Three huge overreactions to Texas A&M football's spring game: A&M will lead the conference in pass defense
After that spectacle today, I'm pretty much ready to declare the pass defense entirely fixed. I mean, come on. This team last year looked like they had no idea how to cover receivers downfield, and today it felt like no receiver had even an inch of space when targeted on the long ball.
The only poor coverage I saw was a quick mental lapse by freshman transfer safety Marcus Ratcliffe, who didn't get his head around when trying to catch up to Noah Thomas, but he still made the catch tough on #3. Of course, Thomas used his spectacular receiving ability to pull the ball in anyway.
But Ratcliffe made some positive plays as well, including some supreme physicality on a hit early in the game that jarred a ball loose. He was second on the white team in tackles, notching 6 in total.
BJ Mayes impressed as well. He drew one pass interference, but his coverage was superb the whole day otherwise. He's been a favorite of mine to start at one of the corner spots, and today's performance enhanced that intuition even further.
Dalton Brooks, Bryce Anderson, and Jaydon Hill all looked outstanding in their given roles as well. Donovan Saunders showed me something at corner. There's so much to be excited for in this secondary—and I think they can get back to the league-leading level of pass defense they played two years ago because of it.