What do yall think of Daingerfield this year?

[true_blue_tiger]

any guesses? and also is there anyone on here, thats on our schedule?

[wildstangs]

Are they gonna have a Wrestlemania in their last game again? :)

Serious though, I think Daingerfield will be a tough team, as usual. I am not sure what they have coming back, but I would bet they compete for the Region 2 title.

[Jimbotex40]

you gotta remember that theyre still the only team to have beaten celina in the past 5 years.

i still havent told that awesome pitcher that pitched the first game against forney in that series that i thought that he, along with the rest of the players, were some heck of a ball player and ball team. i was the one that was raggin on him real loud at that first game.

i wont apoligize cuz what i did wasnt wrong, but i just wanted to let him know that nothing i said did i mean to hurt him. i just did it to better our chances of winning, which regretably to say, my efforts fell short.

[true_blue_tiger]

<small>[ July 16, 2003, 11:01 AM: Message edited by: true_blue_tiger ]</small>

[true_blue_tiger]

hey, check out dtigers.com! and no, i guarantee ya, there will be no wrestling match, or whatever ya want to call it at the end of the game! as for that pitcher, he was one of our star tbs also. he pitched 5 1-hitters in a row, spanning the last game of district through his 1st 4 playoff games.

[BUDDY]

Here is what they have coming back..

OFFENSE
Wide Rec.
Left tackle
Center
Right Tackle
Quaterback
Fullback
Tight End

I know they have 2 part time running backs coming back from last year. One of them is 5'10 about 205 and they say he runs a 4.5. Also another part time Tight End.

Defense
Defensive end 5'10-190
Defensive end 6'2-230
Defensive tackle 6'0-200
Free Safety 6'0-180
Corner 6'0-175

2 part time tackles and Strong safety also return.

This is their true returners. Gilmer says that they have 9 back on offense. If I remember they lost 2 recievers and 2 offensive linemen. Lets see 4+9=13. No wonder they are ranked so high, heck they get to play with 13. That is just having some fun!!!!LOL. Daingerfield could say they have 9/9 returning, but true starters, they only have 6/5
Yes, Region 2 will still belong to Daingerfield, you can count on that.

[BUDDY]

Do you know true blue tiger, who Daingerfield is scrim, when and where, times etc. :rolleyes:

[Gobbla2001]

D'field is D'field, no matter which year...

I hope we're on your schedule, that would mean the State game...

Good Luck!

[Gilmer Buckeye]

I can explain one of the discrepancies. Sophomore Manuel Johnson replaced senior A.J. Easley at one of the receiver positions for most of the second half of the season because of Easley's injuries. Johnson scored the winning touchdown in the Lindale game. He also had a good game against Daingerfield. He is being counted on for lots of big plays this fall.

Of course, the two statistical leaders who return are Derek McKenzie at QB and Andrew Hines at TB. We are desperately hoping for a rematch against Daingerfield in the playoffs.

I wish we still played the Tigers during the regular season as well. It's a great rivalry. It's almost as big a tradition for Gilmer as our annual matchup with the Gladewater Bears, which will be coming up Aug. 29 as the inaugural game on the Bears' new artificial surface.

[true_blue_tiger]

umm I believe our two scrimmages are going to be against Mt. Pleasant, in MP this year I believe, and I am thinking Winnsboro in Winnsboro. I'm not sure about dates, times, but usually our scrimmage with MP has been on that 2nd Saturday of 2-A-Days, around 10:00 a.m. or so, and then the next scrimmage is usually like on the following Thursday or Friday night. Man I wish we could get new turf, I loved playing on it during the playoffs. Too bad our game wasn't in Gladewater this year! but I guess I'd better not be complaining, we just got a new gym and track. Neither of which I'll use. ohh yeah, Gobbla, I hope we do meat y'all in the state game, would bring back some old memories huh?

<small>[ July 17, 2003, 06:12 PM: Message edited by: true_blue_tiger ]</small>

[Xtex]

I for one don't won't to see Gilmer... PERIOD! lol You guys certainly have caught the eyes of Collier-Sharp and with what's coming back may very well be the team to beat in regII D2. But, being from D'field I'd like to prop us up a bit. Yeah, we only got 6/4 back but what Dave doesn't tell ya is that we had a few transfers that are going to loom large during this season.

Bull...(don't even know his name,) comes from Mt. Pleasant and is a little more than serious, will be moved to nose guard and will free up Aaron Wilson to move back to a LB spot.

Courtney Thomas....from Hughes Springs, had injury probs his frosh and junior years during feetball season, but ran for 1400+ yd's his soph year and jumped 6'5" his soph yr at HS and again at DHS this past season (transfered before track got under way), sounds like a good corner to me on the D, plus the obvious! There're two more but I'm not familiar with them. Another MP kid and a boy from TK Gorman.

Several jr's last year that DCFM didn't mention, but will be significant this season. The one thing that WAS said, was about the better than good athletes off the jv. Several of them got a lot of playing time during the playoffs last year and in my opinion should've been up long before then.

The biggest plus is that D'field won't be coming into the new season trying to figure out what kinda' offense they will run, that's been decided. That crap last year was a good learning process and I'm glad it's over.

The defense?..... Randy McFarland is a D guru and it doesn't really matter what kinda talent he has to work with cause this guy's goin' to put something on the field that will be the way I described the Bull.....(more than serious)!

This will be a much bigger Tiger team than people saw last year, but big ain't bad as Greenwood showed us last year but I like our chances.......

Wrestlemania?.... If you saw the film, you would've seen the majoriy of D'field's guys trying to stop the damn thing! Was only a few acting an azz and not indicative of the rest of them.... Greenwood was BETTER that night. lb for lb the strongest team I saw last season. Small, but would rack your azz.

Anxious to see how Gilmer and Lindale match up.

[Ranger Mom]

I was at the game and I saw plenty of D-Field players trying to drag their team mates back to the sidelines. The whole incident was blown out of porportion. How many players were finally punished (or whatever you want to call it) for that...wasn't it around 8??

I had a carload of Daingerfield fans park next to me at the Championship game...they were there to cheer Greenwood on. I thought that showed real CLASS on their part. They were worried about what Greenwood fans would think about them being there, and I told them the more fans the merrier!!

[Gilmer Buckeye]

Gilmer has only been in the same district with Lindale one season, but before that, we would scrimmage them most years. So even though it's a road game (last game of regular season), the guys are very familiar with Lindale's facility.

What some of the Buckeye fans were sweating out last year was the possibility that Lindale would miss the playoffs entirely with the top three being Gilmer, Winnsboro and Mount Vernon. That would have put Gilmer (HS enrollment 630, second only to Lindale's approx. 800 in District 11-3A) in the dreaded Division I. Ironically, we might well have lasted a few rounds in that division. Instead, we come up against the eventual Div. II semifinalist in bi-district.

Our tailback Hines had just had knee surgery only 12 days before that game and still rushed for about 130 yards, but even if he had been all-the-way healthy, I think D'field still would have had the Buckeyes outgunned that day because of your opportunistic defense.

And your offense was boring, but very effective with the four or five good running backs shuttling in and out. D'field's tradition alone gives y'all about a 2-TD edge every time you step onto the field.

I still think the fact we drew D'field in bi-district was because of some sort of shenanigans on the part of or on behalf of New Boston. There was some sort of coaches' executive committee meeting on how to break your 3-way tie in such a way that NB didn't have to play us. Gilmer was all set to play NB. No one here really wanted to face D'field in bi-district last year. We're not crazy.

We wanted to square off against you in the same round Spring Hill eventually did. BTW, we scrimmage Spring Hill every year and get the better of them most years (including last August at their place), but it seems they are consistently ranked higher in most polls, C-S being the exception. Polls are absolutely meaningless.

[true_blue_tiger]

yeah, it was mainly Bickham's behalf up in NB, that we faced Gilmer and Celina! New Boston was scared to face two very tough teams. thats all there was to it, plain and simple

[BUDDY]

Who are the 8 defensive starters returning for Gilmer, we have only been able to identify 6. I realize that there are a couple of weapons back on offense, but to me the defense seemed to be the problem area for Gilmer. Daingerfield had like 350yds rushing, boring or not. I love to hear people talk about offense, that usually means they don't emphasize defense 1st. Just call me old school but I have seen it work year in and year out for Daingerfield, and now we have enough offense to.

[Gilmer Buckeye]

I think the aforementioned Manuel Johnson is one of the two you can't account for. He is a phenomenal athlete. I am so old I played on a team with his dad, MJ Sr., who was also very talented and later did pretty well at Kilgore College as well, but his son is even better than he was, IMHO. And I think his proud dad would agree. wink

Back then, we considered it a moral victory to stay in the game until halftime against D'field. This was back when the top classification was 4A and Gilmer, D'field, MP, Atlanta, Liberty-Eylau, Paris and Sulphur Springs were all in District 7-3A. The "long road trip" days. Even Clarksville was briefly up in the second-highest classification back then.

I'll have to get back to you on who the eighth starter might be. There were quite a few lineup changes during the 2002 season, so I would imagine they're counting another guy who only started a few games as a returning starter.

You are right about defense. Offense sells tickets, but defense wins games. Coach Traylor is a former QB, so, not too surprisingly, his personal emphasis is tilted toward the offense. But, boy, is he entertaining in terms of play-calling. He's a "go-for-the-throat" kind of guy. Gloves off and no holds barred. "Pitch and catch" is what 21st century Gilmer teams like to do. No huddle, keep the defenders on their heels.

We were nearly halfway through the season before the coaches discovered giving it to the tailback at least 20 times a game might be an even more lucrative approach in some circumstances than the air war. Hines made 318 yards (school record) as his single-game high and had about 1,400 for the nine games he played in the regular season. Averaged over 10 yards a carry, IIRC.

To me, the "three yards and a cloud of dust" offense is the football equivalent of the "stall" in basketball. It's often good strategy, especially when personnel limit what you can do, but it sure gets monotonous after a while.

[true_blue_tiger]

umm, I don't think you can be calling the Daingerfield offense boring though. After all we did rack up 36 points on y'all! I guess you can either call our offense good, or y'alls defense not so good. Also, while y'all had a good day in the air, we had 334 yds rushing! And stats show that anytime we gain 200+ yds rushing, we will usually win the ballgame. Personally, playing Offense more than Defense, I'd rather be a tad boring and win the game, than to be exciting and still lose. Here are some stats from last year.

Opponent Rushing Yds Score
Pittsburg 205 24-14
Gladewater 217 6-12 (ot)
Chapel Hill 243 29-7
Jefferson 179 28-0
Lindale 66 10-3
Liberty Eylau 216 39-0
Atlanta 161 28-19
New Boston 143 0-7
Queen City 155 20-17(ot)
Pleasant Grove 279 35-6
Gilmer 334 36-23
Celina 237 21-20
Rusk 245 34-10
Spring Hill 437 49-21
Midland Green. 182 0-10

[BUDDY]

Thanks for the info true blue, and Gilmer guy. I really think it will be a great year for both schools, I can wait. I do think that with the coaches son and the fullback returning, we will be a little more than 3 yards and a cloud of dust. It will be more like Cledus and the Bandit(18 wheeler and Trans Am).LOL!!!! I also think that Daingerfield will post its best defensive season since McFarlin has been at Daingerfield.

[big daddy russ]

BUDDY:
I know they have 2 part time running backs coming back from last year. One of them is 5'10 about 205 and they say he runs a 4.5. Also another part time Tight End...My God. 5'10", 205, and he runs a 4.5? I'm guessing he's a tailback because you said that your fullback from last year is returning. That's NFL size.

[Gilmer Buckeye]

Yeah, I meant that strictly in metaphorical terms. Unfortunately for the Buckeyes, your running backs were more along the lines of "30 yards and eat my dust" on the average play that day.

We couldn't wrap up. Your running backs were too strong. And there were too many of them. They were always fresh. They broke tackles like Ricky Wiliams on a good day.

I heard after the game from the coach himself that Gilmer was going to have to get stronger and really hit that weight program hard during the off-season. Our MLB that day weighed only 145 lbs.

I definitely agree that without a stellar defense, all the offensive fireworks can do for you is keep you in the game, usually losing and with a final score that looks more like a basketball game.

BTW, I've often wondered why Daingerfield didn't name its teams the "Steelers" especially after Lone Star was incorporated into the district. It'd be a catchy and distinctive name, IMHO

Oh well. That's for you all to decide. I like Buckeyes because it is fairly uncommon (we are the only one in Texas that I know of) and buckeyes actually grow wild in East Texas. Our football ribbons during homecoming week used to have actual buckeyes attached to them gathered from the surrounding countryside by the students (who got out of class to do so; this was pre-HB 72/Ross Perot school reform era).

[true_blue_tiger]

If I'm thinking correctly, Ohio State did a study to see how many teams across the nation are nicknamed Buckeyes. I believe Gilmer is the only one besides Ohio State. Steelers would be a catchy nickname. Wasn't it them that had that great defense back in the 70's? I'm not sure what decade, just taking a guess, because I wasn't around then! LOL! After the '83 season, they made a book about the season, and they had a poem in it, here was part of it:

"...We forged our defense at Lone Star Steel and our offense runs on an even keel,
Over our heads you will not pass and we'll hardly let you trod our grass,
So bring your best, your biggest name, we're re-inventing the football game..."

[BUDDY]

OK, I called someone very reliable to find out info on the Daingerfield backfield for next year. Here it goes:

Fullbacks 6'2" 230 4.7 Mentorn Mimms
5'10" 245 4.9 Anthony Craddock
5'10" 190 4.8 C.J. Rollings

Halfbacks 5'11" 205 4.5 Aron Wilson
5"10" 195 4.6 Patrick Jones
6'0" 175 4.7 Huggy Frazier
5'8" 190 4.8 Brandon Lafayette
5'6" 160 4.6 Courtney Thomas
5'10" 185 4.6 Jessie Kennedy

Quarterbacks 6'0" 175 4.6 Craig McFarlin
6'0" 175 4.7 Huggy Frazier

There are also some others that will step up to contribute, but yes Old Russ we do have some size this year, wait till you see our defense and the size of our "O" Line.

[true_blue_tiger]

and that is just a handful of the running backs! to say the least! as for the O line, they'll be pretty big this year, smallest one is the center weighing in around 190, but they all are very quick and very aggressive.

[Gilmer Buckeye]

Yeah, the Steel Curtain was what Pittsburgh's defense was known as during the '70s. And the Cowboys were called the Doomsday Defense. Then even previous to that, the LA Rams' front four was called the Fearsome Foursome. Minnesota in that era was briefly called the Purple People Eaters. And the list could go on, I'm sure.

I happened to come across the news release linked below from the University of North Texas a while back touting a celebrity golf tournament in the Metroplex involving members of both teams. Mean Joe Greene is one of the more famous alumni of UNT (back when it was the NTSU Mean Green) and a former Steeler.

http://web2.unt.edu/news/index.cfm?id=1621

[Xtex]

Sorry fellas, but a D'field coach said that Courtney has decided to go back to HS for his senior year, but the Hughes Springs folks tell me that their coach will leave it up to a vote by the kids if he can even play there. Looks like too much bouncing around left a bad taste.

I was looking at him for a little help at one of the corners but after talking to the HS people, they tell me he didn't play much D and is a little tentative even when he's totin' the ball. So, doesn't sound like much of a loss.