Texas Longhorns: Tom Luginbill
Tom Luginbill previews this weekend’s Gridiron Kings 7-on-7 tournament.
Tom Luginbill talks about a few things to watch for at the Elite 11 Finals.
Much goes into the scouting and preparation of each year's initial ESPN 150 recruiting rankings. There's also a method to the madness when it comes to determining which players go in what spots.
RecruitingNation's Tom Luginbill and Craig Haubert take you inside the process:
Scouting
:
ESPN Senior Recruiting Analyst Tom Luginbill explains the national vs regional approach to recruiting for ESPN Recruiting, and why the positional approach is the best method.
Timeline
:
Luginbill explains the timing process for the release of the ESPN 150 rankings, and when ESPN Recruiting will begin to have two recruiting rankings active at the same time.
Resources
:
Luginbill gives you a look at how ESPN Recruiting evaluates players, and what kind of resources they have at their disposal.
RecruitingNation's Tom Luginbill and Craig Haubert take you inside the process:
ESPN Senior Recruiting Analyst Tom Luginbill explains the national vs regional approach to recruiting for ESPN Recruiting, and why the positional approach is the best method.
Luginbill explains the timing process for the release of the ESPN 150 rankings, and when ESPN Recruiting will begin to have two recruiting rankings active at the same time.
Luginbill gives you a look at how ESPN Recruiting evaluates players, and what kind of resources they have at their disposal.
Great State Debate: Comparing the pros
January, 18, 2012
1/18/12
2:30
PM CT
By HornsNation staff | ESPN.com
The ESPN HS Great State Debate continues. When comparing current pros, what state has bred the best? Brady and Rodgers are California boys. 5,000-plus passers Brees and Stafford hail from Texas. Time to discuss.
Top current NFL quarterbacks from Texas: Drew Brees (Austin Westlake); Andy Dalton (Katy); Matt Flynn (Tyler Lee); Kevin Kolb (Stephenville); Colt McCoy (Jim Ned); Christian Ponder (Colleyville Heritage); John Skelton (El Paso Burges), Matthew Stafford (Highland Park); Vince Young (Houston Madison).
Also part of today's package, Tom Luginbill looks at the spread of the spread offense and how spread quarterbacks have not fared well in the NFL.
Here's a sample:
The NFL is a quarterback-driven league, with smart signal-callers who win by throwing the ball accurately and on time. But at the college and high school levels, there's more of a willingness to accept a less-than-ideal passer who is an extraordinary athlete.
Prior to the explosion of the spread offense in the past 10-15 years, the core foundation of the quarterback position was learning to play under center. You dropped back from under center, read coverages from under center, made pre-snap assessments from under center. Everything you learned was about footwork, timing and reading defenses on the move.
Now, almost all you see in high school and college is the spread formation, so quarterbacks lack repetitions under center, which has led to a lack of fundamentals at the position. Every year I go out to camps and combines and see kids with multiple BCS offers who struggle to take a five-step drop, hit their fifth step and get the ball out. It can be staggering how many can't do it.
The reason for this is that from a coach's perspective, your mindset is to force defenses to have to defend your quarterback's ability to run. You implement some option principles into that mentality and it really puts a lot of strain on the defense. In high school, coaches take their best player and put him in the Wildcat formation, and if he has any promise as a passer he is going to get a long look from college coaches.

ESPN.com IllustrationWhen it comes to producing elite quarterbacks, Texas, California, Pennsylvania, Alabama and Ohio have separated themselves from the pack. From the current crop of high school signal-callers like Jameis Winston from Alabama, Zach Kline from California and ESPN HS presents the Great State Debate looking at where the best quarterbacks are grown.
For this Great State Debate, ESPNHS has narrowed the field to the final five, researched the numbers and made a case for each state, but this is a debate nobody can argue better than the football fans who hail from the homes of the sport's greatest quarterbacks.
Texas joins Alabama, California, Ohio and Pennsylvania in the debate.
Why will Texas win?












