting paid to work for a trucking company in the Dallas area when they supposedly didn’t do the work. The owner was an Arkansas booster. He apparently hired these players for summer jobs which was not against NCAA rules. But the charge against him was that he did not monitor their time cards and they got paid for work that they didn’t do.

That cost Arkansas a few scholarships. Nothing major.

Q. I_Was_Right says: Pre-game seemed compressed and professional, not collegiate, against UAB. It’s been going that way for thirty-five years including the addition of more ads than I dare to count. But the denigration of the alma mater to post game redundancy? What gives, yo?

A. I got the story on that from someone in athletic administration. They have been getting complaints from Arkansas fans who travel to other SEC venues that compared to some of those schools Arkansas’ pregame, in-game and halftime atmosphere needs to have more energy.
The school’s alma mater is slow paced as you would expect it to be. It’s somber. Alma maters are supposed to be somber. It was felt that putting it at the end of a game would wrap things up and send fans on their way with a good feeling about the school.

Personally I don’t have an issue with that. Sounds logical to me. If a majority of fans don’t like it I’m sure their voices will be heard. I do know this, when you’re trying to make the public happy you’re gonna offend some people. Not everybody has the same tastes.

Q. Hogtallica wants to know: What happened to the 1990 Arkansas football team? They had good players like Quinn Grovey and Mark Henry returning off back to back SWC championships. Some say it was because Hatfield left. Others say Hatfield left because he anticipated the program was on the decline. What is the truth?

A. Hatfield left because he felt like Frank Broyles was meddling too much in this running of the football program. Specifically, Broyles thought Hatfield had a sharp football mind but his staff was weak. He told Hatfield that he was overworking himself and he needed to hire better assistant coaches to handle more of the day-to-day coaching. Hatfield resisted and in 1997 Frank tried to get approval to fire Hatfield. He was denied so he wrote a letter to each of Hatfield’s assistant coaches telling them that they’d better get on the stick. He also arranged for Hatfield’s defensive coordinator to get the head coaching job at Rice while the offensive coordinator left for another job. In my opinion, those changes are the reason why Arkansas won back-to-back SEC titles.

Frank thought everything was fine and he was caught off guard when Hatfield suddenly resigned after the Cotton Bowl game against Tennessee. I was told that Hatfield worried that the next time the team has a subpar season Frank might try to fire him again.

Frank had to make a quick hire to save the 1990 recruiting class so he gave the job to offensive coordinator Jack Crowe who promptly lost his top two running backs when Barry Foster declared early for the NFL draft and Ju Ju Harshaw left school. Plus Crowe hired a defensive coordinator out of the ACC with a reputation of putting good run stop defenses on the field. That fall several SEC teams including Rice and TCU switched to passing offenses. In short the 1990 Razorbacks, with Quinn Grovey at QB, could throw the ball but had no running game. They also had trouble stopping the pass and finished the season with a dismal 3-8 record.