THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 27. 2007
SPORTS
3B
COMMENTARY
KANSAN FILE PHOTO
Wide receiver Aqib Talib brings entertainment to the football field. He intercepted a pass two yards deep in the end zone during the fourth quarter of Saturday's game and ran 100 yards for a touchdown.
Talib continues to captivate fans
Football highlights at Kansas have almost always come with fine print, kind of like those weight-loss commercials. Players like Carl Nesmith, Charles Gordon and June Henley would make the occasional big play. But every time an exciting play of theirs flashed on the big screen, audiences could half expect the small letters to appear saying "Results not typical."
That's how it's been for the past 10 years. No Jayhawk has been consistently spectacular. Nesmith's "Butcher's Block" fan section busted when the team went 4-7 his senior year. Gordon morphed from punt returner extraordinaire to an over-hyped has-been who elicited cheers on name recognition alone. And Henley? His off-field legal problems were more riveting than his onfield runs.
Let's face it. KU football has been about as exciting as Chevy Chase's memoirs. Until now.
Now, Kansas has Aqib Talib, a player with no fine print attached. He's special. Really special. He's a drive-thru-window fast, Michael Flatley-nimble scorer who loves to talk about his accomplishments. Kansas has never had a player as electrifying and entertaining as Talib.
OK, anyone above the age of 60 is probably screaming Gale Sayers. But no one who's at school now saw Sayers play. When most KU students think of Sayers, they probably picture an overacting Mekhi Phifer whimpering out a tearful "I love
Brian Piccolo" in the "Brian's Song" remade-for TV-flo.
Sayers may be a Hall of Famer, but he wasn't as exciting as Talib. The statistics prove it. Talib's a threat to gain major yardage and score every time he touches the ball.
This year, he's caught six passes as a wide receiver for an average of 28 yards per catch. He's gained more than 36 yards three times. Oh, and he has three receiving touchdowns.
Talib also has two interceptions. He scored on one of them. Add up his catches and interceptions, and it comes to a total of eight touches for an average of 35 yards-per-touch and four TDs. That means Talib scores 50 percent of the time he touches the ball.
Fifty percent of the time?! NFL analyst Shannon Sharpe can't even speak in complete sentences 50 percent of the time.
Sayers doesn't compare. He only had 19 touchdowns his entire career. Talib is on pace to score 12 this season with plenty fewer touches than Sayers ever had. Nolan Cromwell, Tony Sands, Gordon, — name any former exciting football player — none of them
scored 50 percent of the time or averaged 35 yards per touch.
Sure, Talib doesn't get the ball as much as some of those guys, but his use as a special weapon makes him all the more entertaining. Fans never know when he'll line up as a
wide receiver. They never know when a quarterback will make the worst decision of his life and
throw to Talib's side of the field.
All they know is that when one of those scenarios does happen, something exciting will follow.
Take Saturday night for example. The Jayhawks looked ordinary for the first time this season. Brandon McAnderson fumbled twice. Marcus Henry caught only two passes. Raimond Pendleton played as scared as someone who's seen himself on YouTube with his intimidating coach screaming at him. The luster from previous victories was missing.
Talib changed that. He intercepted a pass two-yards deep in the end zone at the beginning of the fourth quarter. Plenty of KU football players would have taken a knee and celebrated the interception. The most exciting player in KU history didn't. Talib instead sprinted for a 100-yard TD run.
Talib's play gave fans a reason to get excited. Everyone left after the return. There was no reason to stay. They had just seen Aqib Talib do what he does better than any Kansas football player before him
provide entertainment.
— Edited by Kaitlyn Syring
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FOOTBALL
K-State game not priority
Team focuses on fundamentals, offense during bye week
BY ASHER FUSCO
afusco@kansan.com
Kansas State. But one group on campus has not yet turned its focus to the Sunflower Show down — the Kansas football team
— the Kansas football team.
Kansas will
use the next few days to tighten up its play and work on some details before turning its attention to K-State next week, coach Mark Mangino said. The extra week leading into Big 12 Conference play will give the Jayhawks a bit of rest and an opportunity to make some additional adjustments in practice.
"It's a good time for us to work on the little nuances, techniques and fundamentals that sometimes get lost during a week of gameplanning," Mangino said. "We think this is a very important week to improve our football team from that aspect."
post-bye week
The Kansas players took Monday off before returning to practice on Tuesday. The Jayhawks will rest on Saturday before plunging into a week's worth of frenzied media coverage and careful gameplanning. But for now, Kansas is focusing more on Lawrence than
Mangino's results in games following bye weeks are mixed. In his five seasons at Kansas, the team had a week-long pardon in all but one, 2002. In 2003, the Jayhawks followed their bye week with a 50-47 overtime loss at Colorado. The next season, Oklahoma drubbed Kansas 41-10 after the Jayhawks' off week. In 2005, Kansas returned from its bye week and defeated Iowa State in overtence, clowning a bowl berth. Last season, the Jayhawks crushed K-State by 19 points after resting for a week.
The post-bye week results of the last two years are an encouraging sign for Kansas fans, especially considering who K-State spent this week preparing for. The Wildcats travel to Austin, Texas, on Saturday to face the No. 7 Texas Longhorns. Texas (4-0) is one of the best teams in the Big 12 Conference and should keep K-State from worrying too much about the upcoming Sunflower Showdown.
Mark Mangino's post-bye week results:
2002 No bye week
2004
2003
50-47 (OT) loss at Colorado
2005
2004 41-10 loss at Oklahoma
24-21 victory vs. Iowa State
2006
Manhattan.
"We're just going to focus on some fundamentals and work out some plays to get everything touched up for the Big 12," sophomore quarterback Todd Reesing said. "But for right now, we're not going to look ahead as much. We're just going to work on our offense and get some things done."
39-20 victory vs. Kansas State
Edited by Meghan Murphy
TEXAS 16, ANGELS 2 Sosa hits one of Rangers' five homers in game sweep
ARLINGTON, Texas — Michael Young reached 200 hits for the fifth consecutive season and Sammy Sosa hit one of Texas' five home runs Wednesday in a 16-2 victory that completed a three-game sweep of AL West-champion Los Angeles.
Nelson Cruz, Gerald Laird,
Travis Metcalf and Hank Blalock
also homered for the Rangers in their home finale. Blazock's three-run huner came in the seventh inning, right after Young had his third hit to reach his milestone.
The Angels, with 92 wins, are still in the race for the American League's top record and homefield advantage through the playoffs. Boston and Cleveland, the other division leaders who played later Wednesday, both have 91 wins.
Sosa hit a two-run homer in
the first off Joe Saunders (8-5)
that made it 3-0. It was Sosa's 21st
this season and No. 609 in his
career. He leads the team with 92
RBIs, even though he has started
only 18 of the past 53 games.
Young joined Wade Boggs and Ichiro Suzuki as the only players since 1940 with five consecutive 200-hit seasons. Boggs and Suzuki both had seven in a row, including this year for Suzuki.
Associated Press