Oooooooooooooooooo

/End lame tomahawk chop imitation

So I got to spend a bit of time with the Atlanta Braves today. Current injured ace Tim Hudson, possible future ace Tommy Hanson, general manager Frank Wren and former pitcher Jim Nash were in Auburn as part of the Atlanta Braves Community Caravan. My story will be up at some point tonight (I’ll link to it when it gets here) but I was going to share a few things I didn’t get in.

* Hudson’s thoughts on the Braves’ offseason

“(The front office) did as good a job as they could do. (San Diego Padres starter Jake) Peavy is a stud. The (A.J.) Burnett thing, I’d have (Derek) Lowe just as quick. I think if Peavy wanted to come here he’d be here. They could’ve worked a deal out. I like the club we’ve got. I like the pitching. We had guys pitching in our three, four and five spots last year that might not make the team this year. You can nver have enough pitching. I’m not sure where we are on (Tom) Glavine, but that’s another option we can have.“

*Hanson’s (who won the Arizona Fall League MVP) thoughts on getting to the big leagues:

“It feels really good (to nearly be there). As soon as I signed it was my goal to get to Atlanta as soon as possible. I’ve just got to keep doing what I’ve been doing and stay consistent with my pitches.“

*Nash on last year’s ridiculous rash of injuries:

“Never (have I seen anything like it). Every time we got something going somebody seemed to get hurt. And sometimes it seemed like a bunch would go down in just a couple of days.“

I didn’t get any one-on-one time with Wren.

Back with one or two things later.

EDIT: Here’s my story.

What can you buy with $2 million? How about an almost-filled staff of assistants.

Lofty numbers have been tossed around regarding the salaries of Gene Chizik’s staff of assistants. We’ve heard musings as high as the $400K-$600K range, though that would not have been safe enough to print.

And while the final numbers aren’t nearly as sky-scraping, Auburn has certainly ponied up the cash for the seven assistants currently on board.

Final contracts have not been released, but a source familiar with the principle deals confirmed Chizik’s and his seven assistants’ base salaries to the Opelika-Auburn News this evening.

The lengths of the deals are unknown, though it is expected a number of them will be of the multi-year variety. Chizik, by the way, will earn a base salary of $1.9 million plus incentives, sources told the Opelika-Auburn News at the time of Chizik’s hiring.

Congratulations go out to defensive coordinator Ted Roof ($370,000). He’s the big winner, followed closely by offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn ($350,000).

Here’s the complete list. Remember, Auburn is still in the market for two defensive assistants.

Ted Roof - defensive coordinator - $370,000
Gus Malzahn - offensive coordinator - $350,000
Trooper Taylor - wide receivers/assistant head coach - $320,000
Tracy Rocker - defensive line - $300,000
Jeff Grimes - offensive line - $290,000
Curtis Luper - running backs - $260,000
Jay Boulware - tight ends/special teams coordinator - $180,000

Grand total: $2.07 million

(Photo credit: Todd Van Emst)

Anthony Gulley commits again, and this time he has an offer to commit to

Brantley athlete Anthony Gulley became Auburn’s 23rd commit of the 2009 class Wednesday, according to multiple Auburn scouting services.

“It’s awesome (to be playing in the SEC),“ Gulley told AuburnSports.com. “There’s probably one out of 10 D-I players that get to go to an SEC school and I’m just excited.“

Gulley passed up on an offer to play both football and baseball at Troy, according to AuburnSports.com. He may try out for the Auburn baseball team, according to the Web site.

At 5-foot-11, 185 pounds, Gulley will play slot receiver at Auburn, according to AuburnSports.com.

Gulley made an official visit to Auburn on Jan. 16 and said at the time he was leaning to committing with the Tigers, but wanted to fulfill a scheduled visit to Troy. Days later – before making that visit—Gulley told Auburn recruiting Web sites he had committed to Auburn, but there was confusion as to whether Auburn had made him an official offer.

Gulley received a firm offer from Auburn earlier this week and confirmed his decision to coach Gene Chizik and offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn on Tuesday, according to AuburnUndercover.com.

“It just feels like this is my home – where I need to be,” Gulley said Jan. 18.

Gulley did it all at Brantley High School, a 1A power.

He ran for 1,162 yards on just 58 carries, caught 17 passes for 543 yards and racked up a 40.7 yards-per-return average on kickoffs and a 40.6 mark on punt returns. All told, he had 31 touchdowns.

As a free safety, he picked up 48 tackles, nine sacks and two interceptions.

All statistics were provided by AuburnSports.com.

28 Tigers named to SEC academic honor roll

We often forget that these 18-to-22-year old athletes we opine about so often actually have to attend class and make the grades.

Here’s a tip of the hat from the blog to the 28 Auburn student-athletes who were named to the SEC fall academic honor roll, which is based on grades from the 2008 Spring, Summer and Fall terms. We’re assuming that these grades had to be good.

FOOTBALL
Neil Caudle - QB - Pre-Building Science
Wade Christopher - LB - Pre-Med
Antonio Coleman - DE - Criminology
Jared Cooper - OL - Pre-Nursing Science)
John Cubelic - WR - Radio, TV & Film
Michael Gibson - RB - Civil Engineering
Josh Harris - DS - Political Science
Morgan Hull - K - Pre-Medicine
Ryan Pugh - OL - Pre-Building Science
Mike Slade - DB - Undeclared Liberal Arts
Jackson Timmerman - OL - Physics
Tommy Trott - TE - Public Administration
Bailey Woods - TE - Public Administration

SOCCER
Monica Afanador - Public Relations
Carolyn Cohen - Economics
Stephanie Fransoso - Pre-Dentistry
Heather Havron - Pre-Business
Becca Howell - Marketing
Jenn Johnson - Psychology
Kara Kasten - Accountancy
Jenni Prescott - Early Childhood Education
Addie Ragsdale - Pre-Graphic Design
Gabi Rivera - Psychology
Kasey Warren - Marketing

VOLLEYBALL
Milena Bukinac - International Business
Lauren Mellor - Apparel Merchandising, Production Design, and Management
Sara Shanks - Exercise Science
Rebecca Simon - Pre-Computer Science

(Photo credit: That’s Penny Pencil from ThinkQuest.org)

Auburn commitment John Sullen: King of the hardwood

Here at the Opelika-Auburn News, we’re all about convergence. These trying economic times demand it.

Our contribution to that involves a solid browsing of the sports section every day, even taking time out to read the stuff not penned about Auburn University and its massive amount of goings-on in athletics.

Just today, we learned that Auburn football commitment John Sullen, a massive offensive lineman from right here at Auburn High, is a basketball player. And a darn good one at that, as he scored 14 points in the Tigers’ 83-82 overtime victory over Lafayette last night. To say the least, we were a bit shocked to see Sullen’s name linked to basketball. The blog even fact-checked this one just to make sure there weren’t two John Sullens enrolled at Auburn High.

Sullen tips the scales around 340 pounds, and has weighed as much as 400 pounds in the past. Size, of course, is not a problem with Sullen, but getting that size in gear at a high rate of speed over extended periods of time might have been a concern to Auburn, which didn’t an extend an offer Sullen’s way until two weeks ago.

Basketball, as we all know, involves a bit of running, so we were interested to see how Sullen fared.

Though he threw out an unnecessary cheap shot in his introductory blog, David Morrison is a good guy. Totally trustworthy from what we gather. He was on site to watch Sullen’s performance. Here’s what he had to say.

Give us your overall impressions of Sullen as a basketball player, David.
He definitely commanded a presence in the post. The guards would dump the ball down to him and LaFayette would collapse three or four defenders. Then he’d use his arms, shoulders and belly and the defenders seemed to just wilt away. He started and played more often than he usually does because it was Senior Night, and he scored 14 points on 6-of-11 shooting, all coming from about three feet away from the basket. He did try an open 3 once. Didn’t turn out very well.

He got them some big points in the post, especially toward the end of the game. But sometimes when he’d get the ball and take his one gigantic step across the lane (his one move) he’d get stripped. So he needs to work on his ball security.

Hey David, the Marlins are a total fraud of a baseball team, but what’d you think of Sullen’s conditioning. Is he ready for two-a-days?
He did look a little….well…big. Especially with stringbean basketball players to compare him to. He didn’t do much running during the game because he really didn’t have to. On offense, he planted himself just outside the paint and if the Bulldogs ever got on the break, there was a good chance they’d have at least a 5-on-4 advantage. He was very spry in the pre-game introductions.

It might take a good couple of months for him to get up to game speed, especially for the SEC. But he craved contact out on the hardwood. There wasn’t a possession that went by that he wasn’t jostling with someone, usually with him coming out the victor. That’s a good sign for the trenches, isn’t it?

(Photo credit: Vasha Hunt)