It is no secret that the Arkansas Razorbacks have dealt with injuries virtually every week this season.
Head coach Sam Pittman and his squad have had to mix and match at times, especially in the secondary. Following a 52-35 win over BYU, the Hogs are now in the midst of a much-needed bye week that will allow them to heal and rest.
According to Pittman, the team plans to have all of its players — other than those out for an extended period of time — back for the Auburn game.
"I expect every one of our guys back for the Auburn game (with the exceptions of LaDarrius Bishop, Jalen Catalon and Taurean Carter)," Pittman said in his Wednesday press conference. "I expect everybody else to be back by the way we’re practicing. We want to get as healthy a team as possible."
Pittman said the team is doing three walk-throughs this week (Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday), which is more than the usual one or two that he would prefer in an open week.
"I just -- we won't have enough," Pittman said. "We've had some fingers, hands, different things, concussions, things of that nature, where going into this bye week, if we did that, I'd be really concerned about not only our 1s and our 2s, but our scout team getting us prepared for the rest of the year."
The walk-throughs limit physical contact and allows the team to really understand situation football. It's an opportunity to get away from the fast pace and hard hitting.
"Well, the physicality would happen, certainly, in a regular practice," Pittman said. "A walk-through, we basically go through five segments and they’re situational football...so it’s all situational, team run, things of that… It’s just to slow down pace."
He also added that they decided to take helmets off the players last year during the bye week, because if they didn't, the walk throughs wouldn't become what they want.
"The reason I like that is because the kids know exactly where to go and how to go do it," Pittman said. "In a walk, you can kind of at times stumble into the right guy, if that makes sense. So we want to make sure our footwork’s right at every position. We want to make sure our communication pre-snap, that we know where we’re going."
Pittman said that guys like Bumper Pool (hip) and Jadon Haselwood (AC joint) will definitely benefit from the lack of physicality in practice. Both guys have been playing through injuries for most of the season, but the open week can allow them to heal up.
Another thing Pittman mentioned was quarterback KJ Jefferson will not throw a ball in practice this week, as Jefferson is dealing with a sore shoulder. Pittman added that it will be fine and Jefferson will be ready to go next Monday.
The downside to three walk-throughs is that younger players aren't getting as many reps in.
"I hate it for the kids, because there's some guys like (James) Jointer, Landon Rogers, guys like that...(Quincy) McAdoo, (Sam) Mbake, other guys, Nico (Davillier), that need tackle football," Pittman said. "But we also need, those guys are all, three of them are all in our 2-deep, and the other guys are very valuable for the scout team, as well."
Pittman said the team would normally do a walk-through and scrimmage with young players and then practice Monday and Tuesday, but they didn't do that in the bye week last season and elected to do the same this year. He added that he has cautioned more this season because they have a five-game run to finish the season, rather than the four-game run last year.
"I'd like it to look like it did a little bit more last year than I do now, but I think we've kind of been cornered, or whatever the word is, into what we're doing now," Pittman said.
The Hogs will practice through Thursday and then take Friday, Saturday and Sunday off. Next Monday will be the start of a normal week.
"We’ll come back and have a regular work week starting on Monday," Pittman said on the SEC Teleconference. "Our biggest concern is mentally getting prepared. We’re watching a lot of film on Auburn after we closed down the BYU game yesterday, and getting healthy. Those are our two biggest concerns."
