The Oklahoma Sooner football team has had an eventful first month of the offseason. Now, there is the usual discussion about way too early depth charts, players leaving early for the NFL, and coaching movements. But, this particular first month of the offseason has been particularly interesting. Now, we will look at five spring storylines for the Oklahoma Sooners.<\/p>\n
The quarterback position has taken some interesting turns since the College Football Playoffs. The Sooners were most certainly looking at a drop off at the position in 2019. Oklahoma was faced with the possibility of having some combination of Austin Kendall<\/a><\/strong> or Tanner Mordecai<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0take the reigns in 2019.<\/p>\n Then, the transfer portal was firmly in the Sooners proverbial\u00a0eyeballs.\u00a0 Kendall entered his name in the portal and eventually transferred to West Virginia. Now, Oklahoma was faced with only having one scholarship quarterback for the spring. However, the Sooners received tremendous news when Jalen Hurts elected to transfer to Oklahoma<\/a>.<\/p>\n Hurts has had a storybook career at Alabama. His story has been well told, replaced in the National Championship game and the Tide won the title and a year later he replaced the same starter to win an SEC championship. Hurts brings\u00a0the intangibles\u00a0to the position that will be needed. His leadership, toughness, and class will be counted on early and often. And, he’s a pretty good football player as well. How will Lincoln Riley<\/strong><\/a> tailor the offense around Hurts skill set? Could Hurts drive the Sooners to a third consecutive playoff appearance and perhaps face his old team?<\/p>\n Oklahoma has a new defensive coordinator for the 2019\u00a0season. The Sooners have introduced Alex Grinch<\/strong> to the role in replacing Mike Stoops who was fired mid-season. Grinch will bring a new attitude of toughness with an increased focus on speed and effort. Those facets led Grinch to force at least 24 turnovers in each of his seasons at Washington State.<\/p>\n The Sooners will have a combination of existing\u00a0coaches and new blood on staff for this season. Grinch has made two hires for the defensive side of the ball. Brian Odom<\/strong> and Roy Manning<\/a><\/strong> have joined Grinch in Norman. Odom will coach the inside linebackers while Manning will coach the cornerbacks. Existing coaches Calvin Thibodeaux and Ruffin McNeil will be retained and be responsible for the defensive line and outside linebackers respectively. Grinch will coach the safeties along with his defensive coordinator duties.<\/p>\n In the first place, the effort and forcing turnovers have been a consistent issue for the Sooner defense over the past few seasons. In 2018, Oklahoma had statistically the worst defense in Norman in over 30 years as they ranked 114 out of 129 in total defense. The spring game should be an interesting indicator of how quickly Grinch and company have been able to change the culture.<\/p>\n Now, the recruiting trail has been very kind to Oklahoma. Currently, the Sooners rank fourth in Rivals and fifth in the 247 team recruiting rankings for 2019. And, much of that excitement has centered around the offensive side of the ball. Oklahoma has four five-star recruits headed to Norman. Of which, three of those are enrolled in the spring.<\/p>\n Theo Wease<\/strong>, Jadon Haselwood<\/strong>, and Trejan Bridges<\/strong> have already enrolled and are on campus. Meanwhile, Spencer Rattler<\/strong>, the other five-star recruit will be on campus in June. With Hurts in the mix along with the new trio of freshman on campus, the hype is big with the Sooner offense. In fact, CeeDee Lamb<\/a> <\/strong>recently tweeted out this picture just to get the juices flowing.<\/p>\n \u201cFor the rain and all the pain that we been through\u201d #TheReturn<\/a>\u26a1\ufe0f pic.twitter.com\/AJs6DJMNeA<\/a><\/p>\n — CeeDee Lamb (@_CeeDeeThree) January 24, 2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\nAlex Grinch and the new defensive coaches<\/h3>\n
Early enrollees on offense<\/h3>\n
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