Roundup From BN Walk: Football News & Notes

Tag : Foot Ball Product

We will start this Wednesday with Brian Dohn’s report on Ben Olson’s efforts to gethealthy again . Olson has been throwing for the first time in two months and hasbeen putting in a grueling regimen of 14 hour day of footballrehab. Last week Olson allowed Dohn to tag along with him for a dayin his off season, which resulted in a revealing article from Dohn . You have read the whole piece because it will leave no doubt about Olson’s dedication andcommitment to leaving UCLA on a high note.
What I liked most were the following grafs (after hearing from Chowwhat his QBs need to do this off season):
It is 3 p.m. and administrative assistant Lea Bean is the onlyperson in the football office when Olson walks in and heads to theconference room. He pushes a few computer buttons and is watchingan NFL team's offense run read routes. He has seen the tape timeand again, but watches and rewinds it like this is the first timebecause his focus is to see when the safety tips off the coverage.
He also dials up a video of last season's disastrous Notre Dameloss in which he was injured. The offensive line is in shambles,missing blocks and getting pushed around the line of scrimmage.
"Every time you watch a tape, you try to take a different angle,"Olson said. "When I watched the Notre Dame game, I watched mymechanics. It's something different each time. And coach Chow willtalk on one play for 10 minutes."
More than an hour flies by as Olson also watches tape of severalNFL teams, and of Chow's offensive system when he was at USC. Atleast four times a week in the summer he does this.
"During the season it's much more film," Olson says. "Way more. Intraining camp, we're either on the practice field or watching film.You have to watch film with a purpose."
Dohn also reports that Olson looked sharp in 7-on-7 drills and thenslipped out something amusing (emphasis added):
Olson is sharp, hitting receivers in stride, but he is clearlytired and his foot is bothering him. His release is more laboredthan when throwing with the Texans duo earlier in the day, and bythe end of it he is taking few reps and talking to the youngerquarterbacks more.
Olson admits to being worn out, which is understandable since thisis just his second day back, but he still must get treatment andice his foot before leaving campus. Again, he mentions his footbeing sore.
"It's kind of afraid of soreness," he says. "I remember how ithappened (planting his foot). It was kind of a weird thing, so I'mkind of nervous any time something doesn't feel right. And you knowthere is a screw in there, too."
The start of training camp remains weeks away, and the seasonopener is not until Sept. 1. Olson understands his role asquarterback of one of the Pac-10's premiere programs opens him to scrutiny not felt by teammates or other quarterbacksin the nation.
So after all these months of downplaying the potential of UCLAfootball, Dohn has finally calling Bruins having one of the“premier programs” in the Pac-10? :-) We will see ifthis a new trend.
Anyway, going back to Olson as I mentioned in my notes on QBs , I think what he needs to focus on this season is work on managingthe team. Assuming he can get protection from a patchwork OL (whichis a huge question mark itself), he needs to work on managing theteam within Chow’s scheme and focus on minimizing hismistakes. There is no pressure on him right now to be a John Elwayala savior of UCLA. If he can provide same kind of production WayneCook did in his junior year after coming back from his injury, UCLAwill have a shot. And we are all rooting for Ben.
Well going into this camp Olson is going to be pushed by our young signal callers. One of themhappen to be Kevin Prince , who according to Dohn has been looking good :
One of the more impressive freshman during the summer passingdrills has been quarterback Kevin Prince, a Crespi High of Encinoproduct. Prince has looked sharp and shown good arm strength duringthe 7-on-7 drills, and several of the veteran players remarked tome that he looked very good.
From what I'm hearing, Prince, fellow freshman Nick Crissman andred-shirt freshman Chris Forcier will be battling for the thirdstring spot during training camp.
Besides Prince, Crissman, Forcier, and Rasshan there is another QBwho is looking to be in this year’s camp. Dohn has more on– Tyler Tuiasosopo – a familiar name for all Bruin fans who is walking in as a QB into our football program.
While TT is coming in, UCLA is losing yet another OL. Aaron Meyer is leaving the program. The redshirt senior who was listed 3rd in the depth chart at LG following spring came at LG, has not been able to break through atUCLA. He is on track to graduate this summer so he decided to notreturn for his 5 th year. Wish he had stuck around. But oh well. At least he got agreat education. Good luck to Aaron.
We will end this walk with a note on OC Register’s “UCLA Blog” where Marcia Smith was concern trolling yesterday re. our ticket sales from this season comparing them to the program from across town(completely discounting the record of these two teams from last fewyears). One of the commenters blasted back trying to put some sense into Marcia :
You failed to mentioned that UCLA begins their home schedule whenschool is not in session and won’t be for nearly anothermonth. Not that the addition of the students would be enough tofill the Rose Bowl, but it would have been at least an attempt tobe fair in your reporting. And chances are pretty good that theband won’t be there as well but you can beat that dead horsein another article.
Maybe the Register can do us UCLA fans a favor and keepMarcia’s reporting on the SC blog. I still chuckle atMarcia’s article a couple years ago that it was okay to askSC players for their autographs. I guess she never had a nephewturned down for one by Leinart or Bush.
She didn’t respond back to her reader in the comment threadsof her “blog post.”