How Missouri Tiger football players are dealing with an offseason full of change
This offseason has been full of change for the Missouri Tigers football team, which kicked off spring practices on Friday.
Four assistant coaches, including defensive coordinator Steve Wilks, left the program or stepped down from their positions. Three new assistant coaches came on board and several others switched positions on staff. Several players transferred as well, replaced by 28 incoming players — 11 transfers and 17 freshmen.
“It’s a process,” safety Martez Manuel said of adjusting to all the changes. “From the transfer portal to coaches to everything, it’s just kind of the way the world’s spinning right now in this sport.”
Mizzou has still yet to officially name a defensive coordinator — a point players were clearly told to hammer home when they spoke with the media earlier this week — but there have been reports that Blake Baker, who joined the coaching staff in January as safeties coach, and linebackers coach/recruiting coordinator D.J. Smith will split those duties.
Regardless of what comes to fruition there, that means three defensive coordinators in three seasons under head coach Eliah Drinkwitz.
“Honestly, it’s kind of difficult to process,” defensive lineman Darius Robinson said of Wilks leaving. “Unfortunately it’s starting to become normal. But I think Coach Drink(witz) is doing a good job of bringing the right people in with the guys we have. But it’s definitely — it’s tough having a lot of changes. But as long as we got each other, we’re gonna be all good.”
Manuel admitted that he struggled learning Wilks’ system last spring and at first had doubts about whether he could find a way to succeed in it. He spent extra hours in the film room trying to adjust and even made online quizzes to familiarize himself. So upon finding out that Wilks was leaving, Manuel approached Drinkwitz about the challenges of learning another defensive system.
“I did mention to him that I did feel like last year we were just starting to get stuff figured out there at the end,” Manuel said. “I told him that it was very important to me that we do try to keep things a little bit similar. But at the same time … this is my third defensive coordinator in three years, so if they do bring in somebody and he wants to run his system, I’m open and I’m fully confident in myself learning that system and being comfortable with that system.”
Manuel won’t be participating in the start of training because he’s dealing with a UCL tear in his elbow that he suffered in the third week of last season and tried to play through. He said he had surgery in January and plans to be good to go for non-contact activities towards the end of spring practice.
Not being able to compete in the weight room and on the field certainly makes adjusting to new teammates and coaches more of a challenge, but it’s still important to Manuel to take a prominent leadership role entering his fifth season.
“The first meeting we had this year when we got back for the spring, I told everybody, ‘Everything we do this year is gonna be for us. Not for coaches, not for fans, not for families, it’s for us in this room,’ ” Manuel said.
“I feel like just saying stuff like that and reminding guys when the workout’s hard, like we’re doing this for us. When the season gets tough and coaches are thinking about leaving, Coach may get fired or something might happen, it doesn’t matter because we’re playing for each other. So I think just doing stuff like that is a big part of it.”
Building that chemistry will be especially important on defense, which added six transfers — defensive linemen Jayden Jernigan (Oklahoma State), Tyrone Hopper (North Carolina) and Ian Mathews (Auburn), linebacker Ty’Ron Hopper (Florida) and defensive backs Joseph Charleston (Clemson) and Dreyden Norwood (Texas A&M) — along with seven freshmen.
“I definitely think spring will be good because we’ll be able to grow into the new defense and be able to learn more with not as much pressure of a game leading up,” Robinson said, “because right now it’s just Mizzou versus Mizzou. So definitely time to get better.”
