Samuel Gone per BG News

[MarkL]

It always stinks losing a high character high talented guy like that. However, I'm not too worried and wish him all the best. I think Givens is going to be awesome for us this year. Like 1000 yard season awesome. Martin, if he can stay healthy, will have a solid year. Hopgood should contribute and be reliable in short yardage and end of game situations. As for the new guys ... we saw Travis Greene light up the D in the spring. Fred Coppet looks like a future all star, and the other three incoming guys all look like they'll be solid for us. Nobody expected Anthon Samuel was going to be as excellent as he was until we actually saw him light up Idaho, so we may have a star on the team we don't even know yet.

And on that point ... will the freshmen redshirt? While I hope they do, Samuel was awesome as a true freshman and so I have confidence that if Clawson needs one of those guys to contribute this year and feels any one of them is ready, he will be ready and will contribute.

[jpfalcon09]

Per Clawson's presser today, he said that he left open the idea of the next available schollie to Samuel but that it wasn't enough. My guess is that Anthon was merely trying to save face in all this and try to look as best as possible. Clawson said he felt Samuel had no intention of ever returning.