Eric Wolford on several Gamecocks' OL signees
SOUTH CAROLINA GAMECOCKS FOOTBALL
South Carolina offensive line coach Eric Wolford signed a five-man o-line class for 2019 and Wolford was recently asked specifically about three of those players. He goes in-depth with thoughts on them below.
"Jaylen Nichols has done some good things for a young lineman. He’s starting to learn it’s a lot different from high school with the speed of the game. He’s got some natural tools, some physical traits and some natural ability. It’s kind of going fast for him at times but he competes. He’s got to learn some finer details of blocking when it comes to blocking an SEC guy compared to a high school guys. He looks like he has a chance to be a good player for us.
"I always evaluate their parents. One thing you figured out real quick is they’re disciplined, they believe in hard work, they believe in doing things the right way. When they talk about being here at 1:00, they’re going to be here at 12:30. That’s just the way he was raised. His mom’s done a great job and he’s started off on the right foot here. He’s at meetings on time, he’s in his playbook.
"That’s the first part, then the physical tools, we saw that on film when we watched him. He’s a guy that jumped 30 inches with a strained hamstring as a high school kid. That’s pretty good when you start looking at numbers. That tells you what he has in his body and he weighs 325 pounds. That’s a freshman that’s supposed to be going to the prom in a couple weeks.”
NOTE: Nichols is already on campus and going through spring practice with South Carolina
"He’s obviously a tremendous athlete and just finished up in the playoffs in basketball. He’s a guy that can run the court at 300 pounds and is 6-foot-6. He can legitimately play left tackle. I know he can play right tackle, I know he can play guard so he’s a four-position player right there already. He likes football.
"I still think he’s raw. But the thing about him is when we get him down in June; we’ll have two months with him to get him ready to go. He’s another Jaylen Nichols type guy as a guy that can come in and who knows how fast he learns the plays and how bad he wants it. He might be able to sneak into the two-deep or be the next man in and by midseason may be the best guy. I can’t predict that.”
"Murph’s no nonsense. He’ll run through a wall for you. That’s what you have to love about Murph. He’s a two-time captain at St. Thomas Aquinas. The last guy that did that his last name was Bosa. It’s voted on, that’s something that’s not given. We have high expectations for Murph.
“He’s tough, blue collar. He loves the weight room, loves football. Football’s important to him, family’s important to him. He obviously played a great program, loves to compete and competes at a high level. We talked to him about overtraining. Those are good traits to talk to guys to try and slow him down a little bit. I don’t want him to over train.”
NOTE: South Carolina also signed two other offensive linemen in Mark Fox and William Rogers.
