The Cardinal Countdown: 24 Days Until Kickoff

#24 Jaylin Alderman

Class: Freshman

Ht/Wt: 6-1/215

Position: Linebacker

Hometown: Valdosta, GA

Twitter: @jaylin_alderman

Thoughts: The Cards picked up Jaylin last year as an early enrollee from Valdosta High School. A Top 35 player nationally at this position and just outside the Top 100 in the state of Georgia overall, Alderman joins the team looking to likely use 2021 as a springboard into his career in the next couple seasons. The Cards beat out some G5 schools for Jaylin’s services including App State, Cincinnati, and East Carolina among others.

In the clip below we get the prototypical ‘linebacker’ clips out of the gate where we see Alderman go ‘Hit Stick’ on some poor souls between the hashes, but the encouraging part for me was around the :45 second mark we see four to five plays in a row with him showing off some open field athleticism as he gets to a man in the flats, shows off some good coverage skills, and makes some plays on the outside. While I’m not sure how he was used on the offensive side of the ball you have to assume playing some tight end in high school means he has some decent speed and isn’t going to grow roots in the middle of the field on defense.

My thoughts at this point are that we don’t see a ton of Jaylin in 2021 with CJ and Monty manning the ship this year but some of the intangibles I saw makes me think he’s in the running for some solid PT in seasons to come. A nice pickup by the staff out of a real good area for recruiting.

Sweet Tweet:

Since I scan the twitter feeds of more current Louisville players than arguably anyone else in the known universe you would be shocked at the amount of times this picture or a version of it appears in the “offer” tweet for UofL. It’s an iconic moment that kids this age not only remember but likely saw live or saw all over social media. I don’t know guys……maybe we should build a statue of it or something???

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#24 Mitch Hall

Class: RS Senior

Ht/Wt: 6-1/203

Position: Long Snapper

Hometown: Clayton, NC

Twitter: @Mitch_Hall24

Thoughts: I went back twice just to verify I didn’t get hit with a number change mid-countdown because I could have sworn I already covered Mitch this year. Turns out my old brain was likely just thinking back to one of the five seasons I covered him before today. Yes, thats right, Mr. “I’ve had more action between my legs today than you’ve had your whole life, bro” Hall is back again long snapping his way into your hearts.

Mitch was the real deal out of high school as a long snapper, so much so that Petrino put him on a scholly. Mitch came in, immediately won the starting gig and has consistently done his job year after year after year after year after year. While all countdown posts are my babies some of my best work has come at the hands of recapping Mitch. Like this one from 2019 where we even got some highlight clips.

If we could keep Mitch on scholarship for another six years I’d be fine with that, and honestly he may be as well. The man has quietly done his job every week for six seasons and I’ll miss his smiling face as he whirls the ball through his legs and drops in the bread basket of the punter or holder every time. I pointed this out last year but the only logical conclusion to this career journey for Hall is to win the Patrick Mannelly Award for best long snapper. It’s not only a prestigious award but the trophy is glorious.

Sweet Tweet:

Okay, okay, forget the Mannelly…..we’re going all in this year!