ARNOLD, MOSLEY, BAY SET FOR JAMBOREE

The spring football season will come to a close for Bay, Arnold, and Mosley on Friday night when the schools converge for a three-way jamboree at Gavlak Stadium at 6 p.m. The jamboree will feature three halves of football, with Arnold facing Bay in the first half, followed by Arnold vs. Mosley in the second, and Mosley vs. Bay in the third. There will be 12-minute quarters and regular season game rules except for the elimination of kickoffs, with teams starting possessions at their own 25-yard line. Admission to the jamboree is $6. All three head coaches said they were excited to get the opportunity to gauge the progress of their teams against live competition before heading into summer workouts. “We feel anxious,” Arnold coach Josh Wright said. “It’s been a while since we’ve gone against somebody other than ourselves, so we’re anxious to be able to get out on the game field on Friday night. I think that best describes the feeling here.” A coach’s approach to spring jamborees often vary depending on the team’s personnel, health, and experience level, with Bay coach Mike Watkins taking a decidedly different approach going into his second year with a group looking to replace its top five rushers and pass catchers and has a freshman – Watkins’ son, Blayne – slated to start at quarterback. “Last year, I had a lot of seniors who really hadn’t played yet, but a lot of the starters who were learning new things were 17-18-year-olds, so I threw everything at them,” he said. “I dumped the whole playbook on them to see what they could handle. “This year, with so many young kids who will be sophomores and juniors who haven’t had that varsity experience yet, I’ve tried to keep it simple on them to let them get comfortable. They’ll have enough stress on them in a new environment that I don’t want them to second guess what they’re doing. It sounds crazy, but in year two I have simplified it even more than in year one.” While Blayne Watkins seems to have a firm grasp on the starting quarterback job at Bay, the battle to be the top signal-caller rages on at Mosley. The two main competitors, juniors Michael Maddox and Josh Lingenfelter, will get a chance Friday to stake a claim to the position, though Dolphins coach Jeremy Brown said the competition is likely to continue through the summer and on into fall camp. “It’s still wide open right now. We’ve got a lot of football in the summer,” he said. “We would like to have one of those guys separate themselves by the end of camp, but I’m not sure either one will take it over in the spring game. “But (Maddox and Lingenfelter) have done really well. They haven’t turned the ball over in our scrimmages and have done a really good job of managing the offense. They’ve been a pleasant surprise.” Brown said he hopes to see positive signs from each quarterback and from his team as a whole in Friday’s jamboree, although he said he’s not sure the three-team format is the best way to measure progress through the spring. “Me personally, I would rather play one team. It makes preparation easier for both sides,” he said. “The more you can simulate a real game, the better. With two halves (against different teams), it’s hard to get a gauge on where the kids are mentally. But it is good to face somebody else. I know they’re tired of hitting each other. We’ll get to see the guys who want to go out and compete and hit people and the ones who are still lacking in that department.” Wright said he hopes to find out if some of the strengths he has identified with his team through the spring – particularly in the trenches in Arnold’s case – are actually as strong as he believes them to be. “I just want to see if we can control the line of scrimmage on both sides of the football,” he said. “That will be the real test once you get an opponent that moves and is a higher level than the scout team you face in practice. I want to see if we’re going to get what we think we’re going to get, which is a pretty good front on both sides of the ball.” Watkins said he’s simply interested in seeing if his young team, which replaces 18 seniors from a season ago, is ready for the pressure and intensity of live varsity competition. “We have a lot of young kids and new faces, so I’m interested to see how they respond once the real bullets start flying,” he said. “We’ve got so many guys with question marks that we have to get answered, from the younger guys that may be possible starters as sophomores to the guys who have been here and done that but now are moving into a leadership role. “I want to see how the young guys respond to the situation when they mess up, and I want to see how the older players play under the role of going from just one of the guys to the guy. I want to see how they step up and I want to see if the younger guys are going to be able to handle it.”

ARNOLD, MOSLEY, BAY SET FOR JAMBOREE

Photo Credit: Mosley High School Athletics

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