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Thanks to the Memphis Tider, here’s the ESPN All Access piece they ran earlier this week:

One member of Alabama’s highly touted 2008 recruiting class showed a rare feat of athleticism at the 2008 Alabama High School Track and Field Championship. St. Paul Episcopal School’s Mark Barron won the 5A State Championship in 4 events - the long jump, the triple jump, the shot put & the discus.

Just winning 4 events is itself a great accomplishment. What makes this noteworthy, however, is how different the skill sets are between the two pairs of championship.

It is not uncommon to see the same person win the long jump and the triple jump. It also not uncommon to see the same person win both the discus and the shot put. But for 1 person to win all 4?

The long jump and triple jump are events that rely on quickness and agility, along with speed, body control, and explosiveness. The discus and shot put also require explosiveness and body control, but in completely different ways. They are two events that require a tremendous amount of strength, something not often found on a “jumper”.

Other Bama signees that had good finishes in the meet:

Burton Scott was 2nd to Barron in the 5A long jump.

Julio Jones finished 2nd in the 6A long jump

In a not so shocking move it looks as though Alonzo Gee’s name will be on the “eligible for draft” list submitted to the NBA; Ian Rapoport of the Birmingham News is reporting.

Like fellow Tide players Richard Hendrix and Ronald Steele, Alonzo has not signed with an agent, so he is eligible to come back to Alabama.

This is a no-brainer decision. Basketball players get 1 chance to declare for the draft, work out for NBA teams, get feedback, and return to college. Why wouldn’t every player with pro aspirations take advantage of this?

My guess is that Alonzo will be told to work on his outside shot, his defense, and his ball-handling ability. He likely won’t receive a great evaluation, though he is certainly an NBA athlete.

Of the 3 Bama players taking advantage of this opportunity, Alonzo is the one that I feel the most confident in saying that he’ll be back at Bama next season.

In a move that would be classified under the “Surprise” category below, but is not wholly surprising, it appears as though Charles Hoke will move to a medical hardship scholarship.

There had been rumors beginning as early as the Ole Miss game, when true freshman Chris Underwood made the trip to Oxford and Hoke, a Junior, did not. The rumors strengthened near signing day when Bama signed 2 guys (Devonta Bolton & Michael Williams) who could project at Tight End, and heavily pursued another (Tyler Edwards).

In the spring Hoke made the move to Left Tackle, a move that given his weight made no sense. But given the Tide’s shocking lack of depth at the position, it appears to make a lot of sense. It appears as though Charles Hoke may have “taken one for the team” and stuck around for spring practice in order to help his team.

Either way, it appears as though a nagging shoulder will be the official reason for Charles leaving the football team. His departure leaves the Tide with 65 guys on scholarship. In order to bring in a full 25 in the fall, there will have to be 5 more players leave the team.

I almost abbreviated the name as “AB” in the head to achieve some real serious initial combo points, but opted for something informative. Anthony Brock, of Itawamba Community College (of Itawamba, Mississippi - yes it is just outside of Fulton) has inked a scholarship offer to play for the Tide next season.

The unsettlingly small Brock (5 feet 9 inches, 165 pounds) was second team All America last season, blistering the nets from behind the arc at an astonishingly good 47%. The road will be tougher in the SEC where he’ll no doubt play against guards who are bigger and more physical than the competition he saw last season.

However, capstoneking over at 3rd Saturday in Blogtober (still love that name) makes an excellent point when he notes that similarly sized players such as Drew Lavender at Xavier have had success at this level. It’s still a little unnerving to think that this guy is that small.

With Ronald Steele back in the mix next year (assuming he’s not drafted), he should be free to move without the ball and not have to worry about getting his own shot. Without a reliable point guard distributing the ball this year, Mykal Riley sometimes struggled (particularly early in the SEC) with this very problem.

Hopefully, Brock will be able to contribute some perimeter scoring for the Tide next year and replace production of Riley, and the expected contributions Rico Pickett and Justin Tubbs (who both are bound for greener pastures).

Much has been made about Alabama’s 2008 recruiting class; ranked #1 in the nation by everyone except for ESPN, who weeks after signing a television deal with the ACC managed to squeeze two ACC teams ahead of the Tide.

The Tide signed 32 players in February, with 2 of those (Chris Jackson & Corey Smith) enrolling in January and back-counting towards the 2007 class. Of the 30 remaining guys, Bama can only enroll 25 for the fall semester.

The problem, at the moment, rests with the fact that Bama does not have room under the NCAA’s scholarship cap of 85 to bring in 25. As of today, Bama stands at 66 active scholarship athletes, meaning that something has to give. Specifically, there have to be 6 current Bama players cease to be Bama players in order to make room for 25 newcomers in the fall.

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Although the draft was terribly disappointing for all associated with Alabama football, the following Seniors from 2007 have signed contracts to join NFL Teams -

• Justin Britt - Cincinnati Bengals 
• Matt Caddell - St. Louis Rams
• Chris Capps - Houston Texans
• Simeon Castille - Cincinnati Bengals
• Wallace Gilberry - New York Giants
• DJ Hall - New York Giants
• Keith Saunders - New England Patriots.

Each of these guys has an uphill battle to climb to make the roster for these teams, but former Bama player Anthony Madison was able to pull off this trick to make the Steelers. Tony Romo was also a free agent signee by the Dallas Cowboys.

While this situation is certainly not ideal for any of these young men, they will get a paycheck from an NFL team, and there is something to be said about that.

For the second time in the 69 year history of the NFL draft, no Alabama player was chosen.

You read that right. Two hundred fifty two players were selected by the NFL in seven rounds and none of them wore the Crimson.

Schools that had players taken that were not Alabama included Wheaton, Bentley, Coastal Carolina, Grand Valley State and Gardner Webb. David Vobora, an outside linebacker from Idaho, was the last player taken. Bill Curry smiles somewhere.

It’s a dark day in Alabama history, but not a shock considering a 13-13 record over the past 2 years. It shows how poor the talent level was when Nick Saban landed in Tuscaloosa a bit over a year ago. Consider the following:

• Only three SEC teams went with no players drafted: Ole Miss, Mississippi State, and Alabama
• Auburn had five players drafted; Tennessee and Vanderbilt had three each
•  Paul Gattis points out that the 1988 draft, when Kerry Goode was taken 167th (in the seventh round) was formerly the Tide’s worst since the 1970 draft that included no Tide players.

It’s not a tremendous surprise that Bama has underperformed based on the talent we’ve got leaving the program now.

If we were making a short list of things I never thought I’d blog about, press coverage of the NCAA Women’s Gymnastics Championship would be near the top of the list. But, thanks to Deadspin and Paul Gattis, that’s exactly what I’m doing.

It seems that Gattis has decided to flaunt NCAA rules about blogging from their events. He (along with Deadspin) points out how ridiculous the rules are, and in an act of civil disobedience blogs away.

The more interesting nugget from the article is the discussion about facilities. It seems that Georgia has better and more impressive facilities for men’s (and women’s) basketball as well as gymnastics. It only reinforces my claim that Mark Gottfried is relatively hamstrung with an outdated facility - when compared to those he’s competing against. Auburn’s new basketball facility will not make it any easier for Gottfried - or whoever happens to be Bama’s coach - when it’s completed.

It’s looking increasing like Kerry Murphy will find a home in the Big East in the next few years. According to Gentry Estes at AL.com, Murphy hasn’t yet qualified. The former Hoover High star has battled eligibility issues for the last couple of years, and it seems his time at Hargrave hasn’t yet gotten him to the point of qualification.

According to Hargrave’s site  (by way of Estes), Murphy has been admitted to the University. But the NCAA Clearinghouse still has to speak - and that’s likely to be rough. Murphy’s grades at Hoover weren’t great, and they may have been inflated.

Murphy could have helped at defensive tackle, where Bama isn’t exactly deep.