40 Acres Sports

Ex-basketball player Gary Goodner dies. Center on the 1978 NIT championship team, has died of an apparent heart attack.

Muschamp is ready to get the defense going. Watching the video of the press conference got me fired up.

Former running backs coach Ken Rucker is moving into the newly created Director of High School Relations position.

UT, Texas A&M close to moving game to Thanksgiving? Night game on Turkey Day would be incredible. Great idea, hope it happens.

Mack Brown may not be finished with the coaching shuffle. Akina to Hawaii? Rucker out of coaching??

In a surprising decision, tight end [tag]Jermichael Finley[/tag] has declared for the 2008 NFL Draft and will forgo his final two seasons of eligibility at Texas. Only a redshirt sophomore, Finley is eligible for the draft since he has spent three years on campus.

In just two seasons for the Longhorns Jermichael quickly climbed into the UT record books for tight ends. He finishes his brief career third all time in career receptions (76) for the position and sixth in receiving yards (947). Finley finished the 2007 season with an impressive 45 catches for 575 yards.

From the official UT release:

“The NFL is every football player’s dream and when my NFL grade came back, it was encouraging and I felt like it was in my best interest to enter the draft,” Finley said. “I’ve worked really hard for three years at Texas to prepare for this and I think I’m ready for the challenge. Coach Chambers and all of the coaches have helped me improve and taught me so much that I can’t thank them enough.”

“I want to thank Coach Brown for the great opportunity he gave me and everything I learned from him. He’s a great man. Playing at Texas was the experience of a lifetime. Austin, the campus, every one in the football program and the fans have all treated me so well. It’s a first class place and I’ll really miss it. The win in the Holiday Bowl, getting another 10 wins and the team coming together capped off a great experience for me at UT.”

“I really enjoyed the opportunity to help out the younger guys, especially Josh (Marshall) and Blaine (Irby). They’re both great guys and will be great players so I look forward to watching them and all of the Longhorns. The future is bright at Texas and I’ll always be a Longhorn.”

Rumors this weekend were that Finley would be returning next season after reportedly only receiving a fourth or fifth round grade from NFL scouts. Without going into details, Jermichael had to weigh more than just his draft slot when making this decision. Though he might have improved his draft stock by returning for another season, he has apparently deciding that leaving now was ultimately in his best interest.

The mismatches his size and speed created will definitely be missed in next year’s offense. [tag]Blaine Irby[/tag] played a good bit this year as a true freshman and looked promising, but with no other highly rated guys on campus or in this year’s recruiting class the position is definitely lacking quality depth. We might see a lot more four wide receiver sets or tight ends pass blocking than we did this year.

Good luck Jermichael.

I’m not sure whether or not [tag]Roger Clemens[/tag] is telling the truth, but I’m also not sure I buy that Brian McNamee knows anything either. Clemens sure seems confident that McNamee has no proof, and he’s pissed about it as well:

Clemens has filed a defamation lawsuit in Harris County. Clemens claims McNamee originally made his allegations to federal authorities after being threatened with criminal prosecution if he didn’t implicate Clemens.

He better be 100% positive McNamee doesn’t have sort of evidence, and that there’s no way anyone else can come forward with proof he took HGH or steroids. If he had just issued a denial and then let the whole thing go the only thing really at stake was his Hall of Fame entry. The strong denial and lawsuit are certainly risky maneuvers, Roger is putting it all out of the table in an attempt to prove his innocence. Even if Clemens can discredit McNamee or disprove these current allegations, unfortunately a can of worms has been opened that there may be no way to close.

June Jones officially takes SMU job. Might acually be interesting to go catch a game now.

Appeal of Texas too strong for Muschamp to resist. He was “blown away” by what he saw and what he experienced when he got to Austin.

Lance Zierlein’s first 2008 NFL Mock Draft. I’d love to see Limas Sweed go to the Titans. Great fit.