Razorback Kickoff Luncheon Report

A Poolsville contributor attended Friday's Razorback kickoff luncheon and files this report.

You might remember that last year a friend and I went to this. Tickets were $25 and basically we got a sack lunch. Well, just back from this year and the food was much better -- salad, rolls, chicken, mashed potatoes, green beans, and dessert.
 
Every table but ours had a Razorback at it. We were close to Alfred Davis -- he is taller than I thought and not overweight. Big Tex was close as well and he has dropped some pounds.
 
After the band played and we called the Hogs, Jimmy Dykes thanked the sponsors and such and introduced dignitaries (JFB, Coach Hatfield) and led into Jeff Long, who spoke for about 5 minutes. He was upbeat, but I really can’t tell you much of what he said. Same old “feel good” stuff.

Then they had each captain come up and asked them questions. After one serious question, they asked them a silly one. Ryan Mallett was asked if it were the last play of the SEC championship game and we were down by 6 and we had to throw a long ball, how far could he throw it? Mallett said he would be pumped and probably could throw one 120 yards or so.

Next came Ramon Broadway, who is good in front of the crowd. He was asked several silly questions such as, Who would be the best teammate if one had to go on "Dancing with the Stars"? His answer was Big Tex. Tex got up and Ramon broke into a rap song and Big Tex started moving. Ramon called him “sweet feet.”

Best "American Idol?" Damario Ambrose. He sang a short gospel song. He was chosen for this last year and has a great voice. Best "Survivor" candidate? Rudell Crim because he has a snake and Ramon said anyone who could keep a snake would do OK on "Survivor."

Best Mallett imitation? Dustin Cain, who did kind of a touchdown signal with his arms and shook his head a particular way. Best Coach Petrino imitation went to Pat Jones on the defense who did the normal Coach P. quip: “What were you thinking? Get back in the huddle.”

Next came DJ Williams, and Jimmy mentioned the keyboard playing and asked how he got into it. He talked something about Alicia Keyes, who used to be hot. Jimmy said "used to be?" and then he pulled a table cloth off of something to reveal a keyboard. DJ called up Matt Marshall and he played “Lean on me” and Matt sang. They weren’t sure of all the words, but DJ is talented and Matt sang well. They got a standing O.
 
After that there was a video of some of last year’s highlights and that pumped up the crowd. After that Coach P. spoke mainly the normal coach speak.
 
A friend heard from the Razorback player at his table that Marquel Wade, a great-looking freshman wide receiver, has gone back to Florida. Something about his SAT or ACT. I will investigate.
 
A couple of interesting tidbits I heard: If you are a Broyles-Matthews donor, you might have gotten a notice that there are boxes available at Bud Walton Arena for basketball season. A friend sitting with me said his company was invited to buy one and another friend told me the same thing. Another group dropped its basketball tickets from eight to four and got a call from Shaun Rochelle at the Foundation about it. Obviously, the donation dropped as well. Shaun asked why and the answer was given that basically two of the eight tickets were used for most of the games last year and you couldn’t give away the rest. He said that’s what he needed to know. A lot of that is going on.
 
Speaking of basketball, next year Jeff Peterson is predicted to be the point guard, plus Nobles is back and I think Ricky Scott or the other newcomer guard plays it as well. If we get the third triplet, Madden, he wants to play point as well. And in the past two weeks there have been two other point guards we are in on. How many point guards do we need? I want to hear about centers and big men.
 
Will go to the scrimmage tomorrow, but really don’t expect to see much because no way do they want anyone hurt. I expect it will be players trying to get noticed for the second or third team.
 
Also, I read the report about yesterday’s scrimmage, and I don’t believe the No. 1 offense ever went against No. 1 defense.