Friday Practice Notes

Friday morning, Kansas football held a practice open to the public. Here are some news-and-notes from that practice, all second-handed from this Gridiron Board thread and this KU Sports article on the practice.

• Kerry Meier took no snaps at WR, and instead acted just like a "traditional" backup QB. Not really sure what this means; it could mean that Mangino thinks we have enough talent at WR already to leave him at QB exclusively or, more likely, just that he is alternating practices between QB and WR. I haven't heard anything about him moving back to QB, although I suppose that is also a possibility. In any case, I certainly hope that he sees at least some action at wideout this season. He has a chance to be a really special WR.
• Alonso Rojas, the punter, has had a pretty shaky fall practice so far. Enough to, supposedly, create a punter competition between Rojas and...Mr. Everything Kerry Meier. However, he had quite the day today, and figures to be good enough to hold on to the job.
• A former QB who is going to be a receiver this season is A.J. Steward, who has all of the physical tools to succeed in a big way at TE. However, he is still working out the kinks (he dropped a pass on Friday in the Scrimmage that was picked off by Darrell Stuckey) and shouldn't necessarily been counted upon early. Still, he is an athletic beast who should have quite the career as a KU TE.
• Jocques Crawford, in his first outing in front of the public, didn't look so hot. He ran the ball well, but fumbled the ball more than once, and came the closest of anyone of getting chewed out by the Big Man. In fact, Jesse Newell of KU Sports claimed that were there not children in the audience, Crawfrod would have gotten an earful.
• Finally, and this is a topic of interest that will be discussed at length, Jeremiah Hatch saw a large percentage of the first-team snaps at LT. Hatch was an interior lineman last season, in a reserve role of course, and there is lots of talk about him potentially replacing incumbent LG Adrian Hayes. However, apparently he is being considered for the LT job, a position thought to be fairly certainly headed towards Jeff Spikes' direction. Some speculation has the move being used simply to light a fire in Spikes, as that is his biggest (and only) problem.
  

More stuff later on, there is just a simple practice report update. With the incredibly tight ship that Coach Mangino runs, these public practices are really the only windows that are left open to understand how this team figures to shape up come the regular season.

ROCK CHALK!