As you might have noticed, the College Football Countdown is winding down. Just five teams --- and, hence, one entry --- remain.
That will roll out tomorrow, and all the sudden it will seem like there isn't much content left for the two weeks before the ACC Kickoff event gets football season (at least here) underway.
Au contraire.
There's still plenty of stuff to take a look at. In fact, two series should launch by the end of the day tomorrow.
One is the annual preseason unit-by-unit breakdown for the Maryland football team.
The other is a still-be-named rundown of the top 66 players of the Ralph Friedgen era.
Why 66? One for each victory over the last nine seasons.
Why now? Summer's a great time for such breakdowns; it worked well for last year's breakdown of the top 20 players of the Gary Williams' first 20 seasons in College Park.
Is 66 a little excessive? Yes, considering the headaches of splitting hairs to select the final dozen or so players. But given that this won't be too over-the-top --- not every guy is going to get an 800-word essay --- and there's plenty of time to kill, why not?
A few ground rules for this particular series. I made it a point to include someone from every position. That includes a long snapper. That includes a fullback. That includes a tight end whose primary role was blocking.
Quantity and quality both count. The bottom half of the list will be littered with guys who were simply really solid players for several years.
Pro success doesn't count. However, while making the list, whether a guy was drafted was placed on the list of accomplishments. It doesn't hurt to get a look (or more) in the NFL, but there were players drafted from the last nine years who didn't make the cut for a variety of reasons. Basically, it's the college careers that are getting assessed.
Without giving too much away, 31 of the players were included for their work on offense, 28 for defense and seven for special teams.
The plan is to unveil three guys a day with a few days off sprinkled in, allowing this project to wrap up on Aug. 9 --- the day before preseason camp starts. Plans change, but it's at least a decent target at the moment.
Suggestions (even now, when not a single player has been unveiled) are welcome. Something tells me a few inclusions near the bottom of the list will spark more debate than who is No. 1, but that is to be expected.
In any case, look for No. 66 tomorrow morning as this series gets on its way.
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