The Mule Fan

LET THE SEASON BEGIN - Welcome to Alamo Heights Football 2009!

The time has now arrived. We've watched the Mules through off-season, spring ball, 7-on-7 and summer practice. It's now time to kick off the 2009 season. As most of you know, the Mules moved into a new district last year pursuant to which they play seven district games (unfortunately, Memorial and Kennedy are no longer on the schedule). The non-district schedule is made up of home-and-home games with three opponents. These are typically two year series unless everybody's getting along in which case they may be extended for successive two year terms. Apparently (we can include rumors in this blog since it is, of course, a blog)..anyway, apparently, we weren't getting along with Georgetown because they abruptly cancelled the season opener leaving a hole in the Mules schedule for the 2008 and 2009 season. Suddenly, your Mules had two options--play 9 games or play Stony Point. Some of you, with no stomach, might opt for 9 games since it is awfully hot this time of year and we don't want little Billy sweating too much in August. Well, that's not the way the Mules think about football so here we are in our second year with a season opener against Round Rock Stony Point.

Let's get the serious and not-so-fun stuff out of the way and then we can move on. Just this week, the USA Today Super 25 came out and Stony Point was ranked #15 in the country. We too, did a double take, most certain that the "r" in that word was a typographical error and the word was clearly meant to be "county." But then after reviewing a handy map of Texas with the magnifying glass, we realized that Ft. Lauderdale, East St Louis and Miami--others in the Super 25--are not tiny towns located in Williamson County, Texas. Thus the "r" was correct (sigh).

But then, remember that last year Stony Point was ranked about the same place in a national magazine and things didn't turn out so bad for the Mules in the 2008 campaign. So it's glass half-full, not half-empty, and that's how we should all attack this week. Last year, the Mules traveled to Round Rock where they quickly trailed 30-6, before eventually losing 58-16. No doubt, that was a tough day and the Mules learned a lot about themselves that evening. The score blew up because of a handful of huge plays and, truth be told, the Mules actually played a pretty good second half, but for a couple of plays. The Mules regrouped and continued their march into the season.

Not surprisingly, Stony Point is favored to win District 16-5A. Stony Point returns five starters on offense and six starters on defense. Supposedly, Stony Point has 11 players (maybe the second rumor) committed to D-I schools including CB Kevin White who has committed to Utah and FS Desmond Martin who has committed to Texas Tech. Stony Point will be led by QB Aaryn Sharp and WR/RB Stephen Williams. The Tigers also return all three starting linebackers and three additional receivers. Stony Point won the State 7-on-7 tournament this past summer in College Station so speed and talent are deep on this squad.

Okay, so they are good. We all know that so let it go. It's a great opportunity! Have you seen Carter Thurmond hit? Have you seen Thomas McSween jump to block a pass? Have you seen Trevor Lovelady catch passes all summer? Have you seen the muffin man (whoops, sorry got carried away). You starting to get it? Let's play football.

The Mules are good as well. We have seen these boys working hard since December for this ten game regular season. Our talented coaching staff has spent countless hours helping the team prepare for this season. The staff has our team ready for every game, regardless of the opponent. A group of Mules will be suiting up for the beginning of their last season. And others, will be stepping onto the field with a year or two left, but with the same focus as the seniors. Needless to say, Alamo Heights loves its football and we look forward to watching them play every game this season. The Mules appear to be fairly healthy heading into the season. Though we don't generally report injuries here (unless everyone sees it or knows about it or Coach Byrd mentions it or if one of the Mule Fan editors cramps up), a couple of Mules are questionable for the Stony Point game, but the scrimmage with MacArthur ended with no new injuries--one of the main goals of the scrimmage.

Come out and support the Mules...be early and be loud. It's football time in '09.

FRIDAY, AUGUST 28, 2009
Harry B. Orem Stadium
7:30 p.m.

See you there.


A Few Words with the Head Coach of the Mules – Don Byrd
August 25, 2009 (Season Opener edition)

The Mule Fan: (Coach Byrd starts his 15th season as head coach of the Mules in 2009)
You’ve been through spring training, boot camp, summer conditioning, 7-on-7 and now the first two weeks of fall workouts. How do you feel about where you are now and what are you most excited about as we prepare to kick off the 2009 season?

Coach Byrd: We’re most excited about the chemistry of the players. They really work well together. They have a lot of confidence in each other. They build off each other. So that’s been the fun part. With all the phases-I’m very pleased with Boot Camp and the way off-season went. We had a lot of records in the weight room. In 7-on-7 I thought we competed well against very fine talent throughout the state and the first couple weeks of practice have gone well. Of course you’re in that mode where you’ve got to keep improving. But right now we’re on target with where I’d like to be. But you always have to improve between that first scrimmage and that first game. You’ve got to improve immensely after that first game to the second game.

The Mule Fan: Let’s look at the different segments of the team. We talked in the spring about graduation leaving some holes on the defense. How do you see the defense at this point?

Coach Byrd: Defensively I see a great attitude, a lot of enthusiasm and a lot of intensity. To become a very good defense we’re going to have to play better technique. The kids are trying and that’s a part of being young. They don’t come in right away and get everything perfect but they’re trying their hardest. The coaches are doing a great job of working with them. But the little things of how we fit on people who are trying to block us, how we escape blocks, making sure we have all of our gap responsibilities taken care of and our pursuit and so forth. It’s a fine line of being just an average defense and a very good defense. We’re showing all the effort for it. It’s just coming down to technique now. I think we’re going to be fine there. The kids are really coming along strong. We’ve got a couple of kids out in the secondary. (Luke) Maloy really hasn’t had that much playing time for us this year. And (Mitchell) Dan we’ve been slowly feeding back in after his injury. We’re going to look at those two heavy this week to see how healthy they are and how far they’ve come along and where they are. And that will determine a lot with the secondary. Carter Thurmond and (Phillip) Massari have both done an outstanding job. We’ve got a lot of other young men who are plugging away at it. But Dan and Maloy are the unknowns.

The Mule Fan: You put the 4-3 defense in during spring training and indicated we’d see more of that. You’ve had some more time to work with that new defense now. How has that progressed?

Coach Byrd: It’s coming along very well. It adds a lot of things. It highlights our linebackers and we can highlight our safeties in it so we’re excited about that. It’s a learning process because as we throw it together we’ve got to make sure each coach is on the same page on theory and so forth. And we’re coming along with it but it’s going to be a little slower process by installing a new defense. But I think it’s the way we need to go this year.

The Mule Fan: This time last year we were talking about a very inexperienced offense particularly the offensive line. But this year they’re coming back as a veteran group and the offense of course has a new look at quarterback with Cullen Mills taking the reins. What’s your view of the offense?

Coach Byrd: I am excited about how the offense has come along. Again, they did a nice job with their execution at 7-on-7. Mills has made some very good decisions. He throws a nice ball to catch. He’s gaining more confidence each and every time. You know quarterbacking comes down to a lot of different things. One of the top things is your decision making because on every play you have something you have to decide and its going to determine whether you get positive yardage or not and he’s really been a fine young man. Stephen Elder behind him is throwing the ball great and he’s improving each and every day and gaining confidence. So we’re excited about the quarterback position. Justin Rosenthal all of spring and so far this fall has really done a nice job for us and we’re excited about where he is. We’re going to count on him to make big plays. You know early in the season the ones that have experience are the ones who need to make plays. It’s people like him, (John) Cabell and (Trevor) Lovelady, (Cullen) Wernette, (Nick) Morton and (Matt) Cohen; the ones who started last year are the ones that need to make sure we set the pace and the tone. So we’re excited about it. I think we were able to run the ball a little more this spring and so forth so we’re excited about being back to more of a dual threat type of team. So we’re going to continue to work on that with the experience we have on the line and at running back.

The Mule Fan: We didn’t spend as much time discussing special teams in the spring but we had a chance to see more of that in the MacArthur scrimmage. Where are you with special teams at this point?

Coach Byrd: I think special teams are going to be fine. (Kristian) Stern has done a nice job. He’s worked hard. He kicks a ball that gets great distance and height. We have some young guys that can go down and cover. Of course we haven’t seen it in game situations as much so that’s something that we’ll have to wait and see. Our kickers and special teams people I think will be fine.

The Mule Fan: This group of seniors was the last group that was around for the state title run in 2006. Even though they didn’t play, they were around and practicing for those intense weeks. And of course they’ve been in the playoffs every year since. When you think about how many additional practices these guys have had and the extra playing time in playoff games, is it too much of a leap to say this is the most experienced group of seniors you’ve ever had?

Coach Byrd: Yeah they really are because you know they’ve also been through two spring trainings and we’ve never had spring training since I’ve been here. So there are three extra practices during the spring. Then there are the playoffs. When we won state they were freshmen so that’s five more weeks. Then the next year we went two more and then last year two more. So that’s nine weeks of post-season practices and six weeks of spring training so we’ve been able to work with these young men a lot.

The Mule Fan: At this time of year your thoughts also turn to injuries and early season bumps and bruises. How’s the health report entering the opening week?

Coach Byrd: I think we’re doing real well. We’re going to be able to look at Maloy, Dan and Matt Cohen a lot this week. There’s three of them and John Cabell is getting closer so there are some people there that we’ve missed at the beginning but we’re excited about the experience that they’re going to bring in. Hopefully they’re fully healed and we can move on with them. So the injuries have been down to a minimum so far knock on wood because we’ve got to stay healthy to have success.

The Mule Fan: For the second consecutive year it’s Round Rock Stony Point in the opener. This is a team that had a lot of success last year reaching the state semi-finals, they had success during 7-on-7 as well. They graduated their quarterback and starting running back but there’s probably some depth on that squad. It seemed to us that Stony Point was man-for-man the most athletic team we faced last season. What are you expecting from Stony Point in the opener?

Coach Byrd: Well they are a very athletic team. It’s a fine program. It’s a large 5-A school with 7 teams – three freshman, three JV’s and a varsity. And they do have a lot of depth. You know it’s been tough trying to schedule games here at Alamo Heights. We’ve had some success and a lot of people have chosen not to play us. So Stony Point was one we had to go with. Coach Chesser does a great job. It’s a big challenge for us but it’s a team that’s going to make us better in the long run. We’re a more experienced team this year. Last year we had three new coaches and no experience on the offensive line. All our coaches are back this year. I’m excited about having six guys back on offense. I’ll be upset if we don’t have some success this week. We ought to be able to move the ball.

Other Action This Week:

JV is at Stony Point Thursday(5:00 and 6:30) and the Freshmen are at home against Stony Point Thursday(5:00 and 6:30). Good luck to all four teams!

Remember the Fall Kickoff Picnic is this week!

Your attendance is vital at the Fall Kickoff Picnic this Wednesday August 26 at Harry B. Orem Stadium. Come out and support the players, meet the coaches, leaders and families of this year’s sports teams, band and spirit groups. There is no better way to build community spirit for the upcoming year than to slop some barbecue on your shirt with your friends at this popular event. Come watch Football and Volleyball practice from 4p-5p. Then from 5p-7p you’ll be entertained by the AHHS band and hear introductions. Barbecue dinner plates are $6 each and tickets can be purchased at the picnic. The dinner plate proceeds go towards defraying the cost of the event.
SPONSORS ARE STILL NEEDED FOR THE EVENT.
If you would like to become a sponsor please send a check for $200 (or more) payable to “The Mule Team” and return to Troy Jessee @ 141 Blue Bonnet Blvd. San Antonio, Texas 78209 or turn it in to the athletic office. Should a sponsor choose to designate their contribution to a particular athletic team or school organization please note that team or organization on the check. Any un-designated contributions will go into the athletic fund and used at the discretion of the athletic director. Checks needed to have been received by August 21st for banner recognition. But the donations still make a difference. More information is available at the AH athletic office.
New feature at the Fall Kickoff picnic: This year there will be two other ways for the Mules to get into your wallet but you’ll like these. There will be a silent auction for a reserved parking space in the “jock lot” for home football games!! This is the lot just behind the west stands between the stadium and the Mule Dome. The only way to get closer to the stadium would be to tunnel into the locker room or to live in the press box.. So that ought to get your attention. There will also be a raffle for two season tickets for the 2009 AH football season. The Mule Fan editors got a private tour of the seat location and we can confirm that they are on the 50 yard line (well not ON the 50 but up in the stands on the 50-you know what we mean).

Mules on Twitter:

Hey we are a happening group of fans on the cutting edge. As you saw last year with some of the new features and toys we used, you’ll know that we like to use available technology to round out our coverage and burn up some of your valuable time. Well another year has passed and there’s more stuff out there for us to try. So here goes. The Mule Fan is on TWITTER! Go to www.twitter.com/mulefanblog and sign up to follow the Mules in very short bursts of quite tasty information! Our pledge – to use Twitter to deliver different content than you can get here on the site and to use puns when appropriate. What a deal! More work for us and the quality of your day increases by 140 characters at a time. Activate Twitter on your mobile phones so we can try and distract you at games as well. We promise to tweet you right.

UPDATE: After this compelling promote of the twitter site, enough followers poured in to fill a pretty large bathtub at a nice NYC hotel suite. Head Mule Fan twitterer Cohen was overheard telling someone at the MacArthur scrimmage "Heck at this pace it would be easier just to walk up to everyone and say hi and tell 'em something I just thought of." Rumors are flying that this twitter idea is demographically careless, a little like wearing white a few days after Labor Day and potentially embarrasing to our publishers who have forked over the resources to help make it happen. We have convinced our publishers that they are being too hasty in their harsh judgement of the Mule Fan Nation's hipness. After all, this is only 2009's second post and even though y'all roared back in to the Mule Fan blog on the web (thanks folks) you should be given time because everyone's busy with the cooking, the washing, flossing, the back-to-school shopping and writing checks to the PTO. So we've settled down those cigar-chomping, cake-eatin' clean boys in the carpeted office. Frequency of the message is important and we've only just started. This is a great chance to get out front of your children on this because they just might not be on it too much yet either. Here's your chance to shut them up once and for all on who's bad and who ain't. Think of the dinner time conversations this can stimulate. You'll have something to tell your barber. People in Estonia will know your name. You will no longer be mis-tweeted!



Tickets!

Those of you who are waiting for your Alamo Heights season tickets to be couriered to your front door are going to be surprised to hear us remind you that you must go to the athletic office and PICK UP your tickets. THERE IS A GAME THIS WEEK!!! Patty Juarez sends her warmest regards and asks that you get on over there and get 'em. You might consider picking them up when you come to Wednesday night's Fall Kickoff Picnic. But in any case, you can pick them up before Friday August 28th at 3:30pm. If you miss that deadline, then they will be available at the ticket booth on the home side of Harry B. Orem Stadium on game night. If you miss that deadline, you could potentially be subjected to public ridicule and scorn. You could also be chosen at random to have a wild game cookbook read to you by a rough looking woman with a heavy Slavic accent. This may or may not be pleasant but why risk it?

Laredo bus trip:

Looking ahead a little, the Mules take on Laredo United on September 10 in Laredo. That’s a Thursday night folks (productivity and commerce that day among Mule faithful should be robust). Fair is fair, we made them come up here last year on a Thursday. But anyhow, bus trips are forming up for that schlep down there. We hear that the fare will be approximately $30 per person. You can be bumped up to first class for $31.75. The movie on board will be “Border Fencing-An Olympic Saga”. But seriously, more details will come along. As usual, the Mule Fan pushes off most of these details and questions to the AH Athletic office since they can actually answer the questions. Check with Patty Juarez for more details.


Mules On Radio This Week:

Two important announcements regarding the Mules on the air! This season the Mules have a new radio home - ESPN 1250 AM "The Zone." Dave Parker and Ed Suarez will bring us all the action - home and away. Please remember to patronize all the Mules radio sponsors and tell them thanks! Parker also hosts an exciting live broadcast each Wednesday evening from 7pm-8pm on ESPN 1250 The Zone called Dave Parker's High School Coaches Corner. Big Bob's Burgers is located at Harry Wurzbach and Eventide. The show features a different high school coach each week and Dave's first guest is Mules head coach Don Byrd on Wednesday, September 2nd. Bring your Mom and them and come down to Big Bob's next Wednesday and show our support for Coach Byrd, ESPN 1250 and Big Bob's!

Go Mules!