With apologies to Tyler Lockett, who I'm sure has heard more than enough of this, it's time to take a look at what K-State's most exciting young receiver/returner needs to do to reach the same level as his relatives. After all, we've still got 96 days until Missouri State.
The bad news for Tyler is that - partly due to injury, and partly due to the fact that he wasn't part of an offense as predicated on passing as much as Kevin and Aaron during what were by far the two most prolific seasons for freshman receivers in school history - he has a lot of catching up to do. The good news is that both Kevin and Aaron slowed down significantly as sophomores.
I was very young, so I can't really say what happened to Kevin, and it's a little confusing since he still had Chad May as his quarterback. For Aaron, the answer is much simpler.
He went from catching passes from Michael Bishop during best passing season by a quarterback in the Bill Snyder era to catching passes from an inexperienced Jonathan Beasley. Aaron also no longer had the benefit of playing alongside Darnell McDonald to distract defenses, which was surely a huge key to his record-breaking freshman season.
Still, Tyler's got a lot of work to do to catch Aaron (4th in receiving yards and 6th in TDs all-time) and, well, no one's expecting him to catch Kevin (1st all-time in receiving yards and TDs). Let's take a look at the numbers.
| Year | Kevin | Aaron | Tyler |
| Fr. | 50 rec/770 yds, 4 TDs | 44 rec/928 yds, 6 TDs | 18 rec/246 yds, 3 TDs |
| So. | 39 rec/583 yds, 3 TDs | 33 rec/531 yds, 3 TDs | ??? |
| Jr. | 56 rec/797 yds, 13 TDs | 36 rec/584 yds, 2 TDs | ??? |
| Sr. | 72 rec/882 yds, 6 TDs | 24 rec/357 yds, 3 TDs | ??? |
| Totals | 217/3,032, 26 TDs | 137/2,397 14 TDs | ??? |
As promised to those of you who read all the way to the end of Tuesday's post about freshman, it's time to take a look at the guys who showed potential their first year but never panned out. As I mentioned before, this will be shorter, because more often than not Bill Snyder's magic works.
In the cases where it didn't, I think it's only fair to try to determine what went wrong. This is generally pretty easy. Keep in mind we're only going back to 2000, and I'm not counting punters or kickers, since kicking/punting in high school is relatively identical to kicking/punting at the Division I level.
Before we move onto the disappointing cases, let's start with the guys that don't really belong in this group. That would be freshman running backs Rashad Washington (2000) and Jarell Childs (2009).
Both of them got a few carries and somewhere around 100 yards rushing before it became clear that the guys ahead of them on the depth chart were much better. Those guys were Josh Scobey and Darren Sproles for Washington, and Daniel Thomas for Childs. Maybe you've heard of them?
Fortunately, Childs and Washington were athletically gifted enough to move to defense, where Washington became a pro-level safety and Childs has grown into a solid linebacker. The other guys on this list weren't so lucky.
For the second straight season, 2011 brought us somewhat of a rarity in the Bill Snyder era: three freshman who made a noticeable impact and gave us plenty of reason to be excited about their future. Actually, it's one of the few areas where the 2010 team comes out on top.
Ty Zimmerman and Tramaine Thompson were certainly anomalies under Snyder, as Zimmerman was a freshman All-American and Thompson would have likely gotten some sort of recognition had he kept up his pace (19 catches for 258 yards) through seven games before his injury. Andre McDonald doesn't get mentioned a lot with his two classmates, particularly with all the buzz around Travis Tannehill Tannahill but anytime a freshman tight end gets significant playing time and a touchdown (even if it was just against KU) it's worth mentioning.
The 2011 freshman class is especially notable for actually having a true freshman in Tyler Lockett, who put up numbers (18 catches for 246 yards and a TD through 8 games) comparable to what Thompson did. Curry Sexton made a few plays at wide receiver as well, but perhaps the best freshman last year was starting center B.J. Finney, whose importance was made abundantly clear when he was named a captain heading into his sophomore season.
Snyder teams are not known for having freshman play major roles for two reasons, the first being that it's just part of his old-school style, and I'm fine with that. The second is that even a real wizard would have trouble recruiting top-tier talent to Manhattan, so there aren't a lot of guys that absolutely have to be on the field in their first year.
Keep in mind that even guys like Darren Sproles, Josh Buhl and Nick Leckey only started as freshman when the guys ahead of them were injured. Leckey and Sproles were able to skip the redshirt season and get to the NFL quicker, where it didn't take long to prove they belonged.
Obviously, I'm not putting Lockett, Finney or Sexton anywhere near that level just yet, but a look back at the short list of freshman who have made a significant impact under HCBS since 2000 gives some good reason for optimism.
Per Dennis Dodd, the Big 12 has verbally agreed to a 13 year deal with ESPN and Fox that will be worth $2.6 Billion ($200 million per year). This means we're currently sitting in the top four with the Big Ten, SEC, and Pac-12.
The deal is expected to be the one reported by CBSSports.com on March 13 worth a combined $2.6 billion with ESPN and Fox. The 13-year deal is projected to be worth $200 million annually to the conference (an average of $20 million per school) through 2025. For the moment, the Big 12 enters the stratosphere of the Pac-12, SEC and Big Ten, all of which are near or above the $200 million per year mark.
Expected to be announced along with the new deal is an extension of the league's grant of rights. League CEOs had previously agreed to a six-year grant of rights that would allow the conference to keep a school's television rights if it left for a new league. The expectation is that the new grant of rights will be 13 years to match the TV deal. That provision essentially binds the at-times contentious league together for the term of the agreement.
The question regarding realignment, now, is finding two schools that add at least $40 million, annually, to this contract.
The game is afoot. Welcome to another summer of realignment fun, boys and girls.
Join me and TB and special guest David Ubben, ESPN's Big 12 blogger, as we discuss K-State's spring football game and the upcoming football season in the Big 12. We talk Collin Klein, getting pulled over with a Diet Coke bottle, and the Kansas Mentors program.
In Aesop's old fable, it's the third time that the little boy cried "wolf" that he was actually telling the truth, but the villagers who believed him the first two times had by then lost all trust in him and didn't come running.
It would be great if the third straight year of a K-State quarterback throwing for monster numbers in the spring game actually meant good things for the future. But it's no coincidence that Klein's 475 480 yards has gotten considerably less attention than his 358 the year before and Coffman's 440 the year before that.
Of course, I didn't watch the game because I could think of about 475 480 ways I'd rather spend my Saturday afternoon, but it's hard to imagine anything Klein did against the second-team defense was overly impressive. The generally wobbly passes to mostly wide open receivers featured in the highlight package only serve to confirm that suspicion.
Now that we appear to have things (mostly) settled on the basketball front, I'm finally ready to reluctantly move forward to football season. After all, spring practices began almost two weeks ago, and even though Bill Snyder keeps The Bill locked down tighter than a North Korean press tour, we still have plenty to discuss.
It's going to be a long offseason, so let's try to take things one at a time, beginning with what I see as the most important question for next season. While many will ask, ‘how much can/will Collin Klein improve as a passer?,' I think the more important question is: ‘how much does K-State need Collin Klein to improve as a passer?'
Obviously, HBCK's 147.5 yards per game and QB rating of 125.6 aren't impressive by any stretch of the imagination, and the visual evidence that goes along with those numbers rarely wowed anyone.
And yet, only a select group of quarterbacks got as much praise and meant as much to their teams as Klein did last season, thanks to his abilities as a running back that can also occasionally throw the ball.
It's easy to say that if Klein could develop more of a passing game, this team would be even better, but honestly I think it's fair to say that K-State caught some breaks (and made its own luck, to be sure) that just might not be there this season.
With that in mind, click the jump for what Klein needs to do this season for K-State to maintain its high level of success.
After a bad first 28 minutes, K-State forced an Arkansas fumble and scored a touchdown to cut the Razorbacks' lead to 19-9 at halftime. Everybody's thoughts should be with K-State defensive lineman Meshak Williams, who was carted off the field after a violent collision with teammate Emmanuel Lamur. Let's go get this one for Meshak.
Go Cats!
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