Around this part of CA, there's only two or three big 'clinics' to hit up: the Burlingame All-Sports Clinic, the San Jose Glazier, and the Nike COY in Concord. The Burlingame clinic had an absolutely TERRIBLE lineup, literally none of the coaches that I interact with in my personal life (Vass and the rest of our semi-pro staff, the crew at my alma mater, NO ONE) were interested in anything being talked about.
The San Jose Glazier had a few good speakers that interested me: Nick Rapone from U of Delaware and Pete Kwiatowski (I think that's right...) from Boise. Unfortunately, the Boise guy, who was primed to talk a bunch of 3-4 that I was jazzed to hear, had to cancel. However I did get to see Rapone talk for about 4-5 hours over two days and that man is a stud. Hands down one of the best clinic speakers I've seen, ever. Vass almost proposed marriage.
The Nike COY was too far and too much of a labor to get to, given that there wasn't a ton that I wanted to hear.
What's coming up...
I'm trying to set up some staff visits with the following colleges: Menlo College in Menlo, CA, Berkeley, and Stanford (I think they're still running a 3-4, right?). Menlo's DC is a man named Mike Church that's been around a long time and has coached at pretty much every single level possible, I'm very interested in making contact and meeting him. Clancy Pendergast, DC at Berkeley, has been to the Super Bowl with the Cardinals. Stanford Co-DCs Jason Tarver and Derek Mason have both been in 3-4 schemes recently. All in all, if I can make some in-roads with those schools, I'll be a happy camper.
"That guy Vass sounds like a total fruit basket" - Anonymous
ReplyDeleteI randomly came across this and saw the piece about Nick Rapone. He was my defensive backs coach at Temple University and it was one of the best experiences I've ever had. There are no words to describe being under his tutelage. I've learned so much about football and life from that man.
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