At Oregon football spring practices, it’s always something new every day. This week, another player will be injured, and pulled out of contact drills. Someone else will make a position change and receive repetitions at running back. A defensive lineman will change over from end to tackle, or vice versa, just to see how it looks.
There has, however, been one constant within spring practices: Walter Thurmond III will come up with an interception. And it will make the daily highlight reel.
Pick a drill. Seven-on-seven? Thurmond will step in front of the target receiver and be gone in the blink of an eye. Eleven-on-eleven? Watch Thurmond elevate on a pass thrown to the sideline, snag it cleanly and keep his toes inbounds.
“Walter is playing very special,” defensive backs coach John Neal told The Oregonian on Wednesday. “He’s very, very good right now.”
Last season, the senior from West Covina, Calif., recorded 66 tackles from his cornerback position (seventh on the team), with five interceptions (tied for first, with the departed Jairus Byrd), eight pass breakups and 13 passes defended (second to Byrd in both categories). Byrd and rover Patrick Chung were both second-round picks in the NFL draft last week, and Thurmond is headed for a similar fortune, pending the outcome of his senior year.
As an overall unit, one would logically expect the secondary to be worse in 2009 with the loss of two starters. In this case, “worse” means giving up more than 270.2 passing yards per game – last in the Pacific-10 Conference – and contributing indirectly to more than 21.2 opponent first downs per game, the second-worst rate in the conference last season. Those statistics were seemingly further betrayed by the adopted moniker of “D-Boyz,” the secondary’s attempt at branding themselves as a tough, athletic bunch that would plant you where you stood, and take your weak passes the other way.
This year, with Thurmond and safety T.J. Ward as the secondary’s only proven commodities – and Ward is only in his second year as a starter – identity will be a question. Any answer begins with Thurmond.
“Walter Thurmond, who I would say is one of the top corners in the country, has been a tremendous leader for us, and really set a pretty high standard with our defensive work ethic every day in practice,” Oregon head coach Chip Kelly told ESPN.com’s resident Pac-10 blogger Ted Miller.
Miller, for his part, agrees. Earlier this spring, the former Washington Huskies beat writer for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer tagged Thurmond as the 10th-best player in the Pac-10 as he ranked the conference’s overall top 30 players.
“Thurmond struggled with various (hip and groin) injuries last year and he only managed to tie for the Pac-10 lead with five interceptions, giving him 10 over the past two seasons. The budding four-year starter also has broken up 35 passes over the past two seasons and shown a penchant for fancypants plays at big times,” Miller wrote on March 31. “His combination of size and athleticism makes him a likely first-day pick in the 2010 NFL draft, and he could play himself into the first round with a big season.”
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