Consistency will come over time

Sometimes there is a great amount of attention placed on the first day of practice for any team.

Mississippi State opened preseason football camp on Friday in Mike Leach's third season as the head coach.

Even though the anticipation of getting back on the field was real for the Bulldogs, they really didn't learn very much from day one.

There is a long way to go and several more practices to get through before MSU begin the 2022 season on September 3 against Memphis.

All in all Leach didn't seem too disappointed with how the Bulldogs performed in his first chance to evaluate them this fall. He said there was more good than bad.

Leach is always looking for consistency and it's difficult to get that on the first day. MSU will get better in that area over the next several weeks.

The one thing the Bulldogs have going for them this preseason is experience.

Having players like Will Rogers, Jo'quavious Marks, Dillon Johnson, Laquinston Sharp and Austin Williams back on offense is a major plus for the third year of the Air Raid offense. Emmanuel Forbes, Jaden Crumedy and Nathaniel Watson return for the defense.

“The older guys can help the younger guys,” Leach said. “Not always verbally sometimes, but by example.”

There's no way to judge how good MSU will be after just one practice. Time will tell if the Bulldogs will be better than most people predict when they take the field in September.

Changing subjects for a moment.

Some of you will recognize the person shown on the back page of the newspaper today and the outdoor column accompanying his photo.

Jim Luke, or James as I call him, was a major influence of mine when becoming a sports writer back in the 1980s. He and Joseph Ammerman will never know how much they mean to me with their instruction and friendship during that time.

The late Don Foster was also a mentor of mine.

James and I, along with a few other former members of The SDN staff, got together recently for a quick reunion over lunch and we were able to remember some good times.

After posting about our experience on social media, one of our readers reached out and requested that James write a throwback outdoor column. That is something that had already been on my mind for a while and knew it would be popular.

Appreciation goes out to James for taking the time out of his schedule to share his thoughts in a column. He takes a great amount of pride in the outdoors and it shows in how he writes about the subject.

As far as the hidden message behind what he submitted for today's edition, it does require some thought to figure out where he went with it.

James was always up for a challenge.

Danny P. Smith is the sports editor of The Starkville Daily News. The opinions in this column are his and not necessarily the views of the SDN or its staff.