The Cardinal Countdown: 13 Days Until Kickoff

#13 Ethan Horton

Class: Junior

Ht/Wt: 6-0/205

Position: Quarterback

Hometown: Hyden, KY

Twitter: @EHorton15

Thoughts: Last season I went a little ‘high brow’ on Ethan’s countdown post and threw in a ‘Horton Hears a Who’ joke. Wait, I guess Dr. Seuss jokes are actually ‘low brow’ right? I mean, they are targeted at a young audience. Maybe I can get a focus group put together to discuss the merits of each side of the argument? Maybe I can even get Ethan to moderate? Of course, I’d only give it a solid 5 minutes before Horton hears a “who…gives a crap?” (Sorry, Ethan, I couldn’t resist) In all seriousness though, go back and read last year’s post for Day 13 as it was one of my favorites and covers one Mr. James Burgess as well.

Ethan will more than likely be relegated to the scout team again this year, and before we dismiss the assignment at hand, Horton will probably be tasked with replicating the likes of Deshaun Watson, Greg Ward Jr, Thomas Sirk, whoever Florida State throws out there, and BB Gun Barker. With the exception of maybe one of those guys, anyone else signing up for that gig? Oh, and he gets the pleasure of going up against a Top 20 defense daily. (Thanks for coming; the exit door is to your left) Good luck to Horton this year, put some pressure on that defense…and try not to piss off DeAngelo Brown. Dude can bench like three of you.

Sweet Tweet:

That feeling when your Friday class gets cancelled >>>

— Ethan Horton (@EHorton15) June 20, 2014

Hopefully some of you young folk get to experience that today for one reason or another. It was always pretty magical when it happened to me. I know I touched on this before but as a Senior in college I needed to take some random advanced statistics class in order to graduate and wouldn’t you know, the only time it was offered was on Fridays 2-4pm.

“Les Miserables” for sure.

If at all possible college folk, avoid Friday classes all together. Thank me later.

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#13 P.J. Blue

Class: Freshman

Ht/Wt: 6-3/195

Position: Safety

Hometown: Jemison, AL

Twitter:@Ocho_Blu8

Thoughts: In a perfect world, three or four years from now I’m still cranking out countdown posts, and I go back and look at this post in particular to see how I projected PJ Blue to impact this 2016 team, and the expectations I had for him during his time at Louisville. By that time of course (say, August 2019) we’ll all be very familiar with Mr. Blue, and just how important he is to our defensive unit. Probably see his name on a few posters, get his name mentioned in some preseason watch lists, and maybe slide into a team captain role. Too much? Maybe I tipped my hand a little too aggressively as to what I think P.J. is capable of, but everything I’ve seen, read, and heard has Blue projecting towards being a big part of the team, we just may have to wait a year or two to see it. With less than two weeks to go you’ve already read my thoughts on fellow underclassmen safety Khane Pass and my recap on Dee Smith will be in a couple days, (spoiler alert: I like them both a lot) but P.J. could potentially be better than both of them...and may not play safety.

Blue was a big target for the Cardinals last year and rightfully so. A consensus 4 star athlete who was a long time South Carolina commit (prior to the dag gum coaching change) and was flooded with offers from Tennessee, Clemson, Auburn, Oklahoma…and most importantly, Louisville. The Sooners made a late push for Blue but Bobby got his man (forever beating the Stoops) and you could tell Petrino and Grantham were both excited on NSD about him joining the program. Blue can sit down and list his accolades for days...an Under Armour All-American, US Army All-American nominee, first team All-State, Top 10 player in state of Alabama, member of the All-Metro team (You know what they say..If the young Metro team don’t trust ya…) and finished his high school career as a four year starter with over 340 tackles. Trophy case on swole.

Even though Blue stood out among the rest of the newcomers in camp, the Cardinals depth in the secondary may mean a redshirt is in the future for PJ this year. Heyward and Grantham both like Blue’s size (6-3 is great, and Miday will give him another 10-12lb of muscle) and both spoke about his physicality early in camp. Coach Dennison also highlighted his balls skills and knowledge of the game for a true freshman. While I’d hate to say they were ‘gushing’…well….they were ‘gushing’. Among all the praise the big quote from Grantham that stuck out to me was when he said Blue had “position flexibility”. Could we see the next JHC in training? Blue did play LB in high school and has similar size, speed, and skills to a young Harvey-Clemons. You all sold on this kid yet?

Before I have us all penciling in Blue as an All-American leading us to a title in a few years let me dial back the hype slightly. We all know that high school awards, stars, and statistics mean jack when you step on campus, and Blue has significant work to do just to catch up with some of the players we already have on our roster. Without the drive, the athleticism means squat, without the hours in the film room, the size is worthless, and without the pressure to succeed, the early season praise is pointless.…but, I think when I have that August 2019 flashback Blue will have me looking much smarter than I really am. Future me says “thanks” for the doing all the work PJ, I’ll just take the labor free admiration.

Sweet Tweet:

Summer workouts ✅

— P.J. BLUE... (@Ocho_Blu8) July 22, 2016

I told you Miday was gonna get that weight up. Blue may be able to protect ole’ Ethan from DeAngelo Brown here soon….

Nah…probably not.