Here's Your Shield Tres Barksdale

Note: Leo is in the kitchen working on the Gerald Holmes post. Have you ever tried to make a Baked Alaska? Sheesh.

MSU announced yesterday that has accepted Tres Barksdale as a preferred walk-on for the class of 2012. Barksdale is ranked a two-star prospect by Scout and unranked by the other two recruiting services. He was a Georgetown Hoyas football commit(they don't award scholarships in football), so expect an angry phone call from Kevin Kelly about poaching commits. (Not really.) As a senior Barksdale snagged 32 catches for 411 yards and 5 Touchdowns. Interestingly, as a sophomore he had 38 grabs for 578 yards and 5 Touchdowns. That likely means doesn't mean anything, I just thought it was interesting.

Barksdale goes 6'2" and 183. So in case you were worried Dantonio forgot he likes wide receivers who only shop the big and tall section, he hasn't.

A Predictor of Future Success is YOUtube

This video was compiled across his last three years of high school from 2009-2011. What's to love about this kid? He does a nice job after the catch slipping the initial tackle and getting a few extra yards. He does well catching passes in the middle of the field. His hands are good in this highlight video, but you don't build a three year highlight video and show him flat out dropping a pass. Obviously he's missing elite speed and that's why he had no FBS offers. He's getting caught from behind or losing ground whenever he gets into a breakaway situation.

Obviously he redshirts this year, whether he sees the field at MSU or not is a matter of time. Still, the thing that makes good football programs into great football programs is a healthy walk-on program.

Bonus Links


Six Spartans were invited to the combine yesterday. Edwin Baker, Kirk Cousins, B.J. Cunningham, Keshawn Martin, Trenton Robinson and Jerel Worthy all received invitations. Worthy and Baker were late additions because juniors aren't included in the first round of invitations. Notably absent was Brian Linthicum, if you're a team that uses your Tight Ends to disguise pre-snap play calls and then throws to your Tight End, you best be looking at this guy. Niners, Pats and Lions I'm looking at you.

Trenton Robinson reports a cop for his potty mouth.Greg Jones proposes to his girlfriend right after winning the Super Bowl, which on the list of manly ways to propose is pretty close to the top. KJ talks tempo-free over on the Only Colors. The Georgia Leather Helmet Blog talks about yesterday's film study on the MSU defense.

Monday Morning Hot Links

Yesterday afternoon, the Men's hoops team knocked off Michigan basketball 64-54 at the Breslin. An excellent win against a Michigan team who has been solid at home and kind of flaky on the road this year. Beilein is doing good things in Ann Arbor. Chris Vannini says about the Michigan State win.

While the Izzone chanted "little sister" as the final seconds counted down, don't expect "order to be restored," as it were. As I said before the game, this U-M program is still on the upswing, as is MSU (18-5, 7-3). The rivalry won't be like the old days, but this was an old-time performance by MSU.

Quick Soapboxing. I hate the "little sister" chant. It's inference of course being that being little sister is worse than being little brother. The little brother chant is juvenile, arrogant and priggish and you only hear it from the crappy Wolverine fans. The little sister chant is priggish, unoriginal(it's derived from the "little brother" chant) and sexist. Don't give the wolverines the satisfaction of making our fan base unoriginal and sexist.[/Soapboxing]

Update: In rereading you might get the impression I was picking on Vannini for pointing that out, I wasn't. I only pick on him about recruiting.


How did MSU win so well? It never hurts when Draymond "Rickety Knee" Green outrebounds the entire Michigan "We did not want to dirty our hands getting boards" Basketball team. 16-15. So the remainder of the boards picked up by MSU, 23 more to be exact, could be applied to drop the whoopings as necessary.

That wasn't all the good news though in terms of beating our friends down the road, the Lady Spartans knocked off the Lady Wolverines 65-63 in Ann Arbor yesterday. Porsche Poole was in beast mode as she dropped 23 points, grabbed nine boards and had five assists. Good win for the women as they improve to 14-9 and prepare for postseason action.

But wait, there's more... The Michigan State icers swept Ohio State on OSU's way to a ten game winless streak Hockey rankings confuse me, I do not understand how OSU could lose or tie eight straight prior to last weekend and still be ranked 10th. The wins sounded pretty convincing and prevented Spartan tailspin.

Update 2: Just found a new blog out there called the The Munn Minute. They obviously are not covering golf. Stop by and welcome them if you're into Hockey.

Football News. Congratulations to Devin Thomas and Greg Jones on winning their first of hopefully many Super Bowl rings. That was a doozy of a game was it not?

Gerald Holmes a big bodied running back out of Flint Carmen-Ainsworth committed to MSU as the first member of the class of 2013. He chose MSU over an offer from Central Michigan writes the Little Brother Blog. I've said for a while that unless Darien Harris sticks at RB MSU has no big backs after Bell. That changes with Holmes "commit". A more substantive "Here's Your Shield" later.

Are you missing football already? Tomorrow we have the Outback Bowl defensive film review coming up, c'mon back for that. Today head over to College Football Zealots and check out the 2011 Exit Survey I did for them.

Friday Morning Hot Links

Outback Bowl Film Study: The Only Colors has it. The always excellent Heck Dorland does an outstanding job breaking down a third quarter drive in MSU's comeback win against Georgia in the Outback bowl. Required reading if you miss MSU football.


Divination, Tea Leaves and Real Estate Speculation: The class of 2012 was officially signed, sealed and delivered to MSU this week. If you want an excellent and quick overview check out the Little Brother Blog's write up on 2012 MSU Defensive Recruits and 2012 MSU Offensive Recruits.If something a little more official is your bag, MSU Spartans, has all the quotes about athleticism, change of direction and toughness you could want to read. If you want the super deep dive on MSU recruits hit that link for all of the write-ups we did this week. It's lame to link your own stuff in a links post, but there are some people who only read on the weekends. Chris Vannini points out that making predictions for the class of 2012 is not possible. He also hates freedom, joy and puppies. However, he wisely points out that a retrospective recruiting ranking would be more accurate. Luckily, if you're interested in such a thing, it exists. Spartan Nation examines a retrospective ranking of the class of 2008.

Urban Warfare(Pt. 2)

This is not 'Nam, Urban. This is recruiting, there are rules.

Bret Bielema thinks that Urban Meyer is "OVER THE LINE!" So, he's going to have Alvarez talk to "the league office. I don't know maybe have them forfeit the match." The point I was trying to make in yesterday's post was if you want to say the B1G has a Gentleman's Agreement, fine.When people don't adhere to that agreement, they are not gentlemen. That's fine too. But to publicly complain that decorum has been broken but no actual rules were violated makes you look less gentlemanly.  Also, the reason so many villains are southern gentlemen is because they do their dirty work behind closed doors.

I'm done talking recruiting until camp season or the next commit.

The BasketBOWL is Sunday and MSU really needs a win. Luckily Draymond appears to be ready to go. I wouldn't count on him at full strength. No previews are up on either side yet. Go Green. Beat the Wolverines.

Pledge Week: Defensive Line

MSU took one defensive line recruit in this class. Our defensive line was what made our defense so damned good last year and we needs us some good defensive line. I will say despite how short we are of total recruits we're completely making up for it with the "motion of the ocean".

David Fennell

MSU Spartans

David Fennell committed to Michigan State on January 23rd over offers from no one else. He played his senior year in Portland, Oregon. He is Canadian so I cannot wait to see how evil he gets as a Defensive Tackle once he learns to be an impolite jerk like the rest of us Americans. Fennell was ranked a three star prospect by 247 Sports and two-stars by Rivals and Scout. At 1.905 Meters and and 124.73 kilos he's got the frame to grow, but the size to play already.

His father was "Dr. Death" of CFL fame, not of Kevorkian fame. The elder Fennell won the award of Most Outstanding Canadian in 1979*. So what does our new David Fennell know about playing football? To the Youtubes! 

*Most Outstanding Canadian of the CFL

How Many People Will Fennell Eat in the Big Ten?

Lots. He'll eat lots. I know this is high school ball, but I love his burst off the snap. Worthy-like burst against High School kids. He also does a nice job driving his blocker back and then getting of his blocks to take off after the ball carrier. Areas for improvement? Doesn't look like the surest tackler yet, but I'm really reaching.

2012 Prognostication and Beyond: I think Fennell redshirts in 2012. There's a logjam at the three technique that needs the cable fixed and I don't think it gets sorted out until after this year. Fennell sees rotational duty beginning in 2013.

2013 Needs: 2 DE and 2 DT minimum.

Bonus: As many of you may already know, Monty Madaris has yet to fax in his letter of intent. There are theories ranging from that he's not sure he wants to move the six hours to MSU all the way to Urbz is hiding in the bushes outside his house with a kilo of coke and a gaggle of hookers ready to tattoo him in his new 370z. For my own part, I don't much care what the hold up is, Madaris needs to make the right choice for him. This is all no longer true, but the below is about the next recruiting blow-up.


I'd encourage you in this era of internet transparency to avoid getting worked up about what the kid is or isn't doing. A friend of mine says that people pick their noses more when they're in the car because they think they're alone despite the fact everyone can see you. This is true of the internet as well, if you dog on a kid when you think he can't see you, he can. It only depends on whether he's looking on that message board at the time. Let him be, if he doesn't want to come here that's his choice.

Less Preachy Bonus Links:

Vannini recaps Signing Day in about seven fewer posts.

Official Signing Day Recap

Orson Swindle's Fourth Part on Signing Day: Starring Bret Bielema