Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Kansas Jayhawks Football Adds Former Texas A&M Starting Center Bryce Foster in the Transfer Portal
Episode Date: June 15, 2024Former Texas A&M Aggies center Bryce Foster has a new home in Lawrence, KS with the Kansas Jayhawks Football team as the redshirt junior picked his new school out of the transfer portal. Info, scoutin...g report and what Foster brings to KU. How he fits with the team, how it makes  Lance Leipold's team even better and adds to the offensive line. Predicting the starting OL for the 'Hawks. Plus, grading the football trade of Foster for Armaj Reed-Adams and the basketball trade of Rylan Griffen for Labaron Philon with Alabama Crimson Tide and Kansas Jayhawks basketball.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!LinkedInThese days every new potential hire can feel like a high stakes wager for your small business. That’s why LinkedIn Jobs helps find the right people for your team, faster and for free. Post your job for free at LinkedIn.com/lockedoncollege. Terms and conditions apply.GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply.FanDuelToday's episode is brought to you by FanDuel. Make Every Moment More. Right now, NEW customers get TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS in BONUS BETS with any winning FIVE DOLLAR BET.  That’s TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS in BONUS BETS- with any winning FIVE DOLLAR BET!! Visit FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON to get started. eBay MotorsFrom brakes to exhaust kits and beyond, eBay Motors has over 122 million parts to keep your ride-or-die alive. With all the parts you need at the prices you want, it’s easy to bring home that big win. Keep your ride-or-die alive at EbayMotors.com. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply. eBay Guaranteed Fit only available to US customers.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)
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On today's Locked On Jayhawks, Kansas football has their final piece to the puzzle for their 2024 Big 12 title push.
You are Locked On Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks.
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subscribe to the action on today's edition of locked on Jayhawks.
Kansas has their final puzzle piece that they're hoping can help them make a push for a big
12 title in 2024.
That is former Texas A&M starting center Bryce Foster
committing to the team out of the transfer portal we're going to tell you about Foster we're going
to give you a scouting report what it means for KU and we're going to grade the trades because now
KU basically made two trades this offseason they traded LeBaron Phylon for Ryland Griffin with
Alabama basketball and they traded Armage Reed Adams for Bryce Foster on the football field.
So we're going to grade those on this episode of the show,
which is brought to you by LinkedIn Jobs.
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Okay, so Bryce Foster visited KU about a week ago.
It wasn't this past weekend.
It was the weekend before.
Sounds like the visit went super well. He had some glowing quotes about the team and about the offensive line group
and about how surprising it was.
I think for a lot of people, when you come out, when you're from out of state,
you don't know what you're getting into coming into the middle of Kansas.
Right. And I mean, I'm from California. Right.
And when I came out and saw the campus, it was surprising to me how awesome it
was. And I think you see that with a lot of recruits,
if you can get them to visit and be on campus, they can see, you know,
it's not just the middle of nowhere, Western Kansas that you're talking about.
Not that there's anything wrong with that, but you know, it's not just the middle of nowhere, Western Kansas that you're talking about. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but, you know, it's such a helpful recruiting tool.
And you see the beauty of where the stadium is going to be.
And you have the beauty of the hill and the Campanile and all this stuff.
Anyway, point being, he ends up committing to KU.
He was kind of slowly releasing on his Twitter profile, like in his bio, it said like rock.
And then like, like an hour later, it said rock C dot, dot, dot.
And he was like slowly building up to that.
So kind of cool that he was able to go out and make that happen.
Anyway, he is a transfer from Texas A&M.
And not only is this somebody who can come in right away,
and I think he's going to be expected to be a starter for you
on the offensive line at the center position
because he was a starter for Texas A&M in the SEC.
But also this is somebody who has
multiple years, if he wants it, left of college football that you could have more years out of
this. So who is Foster? He is a 6'5", 330-pound center. His nickname, at least according to one
of his social media profiles, is The Mountain, which very well-suited for a 6'5", 330-pound center.
Again, originally from Katy, Texas.
He's transferring after a ton of play with Texas A&M.
Out of high school, he was a very, very highly recruited kid.
Four-star on 24-7 sports, top 70 overall prospect in the entire country on the 24-7 sports composite,
where he was the fifth highest rated interior offensive lineman.
I think on rivals, they had him as like a top 50 kid in the entire country.
So, I mean, this was somebody with super high prospect pedigree.
And this was the scouting report that he was given by Gabe Brooks
of 24-7 sports coming out of high school.
Stout, big-bodied interior offensive lineman, run game mauler
who flashes impressive close quarters
power point of attack punch likely aided by terrific athletic profile that includes elite
throw ability and shot put and discus will finish blocks to the ground especially when initial hand
placement is good aware and pass broke and improve pad level to maximize run game power but owns
immense phone booth strength as is still needs to improve overall balance and body control
size and strength often overwhelm one-on-one matchups but not immune to quickness and leverage
maybe close to maxed out physically but floor is very high among the nation's top interior
offensive line prospects in the 2021 class likely a multi-year high major starter which has already
happened with long-term potential nfl draft potential and speaking of that nfl draft
potential to show you that, you know,
there is still, I think, some interest there.
NFL mock draft database.
They have like a consensus big board, which looks at, you know,
all the different mock drafts that are out there and kind of compiles them.
He's 137th on that.
So that would be what, like a fourth round pick, fourth round comp pick,
fifth round pick, something like that of the 2025 NFL draft with a high
watermark of 101, which would be basically a third round comp pick or an early fourth round comp pick, fifth round pick, something like that, of the 2025 NFL draft with a high watermark of 101, which would be basically a third round comp pick or an early
fourth round pick. In fact, in the Lindy's preseason magazine, which is one of the first
ones that came out the preseason, the college football season, they have him rated as the
number one center for the 2025 NFL draft. So some people are very high on what he could be at the NFL level.
So he came in from Texas A&M, and he began his play in Texas A&M in 2021.
That was as a true freshman, which was actually, by some metrics
and grades or whatever, his best season.
And I do think it correlates with that was his healthiest season,
and that ended up being his best. He started all 12 games for Texas A&M that season in 2021. He had a PFF
grade of 69.2. He was all SEC freshman team. He was freshman all America team by both the Athletic
and the Football Writers Association of America. He was a great player in his first year as a freshman. Unfortunately,
his second year in 2022, he suffered an injury. He started four games and then took that injury
and then ended up taking a medical redshirt. I do believe, though, 2021 was the playing through
COVID year. So I don't believe or would that have been 2020 in which that was the case? I guess that
was 2020 so
anyway so now he's going into 2022 he's a sophomore takes a medical redshirt now he's going into 2023
where he is now because he took a medical redshirt a redshirt sophomore and this past season in 2023
he again started in all the games he played in started in 12 games the pFF score dropped a little bit. He went down to 60.1 on PFF score, although he did
play the second most snaps of anybody on Texas A&M. They had a tackle who played the most. Foster
was second. Nobody else played more than 700. Foster was at 814 snaps. So very, very experienced
player. But also it seemed as if he was playing through injury last season. So I'm
sure that affected the PFF grade that if you can have a more healthy version of Bryce Foster,
you probably get him closer to what he was that freshman season. You look at some of his better
games that came earlier in the season. His best game actually was later in the year against
Mississippi State when he had a 71 grade. But his other best games, like Arkansas in the fourth game of the season,
New Mexico in their first game of the season,
played well in the bowl game against Oklahoma State.
And you look at how the grades are compiled, he had a 67 pass block grade.
So that's actually pretty good.
That's above average last season.
But only a 56 run block grade.
He only gave up one sack last season.
Over the course of his career at Texas
A&M. So you're talking about over 1800 snaps.
You're talking about 28 games played over three seasons.
He's given up four sacks and had six penalties to this point.
And it's interesting though, his freshman season,
it was actually a better run blocker than he was a pass blocker.
He was a 73 graded run blocker as a freshman and a 58 graded pass blocker.
If you end up, if you can get the best of both worlds,
if you can tap into it and get him to be that freshman run blocker
and be that third year pass blocker, you're going to have an all big 12 center.
The question is if you can line those things up and line up health
and everything like that.
Now as a transfer, he is graded out by 24, seven as a top 500 overall player in the
transfer portal.
He is the number 33 interior offense aligned in their three-star 88 graded transfer.
That's, that's a good rank for transfer.
I think around Lonnie Phelps is like an 88 or an 89 on there.
So like he can still be an impact player, uh, but maybe not as highly rated as where
his freshman or his high school ranking was kind of coming in.
But it is interesting out of comparison that Mike Nowitzki wasn't far off from what his PFF grade was last season.
And again, you take the PFF grades with a grain of salt because they're not always 100 percent.
And they are grading on a little bit different things like sometimes they're grading more on a potential nfl draft perspective than like a college what is getting the job done perspective
to where it's more about like pop plays and flash plays but still it is at least a little bit
interesting but i take it as if you know the ku staff was all over this kid and enough to a point
where to me it seems like the idea is for him to come in and be a starter right away they are very high on him and i think you should be too and what he can
bring to the table uh he's also a strong shot putter and that was part of this in the recruiting
uh as he was part of the track team with texas a&m figures to continue uh doing track and field
at kansas who just wrapped up top 15 finish for the men at the track nationals last weekend so
i mean give credit to stanley redwine the head coach of the men at the track nationals last weekend. So,
I mean,
give credit to Stanley red wine,
the head coach of KU track,
uh, track and field team,
uh,
KU track for being a big part of this and give credit to Lance Leipold and
the football staff for being amenable,
uh,
enough to kind of do this all because,
you know,
if you,
you ask some Texas A&M people,
I was just doing some quick internet searches.
You,
you would see some,
and again,
this is just kind of,
okay.
Sometimes a little bit of keyboard heroes, but that he was focused too much on track,
that he didn't fulfill his weight room and potential abilities because of that.
But if you're Kansas, you have to take that trade off. And even if that stuff is true,
which I don't even know if it is, he still would be KU's best option to start at center right now
and to make them better in a year where you feel like you have a lot of seniors, you have a lot of guys lining up to make a possible run
and making it to the Big 12 championship game,
you go out and get that final piece that you can
to make you just a little bit better.
And that's exactly what Bryce Foster did.
And I think there's a ceiling on Bryce Foster
that would go through the roof that will really take this offensive line
to another level if he can reach it.
So let's talk more about that, what it means for KU
on this episode of Locked on Jayhawks.
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So Kansas Land, Bryce Foster, huge pickup for KU because I think the expectation is for him to come in and be a starting center.
Now, the level of what you're going to get, are you going to get –
because, again, if you're getting basically an
average level power five starter at center, that's still very helpful for where KU was at.
And I'll tell you why here in a second. But if you get what the possible ceiling of a former,
basically near five-star prospect in year four of their collegiate career, where by the way,
he'll be a redshirt junior. So he has this year and one more if he wants it um to where all that potential comes together and then now you're
talking about like an all big 12 center like that's entirely in the realm of possibility
and not many teams are adding players who can be starters at a power five level with a potential
to be like an all-conference candidate this late in the game very often. So, yes, that makes it a huge deal.
Anyway, yeah, the PFF grade, again, wasn't absolutely great last season.
That 60 through 69 is kind of just like an average starter in how PFF's grade scale goes about.
And then once you get to the 70 to 79, it becomes like good.
Once you get to like 80 to 89, it's like great.
If you're like 90 or above, it's like you're like Heisman-american first team level like that that's kind of the scale of where things
are at um but again he was playing through injury last season and his pff grade was actually only
one point lower than Mike Nowitzki so if if we're just talking about this being basically you
replaced Mike Nowitzki with somebody who's going to give you similar production to Mike Nowitzki
isn't that good enough because Mike Nowitzki was good enough for you to be a really good
you know team in an offense and I know Nowitzki was playing through some injuries last year too
that it ended up being one of his lower PFF graded seasons but if you're just talking about
you're getting around the same level of play at center as you were last season then the idea is
okay well our receivers are all back they could could be even better. Our running backs are back. They could be even better. Jalen
Daniels, if he can stay healthy, he can be even better. You know, you have Michael Ford back,
like can your guard position be even better? So there are ways for you to still get better if
you're just kind of the same at that one position, I guess is what I'm saying. But I think there's a
much higher ceiling here for what he could become, right? If we're talking the floor is kind of the production you got Mike Nowitzki last season,
and maybe that's unfair because Nowitzki did so much, I think, from in between the ears
where it wasn't just the physical stuff.
It wasn't just the what are you producing on this play.
It was getting the rest of the offensive line right.
It was calling out, I'm sure, protections and doing a lot of the little things, right?
And understanding when to diagnose blitzes and all that stuff that he was such
a good leader of the team too, that right. But with Bryce Foster,
you're talking about somebody who's played a ton of football at the sec level.
He started 12 games right away as a freshman.
So like he's probably pretty cerebral too. And,
and that's like another part of this,
it probably doesn't hurt that he is going to be going up against
worse defensive linemen consistently.
There's obviously still players in the Big 12 that are great,
would be starters on SEC teams.
I think of Cincinnati with Dante Corleone.
That dude last year was one of the best defensive linemen in the country,
but Cincinnati wasn't very good, so he didn't get a ton of shine.
But if he were to enter the transfer portal,
he would have started on probably Georgia or Alabama too.
Like he really good player, you know?
But you're not going to see that as consistently, right?
Whereas some of the sec teams you're going to play are going to have one or
two first, second, third round draft picks over the course of the big 12
season.
You might see only one or two of those guys, right?
So it's just different in the consistency.
And so when you compare that and then start factoring that in and grade the PFF grade
on a curve compared to what he had to go against compared to what he's going to have to go
against now, that grade probably gets a little bit better.
But again, you're talking about somebody who has NFL level size and NFL level athleticism
and has the recruiting pedigree and has shown it a little bit earlier on in his collegiate
career.
It's not that I think Texas A&M was bad at coaching,
although I guess their coaching staff did get fired and leave to a new coach. But it's not that I think they're a bad coaching staff,
but it's that I just think Kansas is such a good coaching staff that any untapped potential,
I trust Lance Leipold.
I trust him, and I guess it is a new offensive line coach,
so that does kind of remain to be seen, right, without Scott Fuchs.
That was obviously a big loss for KU, but by all accounts so far,
Darrell Palsa, the new offensive line coach,
seems to be getting good reviews.
I trust KU to get the most out of him,
and if you're getting the most out of this kid, yeah.
I mean, you're talking about a potential NFL draft pick,
and you don't see those types of players joining your roster
in the middle of June very often, you know?
And I think the expectation to me, and probably for the staff,
given the nature of kind of going all out this late in the game,
like I haven't even touched on this yet,
but KU was supposedly full-on scholarships.
How are they making this work?
Are they just having him be like a walk-on and using NIL to pay for the scholarship?
Are they having somebody medically retire? Do they have another scholarship that we just didn't know
about? I don't know how it's going to work, but point being, KU is basically probably moving
mountains to a certain extent to make this work because that's how impressive this kid could possibly be for them.
And obviously this will be a tough transition for him.
We've seen this before with transfers joining the program after spring football for KU.
And it's hard to get serious play time early on in year one. Like we saw it with Kobe Baines.
He joined the team like a week or two into fall
practice or summer whatever you want to call it preseason practice fall camp his first year that
he joined he ended up playing a little bit later in the season but he wasn't playing in the early
part of the season Lorenzo McCaskill who was like an all bit a sunbelt linebacker for like a quasi
top 25 Louisiana team came in in the summer and ended up not really
being a starter, ended up being more of a rotational linebacker when I think the expectation
was to be more of a starter based on the pedigree when he was coming in. So we've seen that struggle.
I think I'm less worried about that here. One, because I think there's, I don't know,
maybe just another level of talent you would would say, here with Bryce Foster.
But also, it's the track record of he started 12 games as a true freshman at an SEC school at the center position,
where that is, I guess, the most cerebral position on the offensive line that you have to know everything going on.
If you can do that, you're going to be able to get acclimated in your fourth year of college
at a new school pretty quickly.
So I do have confidence he'll be able to be the starter as soon as week one here.
And this just makes Kansas a lot better.
It's another starting-level offensive lineman, right?
Again, if we're talking the baseline here is you have another power five starting-level
offensive lineman.
So just in general, you have more depth, you have more competition, you have another player you can plug and play
there. But I think this is an improvement over anything KU could throw out at center.
I think Michael Ford is an outstanding offensive lineman. He graded out as one of the top five
best guards in the Big 12 last season. But what would he have been as a center?
Would he have still been a top
five center I don't know it's possible but if you're trying to get your best guys on the field
you know it allows Ford to move back to guard and continue to be one of the top five guards
in the big 12 where he's at his best and therefore KU can throw out your best offensive line group
right Kansas obviously brought in Shane Bumgarner but uh being able to go after a kid like Bryce Foster maybe tells you that that transition hasn't gone as smoothly as
possible. Still, to have a kid like that as a possible backup just makes you a little bit more
deep. And then there's the ceiling outcome where, as we've talked about, Foster does become an all
Big 12 level player. And then imagine if Logan Brown hits his potential. Imagine if Bryce Foster
hits his potential. You already, as I talked about, Michael Ford was a top five rated guard
in the Big 12 last season.
I mean, that's like not normal for Kansas to have an offensive line.
Like Logan Brown is a former five-star recruit at Wisconsin.
If Logan Brown hits and Logan Brown turns into a good player,
he will be an NFL draft pick.
We already talked about the draft potential of Bryce Foster.
I think Michael Ford's going to have a shot to get drafted. I don't know,
Bryce Cable, who's been an experienced player, he might have a shot to get drafted.
There's a real chance KU could have two, three, four draft picks on their offensive line at once right now. I'm not talking like offensive line draft picks in 2026, 2027, 20... I'm talking
next draft. How often has that happened to Kansas? And that's what you
added here with Bryce Foster even more. And now you're looking at an offensive line at Logan
Brown at left tackle, Bryce Cable do it right tackle, Foster at center. Then you got Ford at
one of the guard spots. And then you got a battle between, I guess, Kobe Baines, Nolan Gorchika,
Daryl Simmons at guard. My money would probably be on Baines there, but it sounds like Gorchika
had a really good spring,
and Darryl Simmons obviously very experienced playing at a Power 5 level at Iowa State.
And then you're talking about, I mean, at that point, if let's say Baines was the other starter there,
Gortica and Simmons as your backups, that's a really good backup unit.
Bumgardner is the backup center.
You feel a little bit better there.
And then your swing tackle, eventually a healthy Calvin Clements, which you feel really good about that.
Up until then, maybe it's James Livingston, maybe it's gorchika bouncing out whatever it is i feel really good about ku's top seven or eight in the offensive line group at this point
in time i feel really good about that starting five i feel really good about what the potential
the ceiling could be and i feel even better about the floor now it is the cherry on top to what has
been a unbelievable spring offseason for KU.
I mean, to go out there and fill needs like by Job and to bring on Bryce Fogg,
I mean, this has been an unbelievable spring offseason for KU
when they had limited scholarships and there's not a ton of players out there
to make that big of a push coming into a season in which they have a real chance
to do some special things is really, really cool.
What Lance Leipold and company have cooking out in Lawrence.
All right,
let's grade the trades coming up next on locked on Jayhawks.
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All right, so we're going to be grading the trades here, which both basketball and football
here.
By the way, I did want to give a name because I mentioned the KU golfer going to be playing
in the US Open.
Gunnar Broin is the name on that one.
But anyway,
so basically KU made a basketball trade and a football trade.
So let's grade the football trade since we're right there.
Bryce Foster for our Majoree Adams.
So I think our Majoree Adams might.
Okay.
By PFF grade,
Reed Adams graded a little bit better.
He was like a 65.
Foster was like a 60. So you could Adams graded a little bit better. He was like a 65. Foster was like a 60.
So you could argue Reed Adams a little bit better there.
I could also argue that with Reed Adams in terms of his growth potential
and where he's come from to where he's gone now
and the body and movement ability that maybe he has a bigger ceiling.
But I don't know.
Foster has a pretty big ceiling too based on that high school class.
I would argue, though, Kansas needed a center more than a guard.
I don't know, maybe not at the time because of how shuffling happens
after the Reed Adams movement, but certainly now.
Certainly right now, Kansas needed a center more than a guard,
as I talked about.
Michael Ford is one of the best centers in the Big 12.
Darryl Simmons, an experienced guard from Iowa State.
Kobe Baines, I like the progression he's shown and the flashes that he's shown, whether it was in
year one a couple years ago or being a more regular player and basically a starter on
last year's team.
Nolan Gortica taking steps forward.
I feel good about the guard position at Kansas this year, but you had some questions about
the center position.
So in theory, with Reed Adams, who was kind of a guard tackle swing guy, which that would
still be helpful for this team with Calvin Clemens being injured, but I think you would argue you need the center even more. position so in theory with reed adams who was kind of a guard tackle swing guy which that would still
be helpful for this team with calvin clements being injured but i think you would argue you
need the center even more so um i would give this one i guess i don't know do we like you still
wouldn't have loved to to lose our majeure adams i don't think you can give it an a and that like
bringing in bryce Foster is an A addition.
But if you're talking about it as a trade, I think it's a B.
It's probably a B for both teams.
Like maybe it worked out for both teams because it's hard to say it's a slam dunk because Reed Adams could end up being really good and versatile and obviously had the better
PFF grade, but also Foster's prospect pedigree freshman year.
He was the better player than anything.
Reed Adams has kind of put out to this point.
Obviously the injuries could come into this one way or another,
but KU needed a center more.
So overall, I think it works out for KU.
Then the basketball trade.
KU basically traded LeBaron Phylon for Rylan Griffin.
Okay, it's hard.
If you're talking long-term, you could argue the Phylon one
ends up being the winning side of the equation
because you at most have two years with Rylan Griffin.
What a Phylon says three, four years in college and is a really productive player.
But I don't know that you can grade trades off that anymore because in today's world,
like guys transfer after one year, guys transfer after two years, or if a guy's that good,
he's going to go pro.
So I think you can only really evaluate it based on the upcoming season if you want to evaluate on two seasons then maybe that's fine
I'm only going to evaluate it on this season because that's all you know like Phylon could
have stayed at Kansas this past season and then transferred after the year anyway so for if we're
just talking this season this is an a plus trade like I mean Phylon might have been part of the rotation. He might not have been, I mean,
maybe KU doesn't bring on Shaquille Moore if they still have Phylon at this point, and then
probably would be part of the rotation. But that probably part of the rotation is, is what?
Seventh, eighth man. Rylan Griffin's probably going to start and Rylan Griffin might end up
being your best three-point shooter on the team and your most effective three-point shooter on the team. So you do that trade 10 times out of 10,
if you're Kansas, and you always know there's going to be more players in the portal in future
years. And even if we did evaluate this trade based on this year and the following season,
so the next two seasons for KU, who are you taking? Senior year Rylan Griffin or sophomore
year LeBaron Phylon? Because you're probably still taking senior year Rylan Griffin at that point. So A plus
on that trade for KU. Alright, that'll do it for
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