Not that I've heard or read. No mentions on this board.
But appreciate your post. Interesting about the Isaiah kid. Before our haul this cycle, and with Al gaining a few extra pounds, I was ready to have him go incognito at DT and do the **** thing himself.
Just the fact they're not playing football suggests to me they don't have an interest in doing so. They just want to do track. Not every track guy is a football player.
Just my guess. I've seen track guys without significant football backgrounds come out for the first time in college or the pros, and it rarely works. (Renaldo Nehemiah might have been closer than some, but he was still an experiment.)
Before there was Bob Hayes, there was Frank Budd. Budd and Hayes were trading shots at the 100 yard (not meter) dash record in the early '60's. For years, the record was 9.3, and it was never eclipsed. I think Budd was the first to run a 9.2, and then Hayes ran a 9.1.
Budd tried playing for the Eagles and the Redskins, in fact I saw him in person in an exhibition game at the old RFK stadium in D.C. when I was up visiting relatives. That would have been August 1963. Budd had not played college football at Villanova, but was one of the two or three fastest men on earth back then. He just didn't make it. Most of the great sprinters have not played serious football. There are exceptions, but most don't.
There was so much talk in the media back when Budd tried football, because he was so fast. Then Hayes went into the NFL and became a true star. He was part of a stellar group of runners and receivers at FAMU. The best player on the FAMU team, by the way, was not Hayes, but a fellow named Bob Paremore. Bobby Paremore, like all the FAMU backs, was also a track guy. They had an incredible group of fast athletes. Paremore played sparingly for two years with the St. Louis Cards, and then Canada.
Interestingly, Bob Hayes tied Budd's new record of 9.2 for the 100 yards in--of all places--Coral Gables.
At another meet, he tied the world record in the 220 yards dash of 20.5. Also in Coral Gables.
At yet another meet, on New Year's Day, 1964, he ran blistering 9.1 in the 100 yards, and 20.1 in the 220. Both would have been world records, had there been a wind gauge, but there was not. So, the two races were not ratified as world records. Where was this meet? You guessed it: Coral Gables.
Where could he have been running all these meets in Coral Gables? I'm guessing it was not Gables High. So, although I haven't been able to verify it, I suspect that Hayes spent a lot of time at meets at the U. Perhaps that's because maybe he couldn't go to meets at the more "southern" schools, like FSU and UF. UM was probably more receptive to black athletes at meets because it was not really an institution of the deep south. Most southern schools were segregated. That probably included track meets. Just guessing.
If Hayes did all of that at the U, I suppose the track there has a pretty illustrious history. Never was there a better sprinter when it came to a body built for football. He was like a machine of muscles when he tore down the track. Not like the other sprinters. Absolutely incredibly powerful runner for a sprinter.
One guy I would have loved to see in football was Usain Bolt. Incredible body.
If a guy is already concentrating on track at UM, and has not come out for football, and doesn't have a significant football background, forget it. It's nice to dream, but some kids just focus on track and field.
Anyway, went off on a story or two. I've always been fascinated by the interaction between track and football, and always disappointed that more pure speed guys have not made it into football.
We had guys who were very fast but I don't think ran track--like Rocky Belk. Laurence Thompson was on the team at the same time (early '80's); he could run and high jump very well, but never got into games.
That's why I don't want to see Njoku bulked up. He's got incredible jumping talent right now and could be lethal on the outside.
