Monday Thoughts

The Aggies start spring practice March 1, and they're not even the first SEC to get after it. But just the same, it's an early start and there are a number of guys I'm looking forward to seeing, either for the first time or to get a better look at. Here's some of them:

QB Kellen Mond. This guy is supposed to be the future of the offense, and I want to see what the fuss is about. We won't see much, but we can at least get a clue.

QB Nick Starkel. He was buried last summer and we already knew Trevor Knight was the guy, so he didn't draw much attention. It's a different story now. Let's see what he's got.

OL Kellen Diesch. He's supposed to be much bigger. If he is, and he's ready to go, then A&M's offensive line issues could be minimized.

LB Anthony Hines. Another guy who's supposed to be the real deal. You can't see much in shorts, but we can at least get an idea of his speed and agility.

LB Santino Marchiol. They need him to be ready. Let's see what he's got.

LB Otaro Alaka. Why? Because I want to see where they're going to use him.

WR Clyde Chriss. I raved about this kid's speed last year -- but is he a contributor? Time to find out.

WR Jhamon Ausbon. Big body. Elite skills. Let's see them put to use.

S Keldrick Carper. There's an opening in the secondary. Can he make an impact on the competition?

RB Rakeem Boyd. He didn't get much work last summer due to his late arrival and five guys ahead of him. Now's his time to make a statement.

Congratulations to the University of Oklahoma football program, which made it seven whole weeks without having its name connected to a legal issue. Of course, Joe Mixon did his evil deeds a couple of years ago, but making the tape of his pummeling a female student public brought it all up again.

At the time, Bob Stoops said he would have handled things differently if the situation had occurred now, having a real punishment for Mixon instead of redshirt -- err, excuse me, suspending him for his first season.

So Stoops, allegedly, has seen the light. Here's his first test: what to do with starting QB Baker Mayfield?

Mayfield, as you probably already know, was arrested over the weekend in Fayetteville, Ark. He was charged with public intoxication, resisting arrest and fleeing (note: if you're charged with fleeing, that means a cop ran you down, Mr. Football Player), among other goodies.

In other words, he was an idiot. A lot of college students are idiots, and a lot of college football players are idiots. But not a lot of college football players are part of a program that has earned the reputation of being soft on misconduct.

Now, let's be fair: Texas A&M didn't do jack squat when Johnny Manziel was arrested on similar charges (before he became a superstar). But, in the interim, A&M has been pretty tough on misconduct, to the point of kicking off multiple players and helping Speedy Noil decide he needed to try the NFL. OU? Nah, not so much.

So here's Stoops' first real -- and quite visible -- chance to show he's changed his stripes. What will he, and OU, do to Mayfield?

I'm expecting the answer to be nada. After all, they've got the Big 12 to win and Mayfield's got a shot at the Heisman.

Stoops said he's changed his stance on misconduct by his players. He didn't say by how much.

We know the Aggies have at least one more scholarship they can use in the 2017 class, and there appears to be one candidate for the slot: former LSU QB Brandon Harris. Harris, if you'll recall, was a heavy A&M lean in 2014 before top-ranked Kyle Allen pulled the trigger before him. Harris, in turn, ended up at in-state LSU.

Now, after following the decade-long tradition of quarterbacks struggling at LSU, he's looking for greener pastures as a graduate transfer.

"Obviously these are bridge situations where you're going in because they don't have a quarterback who's necessarily ready to play," he said in a recent interview with 104.5 FM in Baton Rogue. "Or they may be in a situation where they just lost a senior and they've got two freshmen who are not ready to play."

Sure sounds familiar.

I totally get why Harris would be interested in A&M. But I don't get why A&M would be interested in him.

Don't get me wrong; Harris is a first-class young man and I would have loved to have seen A&M add him a couple of years ago. But this isn't a couple of years ago. Honestly, I think A&M would have to rebuild him as a quarterback and that takes time the Aggies may not have the luxury for.

Looking at his stats, Harris has never completed more than 56% of his passes, and that was in only 45 attempts in his freshman year. In his only real season as a starter (2015), he completed less than 54% of his passes for 2,165 yards, 13 TD and 6 INT. He was only 13-25 with 1 TD and 2 INT last year before being pulled for Danny Etling.

Knight, who was routinely hammered for his lack of accuracy, completed 53.3% of his passes but threw 19 TD and 7 INT last year. He was also much better running the ball.

Honestly, I don't know if Harris is better than Jake Hubenak right now. If they're looking for another Knight, a guy who can stabilize a young team, I don't know if he's the guy. He's got a ton of talent, but LSU didn't scheme well for him and sure as heck didn't develop him. How would he handle a setup where it's QB-centric and there are four wides around him? One thing's for sure -- LSU fans don't think he can handle it.

Sometimes, it's better to start from scratch than try to fix an established player. You've got to do more than teach a system, you've got to get him to unlearn what he's learned. I think that's the case here. Could he win as a game manager? Probably, but I don't think that's what A&M needs.

We don't talk much about women's basketball around here, especially a team at another conference we don't care about.

But Kim Mulkey, like the school she coaches for, finds a way to step in it to the point it draws attention.

The Baylor coach, whom I have dealt with in the past (the distant past), is crass. She is uncouth. She is not stupid.

So when she told fans Saturday night that "If somebody's around you and they ever say, 'I will never send my daughter to Baylor', you knock them right in the face," that wasn't a poor choice of words. She meant it.

So congrats, Baylor. You've fired one coach who condoned sexual assault through inaction and coverup, only to have another one come out and support basic assault. That's progress.

Mulkey came out yesterday and said she felt "horrible" about her comments and the later demand that a reporter "move on, find another story to write" was intended just for that reporter alone, who she apparently has personal issues with.

"I hate that I used the remark about punching them in the face," Mulkey told ESPN. "That was not literal. I was trying to make a point, to be firm in what you are saying back at them. I'm not a violent person. I apologize for the very poor choice of words."

Apology not accepted. But her comments are indicative of what's going on in Waco. Since Art Briles, Ian McCaw and Ken Starr are gone and they're really, really sorry about what happened, they think it's time to move on. Their fan base most certainly thinks that way.

You can bet Mulkey does too, and here's why.

When you've got people looking at Baylor and sensing danger for young women, that will hurt its ability to gain the interest of that demographic. When you've got sexual predators in your athletic programs, that's going to make it even worse. Who's going to suffer, when you hear about trainers and soccer players getting raped? Women's sports programs is at the top of the list.

That makes Mulkey's job all that much harder. You can bet your backside she wants this scandal to go away, because she can't put a winner on the court if young ladies are terrified of the school she coaches for.

So Baylor has two options: go through the hard, painful and just course of ripping things down and starting from scratch, or acting like it's done enough and trying to evade reality. It sure looks like they're trying the latter.

And that, bluntly, is utterly disgusting. 52 rapes. 31 players. You don't just forget things like that, and Mulkey should be ashamed for even insinuating that you can. But shame is something in short supply at Baylor University.

I'd like to thank all of you who donated to the fund set up to cover costs for little Riley Ross' funeral and medical expenses. She's being buried this afternoon and I can't imagine the pain her parents are going through. But you guys really made a difference when Lori and Allan needed friends, and they are extremely grateful. And so am I. Words don't suffice when it comes to this level of appreciation, but from the bottom of my heart: Thank you.