Texas Tech offensive lineman Le’Raven Clark continues to receive preseason All-American honors as well as being one of the top ten offensive linemen in the country.
Photo via Charles Henry @ Flickr.
Football
It is a very football intensive Morning Stake.
Writing for The Land Grant Gauntlet. If you’re interested in writing about the Big 12, maybe once a week, then you are in luck as Chris Ross over at The Land Grant Gauntlet is looking for writers to help contribute to the site. I’m hoping that very soon, we’ll be able to include some more writers here at Staking The Plains (I have a list of things I need to get done first because that’s what I promised myself), but I’m hoping to collaborate with Chris during the fall as we cover the Big 12.
Offensive Line Rankings. Sports On Earth’s Matt Brown ranks the top fifty offensive linemen and Le’Raven Clark takes the #10 spot:
10. Le’Raven Clark, T, Texas Tech. Clark redshirted in 2011 and has been a starter ever since, opening his career at right guard, then spending the last two years at left tackle. The 6-foot-6, 313-pound senior has started 38 straight games, and last year he helped underrated tailback DeAndre Washington become a rare 1,000-yard Red Raiders rusher. He plays with impressive quickness and stands out in the run game in an offensive system where it’s not necessarily easy to do so.
The players in front of Clark is pretty impressive and Clark is in good company. In fact, via the official site, Clark was named the Sporting News Preseason All-American yesterday.
Top Ten at Camp. You’ll like this, RedRaiderSports’ Will Mckay lists the ten best camp performers from this past week. I don’t have much to add other than I’d love to add Tyler John Tyler defensive tackle Braylon Jones (6-3/278).
Experience Chart. He belongs to all of college football as Phil Steele has his experience chart, where he awards 3 points for every senior starter (2.5 in the 2-deep) and 2 points for every junior (1.5 in the 2-deep) and so on. Turns out that this puts Texas Tech tied for 91st overall.
Hot Seat Stuff. CBSSports’ Dennis Dodds has his hot seat rankings and he has Texas Tech head coach Kliff Kingsbury at being safe, but you never knkow.
Get on that Leon Bridges Bandwagon. This is not football related, but that’s okay. I’ve mentioned on Twitter that Leon Bridges is going to be the next big thing. This isn’t my prediction per se, but just listening to Bridges, anyone could make this claim because his voice takes you back 40+ years ago, reminiscent of Sam Cooke. You’ve probably heard one of his songs on a new Apple commercial. He’s also from Ft. Worth, Crowley to be exact.