1. CB Adrian Frye (6-1/190): These are guys that we generally don’t know a whole lot about, but what we do know is generally from the spring game and the Frisco scrimmage. I thought of all of the redshirt freshmen Frye looked lik ehe was the most ready to play. He made multiple plays on the ball and both Kliff Kingsbury and David Gibbs have made multiple comments about how Frye has performed. And of all of the positions, I think that the cornerback position is the one spot that probably could use the most help. Of all of the player, I think Frye plays the earliest and the most.
2. DL Nelson Mbanasor (6-3/280): Probably 1.B. to Adrian Frye’s 1.A., I think Nelson Mbanasor is probably second in terms of playing time. There were points all year last year when Gibb or Kingsbury would talk about how playing Mbanasor was a real possibility and there were multiple games where he traveled. I wrote earlier that Mbanasor was likely a hybrid defensive lineman and having that sort of flexibility would probably benefit him in being able to fill multiple spots.
3. WR Dalton Rigdon (5-11/170): Rigdon made multiple plays during the spring, big plays, little plays and he did it on the outside where it’s a bit more difficult to make big plays. To catch you up, Rigdon was a strack standout in Amarillo in the long jump, 200m, 800m relay, 1600m relay, etc., and walked on at Texas Tech. With some of the lack of depth at receiver, Rigdon shined this spring and I tend to think that Rigdon is probably more likely to eventually play inside during the spring because of his size and because of the reinforcements arriving with the freshmen, but he’ll surprise some folks I think.
4. DB Quincy Addison (6-1/190): Of the defensive backs that did something during the spring, I thought that Addison was the second most productive redshirt defensive back. Addison is playing safety and I noticed him because of some of the hits that he had in the secondary. There will be an absolute void left after 2018 at the safety spot as Jah’Shawn Johnson and Vaughnte Dorsey will both graduate and someone will need to be ready to pick up where they left off. I think it would be beneficial for Addison to get snaps to get him ready for next year, but he can also play (he’s probably a better athlete than Johnson), he just lacks experience.
5. C Dawson Deaton (6-6/305): Of all of the linemen from last year’s class that might make a dent this year, I think Deaton has the best shot because he’s the most versatile. I think that it’s been mentioned this spring that Deaton is the most versatile, either at center or guard and given that he has versatility, that probably gives him the edge over a guy like Will Farrar. I watched some of the offensive line play, but no one stood out, so picking Deaton here is really a matter of the above-mentioned versatility than anything else.

One lasting thought is that there really are not a lot of redshirt freshmen other than the defensive backs and the linemen listed and that’s a really good thing in terms of the depth overall. The fact that Rigdon made the list as a walk-on (no offense) is worrisome from the stand point that the receiver position isn’t as deep as you’d like for it to be. Overall, I think the team is in a pretty good spot because the redshirt freshmen will really battle to get paying time.