Usually, my notebook is loaded with football leftovers. But this hasn’t been a normal week.

Basketball duty pulled me away from football practice on Tuesday and Thursday nights. Alex Abrams was there for the entire week, but it has left me searching for some leftover stuff worth sharing here on the blog. The good news? I think I found some.

• We all know that Arkansas running back Michael Smith will be a gametime decision before of his hamstring injury. It’s a situation Florida has been keeping track of, apparently. Florida coach Urban Meyer said earlier this week the Gators are paying attention to Smith, especially since he played so well against the Florida defense last season.

“I guess he’s got a little hamstring injury that we’re keeping an eye on because that’s how much respect we have,” Meyer said. “He ripped us apart last year. I’d never really heard of him until we played him, and I saw firsthand a hard guy to tackle, has great acceleration through the hole. They’re a big zone running team, and he’s perfect for it. No, we think he’s one of the top five backs in the league, no question.”

• Remember what Arkansas did with its punt return team last week? The Razorbacks dropped both Jerell Norton and Michael Smith back deep to catch the ball the entire game. Well, I asked John L. Smith about it on Wednesday night and he said it was something the Razorbacks came up with because of what the Tigers did. Auburn’s punter shaded the ball to the side and was getting extra yards on the roll.

“If we can eliminate the 10-, 20- and 15-yard rolls, then that’s going to save us and make us a lot of ground,” Smith said. “I told them our goal this week for us is to not let a ball hit the ground and we did that. Even though it doesn’t show in the stat as a 10-yard return or whatever, it shows up.”

No word on if the Razorbacks will try the same thing Saturday. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

• Arkansas LB Jerico Nelson has gotten plenty of publicity this week. And he deserves it, too, after his performance against Auburn. But there’s another reason for Arkansas’ defensive resurgence the past couple weeks. S Elton Ford has been back in the lineup and playing well. Defensive coordinator Willy Robinson was asked about Ford on Wednesday night.

“I think he’s done a great job tackling,” Robinson said. “There’s still some liability with him in pass coverage. But I think he’s doing a great job of tackling the catch, showing up on the run. He’s starting to stay on his feet when he tackles and great tacklers do do that. They stay on their feet when they tackle. That’s something he’s made great strides in since these last two games as opposed to the last couple of games he played”

• It doesn’t really need to be said that Robinson and the Razorbacks have plenty of respect for Florida QB Tim Tebow. Who doesn’t, right? Well, here’s what Robinson had to say about Tebow and the way he leads the Gators’ offense even after the concussion.

“He runs that offense and he loves being the leader of that offense,” Robinson said. “So regardless of his injury or what it once was, he’s still going to be that competitor. So even though they might say, handoff, or be cautious here, that’s not part of his nature. His nature is to compete and compete and compete until the final bell.”

• Arkansas WR Greg Childs has really played well this season. His performance against Auburn was even more important because the Razorbacks were without Joe Adams and Jarius Wright. Childs will be needed once again against Florida. Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino explained how much confidence Childs has and how important he will be against the Gators.

“Childs right now, he’s begging guys to come up and press him,” Petrino said. “That’s how you want it. You want to have that type of confidence. Come on and play me man and I’ll get the opportunity to make plays. More times than not he’s made the play and we’ve been pretty accurate with the throws. It balances out and opens up your run game. That’s kind of the balance you see. When you run the ball better, you can throw it better. When you can beat man coverage and beat one-on-one coverage, then that allows you to be able to run the ball better because they have to get out of the man coverage.”

• Finally, how does Arkansas feel about playing the No. 1 team on the road? The Razorbacks are looking forward to it, of course. Here is QB Ryan Mallett’s take from Monday’s press conference.

“I mean, there’s always a little bit extra when you’re playing a ranked team, getting ready to prepare for it,” Mallett said. “And then coming in No. 1 and playing the No. 1 team, it’s a big deal for our program. We need to go out there and come home with a win.”

If all goes as planned, this will be the last you hear from me today. I’m hoping to take the rest of the day off after a busy, two-sport week.

If that’s the case, I’ll check back in with you from Gainesville, Fla., tomorrow.

Make sure you follow us here on the Blog and also on Twitter (@NWARobbie, @NWAAlex and @NWAOnlineHogs)

There wasn’t much news out of Arkansas’ practice tonight. But we can still find three things worth talking about, right?

Of course. So here we go.

• Injury updates: RB Michael Smith was on the field again Wednesday, but didn’t do much in the portion of practice open to the media. Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino said earlier Wednesday that the hope was that Smith could do more in practice. Maybe he did after we left. WR Jarius Wright was on the field practicing, but did wear a yellow, non-contact jersey. Wright was running well and should be ready. Another guy that was dinged up Saturday, S Elton Ford, was on the field Wednesday and said he’s doing fine. Ford hurt his ankle when teammate Matt Harris collided with him in the second half. Ford missed some time, but did return to the field later.

• Tim Tebow talk: Since it was defensive day, plenty was said about Florida quarterback Tim Tebow. The Razorbacks will get their second crack at trying to beat the Tebow-led Gators, but know it’s a big, big challenge. Defensive coordinator Willy Robinson said no matter what happened to Tebow at Kentucky, the quarterback’s game won’t change. “His nature is to compete and compete and compete until the final bell.” Robinson, who typically refers to players by their numbers, said Tebow has his respect, too. “He’s No. 15, but with great respect. I know who the young man is. He’s a fabulous football player. I admire the heck out of him. I think we all do.”

• Jerico Nelson a hot topic: LB Jerico Nelson was a popular guy, doing plenty of interviews after his 10-tackle performance against Auburn. We’ll have a feature on Nelson in tomorrow’s paper, but here’s a good quote from Willy Robinson on the sophomore’s big hit against Auburn: “He’s one of those guys that, all of a sudden, you say, ‘Woah,’ to after he’s hit you. That play that he made on saturday, it ignited us on defense.” And here’s one more from position coach, John L. Smith. “After you watch Jerico and you watch his work ethic and you watch him work out a little bit, pretty soon, it doesn’t take you long to say, ‘Yeah, we can find a spot for this guy in a lot of places because he’s got a great attitude and a great work ethic.’ He just goes to the field and gives you what he has.”

Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino just spoke to us for the final time before Saturday’s game in Arlington.

No big news, but a couple of things worth mentioning:

• Petrino was asked about the defensive back shakeup and said there hasn’t really been one. Elton Ford and Tramain Thomas have split reps at safety this week after splitting time last Saturday. He said both will play Saturday, but did not name a starter.

• Tackle DeMarcus Love practiced again Thursday after missing Tuesday’s workout. Petrino said he skipped Tuesday because his knee swelled up on him after hurting it at ‘Bama. Love didn’t miss time in that game and should be ready Saturday, Petrino said.

• The Razorbacks will go to Texas a little earlier than usual to make sure they get a walk-through in at Cowboys Stadium. Petrino said it’s a little different routine. He usually likes to get the work done in Fayetteville. But we all know Jerry World is going to be a unique environment so the Razorbacks want the shock value to go away with a walk-through. Petrino said the “super jumbotron” might even be turned on Friday.

• Petrino was asked about the team’s work this week and said it’s been good. He was particularly impressed with the attitude of his players, saying they’ve done a good job of encouraging each other. “That shows pride and that shows that they really want to get this thing right,” he said.

That’s about it for now. Make sure you check out RazorbackCentral.com for more on the game tomorrow. And we’ll always have some good stuff here on the Hog Blog. Once again, I’ll be cleaning out my notebook with all kinds of final news and notes tomorrow.

I’m still working on my final story for the week. One that will appear in tomorrow’s paper. But wanted to take a break from putting it together to run through all of the leftover notes, quotes and tidbits. It’s a weekly thing I like to do here on the blog. So let’s get started:

• Saturday’s game is shaping up to be a very interesting battle between head coaches. Arkansas’ Bobby Petrino is regarded as an offensive mastermind, whose team is rolling (especially through the air) this season. Alabama’s Nick Saban, on the other hand, is well-known for his defensive background. And the Crimson Tide has one of the nation’s best defense. It has clearly impressed Petrino this week.

“They’re really good on defense,” Petrino said Thursday. “They have real good players. They have a great scheme. They challenge you. They come up and try not to give you anything easy. They make you earn it. They have great schemes to attack your protections and your pass protection. I’ve got a tremendous amount of respect for what they do defensively and what he’s always done defensively.”

• The anchor of ‘Bama’s defense is nose guard Terrence Cody, who has given teams fits the past two years. After all, the guy is a 360-pounder and plugs up the interior. Not an easy thing to deal with. Arkansas guard Mitch Petrus talked about the challenge Tuesday.

“I’ve never played against him, but I know he’s big. I know he can move,” said Petrus, who was ineligible for last year’s game. “We don’t have anybody on the offensive line that’s 360. We’ve got to really make sure we use good technique and come off the ball. … You can’t go in there and get all freaked out and go in there and get scared. You can’t let him dictate where you go. You’ve got to hold him off the best you can.”

• We touched on it a little earlier this week, but defensive coordinator Willy Robinson indicated that S Elton Ford could be ready for playing time this weekend. Ford hasn’t played since his severe neck injury last October and an ankle injury slowed him the past couple of weeks.

But getting Ford back could help a secondary that struggled. Robinson said it has been a long process for Ford, though.

“He’s starting to come back,” Robinson said. “He’s starting to get healthy and he’s starting to put it all together. The mental aspect of it and the assignment aspect of it. We’re bringing him back. The thing is, we’re bringing him back slowly. It’s still a major situation. I think there was a confidence issue with him. Even thought I thought earlier there wasn’t, I think there was.”

• Along the same line, it’s clear Anthony Leon is getting closer and closer to contributing more. Robinson said he played about 30 snaps against Georgia and the Razorbacks want to see him continue to improve. Leon reported to campus later than most incoming players and it has taken time for him to get adjusted to the Razorbacks’ system.

“I think he had over 30 snaps and played pretty decent,” Robinson said. “He had two mental errors at the end of the first half that were kind of costly, but you live to play the next day I guess. He got more production last week than he’s had. So that was good.

“He’s starting to settle down. It’s coming to him. He’s had a really good week of practice.”

• Arkansas freshman LB Terrell Williams was put in a tough spot last week. He replaced Jerry Franklin when the sophomore was ejected. Georgia went right after him, too. Williams made a mistake on the 80-yard touchdown run.

But position coach Reggie Johnson said Williams can learn from the experience, as rough as it was.

“He is a good football player and he’s going to bounce back and he’s going to make some big plays for us this year,” Johnson said. “We’ve just got to get him in the right situations. He’s got to continue to grow and learn in the defense as we go with this thing. Again, he’s going to come back and have some big-time ballgames for us. We’re not down on him by any stretch of the imagination.”

• Arkansas’ defense didn’t play well. We know that. But the Razorbacks weren’t totally discouraged. In fact, I got to talk to DE Adrian Davis about the run defense the other night. Outside of the 80-yard touchdown run, it was good. Georgia had 75 yards on 35 other attempts.

“That 80-yard run hurt,” Davis said. “But we held them other than that. We feel like we’ve got a better defense than what we had last year.”

Arkansas will find out how good it is against the run Saturday, though. ‘Bama is averaging 267.7 rushing yards a game.

• Last week, Georgia WR A.J. Green had a field day against the Hogs. This week, the secondary gets the pleasure of covering Alabama’s Julio Jones. We got a chance to catch up with Matt Harris, who spoke about the challenge Wednesday.

“It’s just the SEC,” Harris said. “Every week we’re expecting a different opponent with another star player. So it’s nothing that we fear.”

Harris was asked to explain the differences between the two receivers: “A.J. Green, I think has a litlte more speed than Julio Jones,” Harris said. “But Julio Jones is a big body guy. He can go up there and run across the middle and make you play.”

• We know Arkansas can throw the ball. But we don’t know if they can sustain success on the ground. Michael Smith’s injury left that a question mark last week, but Smith said he’s ready to go. And he said Arkansas is ready to balance out its attack at ‘Bama.

“We have to,” Smith said. “We don’t want them to just sit back deep and wait on the crossing pass, wait on the deep route. We want to come up every now and then so we can hit the play-action pass or sit back deep and run right down the middle. That’s what we’ve been working on since December, to become a more balanced offense. Now it’s time to start putting it together.”

OK. I think that about does it. I’m going back to writing my story for Saturday’s paper. I’ll check in later today if something newsworthy pops up.

If not, we’ll be bringing you more from Tuscaloosa, Ala., tomorrow. Make sure to check the Hog Blog and follow us on Twitter.

Wednesday is defensive day, so we just got done talking to defensive coordinator Willy Robinson and his group after practice.

The most interesting thing Robinson said came at the end of his six-minute press conference, when asked what he would tell his players before they leave the locker room and head to the field when they play Georgia on Saturday. His response:

“Play relentless for 60 minutes,” Robinson said. “This is a game for men. If we get punched in the mouth it will be interesting to see how we respond. We got punched in the mouth early last year and we didn’t respond very well at the beginning of the season. We’ve got to be the hammer. Let’s go get these guys. It’s still a game of fun and who is going to make who say, ‘Ouch,’ first.”

Good stuff from Willy. I asked defensive end Jake Bequette about getting hit in the mouth a few minutes later and he believes the Razorbacks are much more capable of putting a big play in the past and moving on to the next.

“That’s the trademark of a good defense, being able to say, ‘Next play. Next play,’ no matter what happens,” Bequette said. “I think that we gave up a couple big plays against Missouri State, but we were able to rally aorund ourselves and shut them out in the second half.”

A couple more things worth mentioning from practice:

• Robinson was also asked about Arkansas’ run defense and said it’s too early to tell if they can stop the run this season. But Arkansas will find out starting with Saturday’s game. “We fit our gaps a lot better, but I still don’t think you can take that first game as a barometer yet. I think this game is a benchmark for us to find out if we can do that or not.”

• Georgia QB Joe Cox has had an up-and-down start under center, but Robinson said he’s impressed by the senior so far. “He’s not the biggest guy in the world. He’s not the most accurate guy in the world. But the youngster just competes and he goes to the end.”

• Safety Elton Ford, who missed the opener with an ankle injury, has practiced the past two weeks. Robinson was asked if Ford was ready for the game. His response: “If they’re out there dressed, they’re practicing. So they’re getting reps. It’s a matter of what goes on in the game whether they play or not. That’s all of them.”

• Perhaps Robinson’s funniest quote came when he was asked if he knew anybody on Georgia’s staff. Short answer: Nope. But Robinson had more to say than just no. “I have no idea who they are. I only know Coach (Mark) Richt. I don’t know him, I just know him by name. I don’t know who those guys are. They don’t know who the hell I am.”

Want to know what’s going on at safety this preseason? Then senior Matt Harris is you man.

We got a chance to spend several minutes with Harris after Thursday’s practice and a good chunk of the conversation dealt with the rotation between he, Tramain Thomas, Elton Ford and Anthony Leon.

Like I said with the last Q&A, I didn’t ask all the questions here. But it’s some informative stuff:

Q: How is the back line shaping up this preseason?

A: “We’re getting some consistency. We’re watching film every day and working those kinks out. We’ve made huge strides since the last game last year and last spring and even since last Thursday when we first put on the pads. If we build on from where we started, we’re going to have a pretty bright future.”

Q: What does the two-deep look like right now?

A: “We’ve got a pretty solid two-deep. We’ve got Tramain Thomas there working with us. That kid is a ball hawk. I love working with him. He doesn’t say much. I guess when he doesn’t say much he’s been studying his plays because he’s out there and he’s right on his stuff. And Elton Ford right there with him. He know what to do. I’m just trying to help (Anthony) Leon learn the playbook so we can have a solid two deep everywhere else.”

Q: Is that slowing Leon right now?

A: “Oh yeah. That playbook, when they first threw it at us last year, it took all spring, all summer for us. We go from Western Illinois, struggling with them, to beating LSU. So it took us quite awhile to learn that playbook. We’ve kind of had to hurry the pace up with him.”

Q: You mentioned Tramain, he isn’t afraid to hit anyone is he?

A: “I love it. I love that kid. I don’t even know if he weighs 170 or 190, he doesn’t need a scale to know how hard he hits.”

Q: The safeties have been shuffled around some, have you?

A: “No. They told me I was going to move to open (free) safety at the beginning of the summer. I played open last season just as much as I did tight (strong), so it didn’t really affect me much. But Ford has never played tight so I had to kind of help him with tight safety during the summer. And then Tramain they just recently moved him from open to tight when Leon came. He had to learn the playbook. But he’s done a good job just like Leon has of learning that tight safety. They’re counterparts, they work off each other. They haven’t had too much trouble, but there has been a few kinks.”

  The past two days have not been good to the Razorbacks. Injuries are beginning to add up, and it has been apparent that several offensive playmakers aren’t at practice.

  I posted a blog earlier about tight end Chris Gragg suffering a likely season-ending ankle injury during Wednesday morning’s practice, but there was some other news to come out of the 2 1/2-hour session. Here is what we learned:

  • For starters, we saw a scene early in practice that I can’t recall seeing before. Safety Elton Ford, who’s returning from cracked vertebrae in his neck, had a scary moment when he went down after colliding with a wide receiver during a pass play in 7-on-7 drills. He took off his helmet, and an Arkansas athletic trainer came out to check on him.

  Here is where it got unusual.

  When Ford stood and walked off the field, a number of players began clapping for him. It’s not often that players clap for one of their teammates, even when one of them gets up after an injury. Ford walked to the sidelines, had a trainer check his neck, and after a few minutes, he returned to practice. He participated in 11-on-11 drills, so he appeared to be fine.

  • Not every Arkansas player, however, was able to come back from an injury. As I mentioned in the previous blog on Gragg, tight end D.J. Williams continued to miss practice with a minor ankle injury. Meanwhile, wide receiver Lucas Miller (knee), offensive tackle DeMarcus Love and offensive guard Grant Cook (knee) were held out of practice.

  • There was some bright spots from practice. In fact, Arkansas spent the last part of practice going through a short full-contact scrimmage. The offense got the best of the defense, and quarterback Ryan Mallett looked good under center. He found freshman wide receiver Cobi Hamilton, who had beaten cornerback Isaac Madison on a deep pass. Hamilton was ruled down at the 1-yard line, though Mallett said it should have been a touchdown.

  Later, Mallett connected with wide receiver Jarius Wright on a 32-yard touchdown pass.

  Second-team quarterback Tyler Wilson drove the offense downfield as well. He found tight end Joseph Henry on a 17-yard touchdown pass, and on the next series, he handed the ball off three straight time to running back Broderick Green. Green gained 40 yards on the first two carries before breaking off a 25-yard score that looked way too easy.

  There was more from practice, but this was just the Cliffnotes version. Check out the blog later today or The Morning News on Thursday for more.

  So, the first Arkansas practice has come to an end. And as is typically the case, there was more news than there was space in the newspaper. Here is one noteworthy item that didn’t make the cut.

  Arkansas safety Elton Ford returned to the practice field Thursday afternoon for the first time since he cracked three vertebrae in his neck while trying to make a tackle in a 23-21 loss to Ole Miss on Oct. 25.

  The grueling injury forced the star freshman to question whether he would be able to play football again as he wore a neck brace for nearly four months.

  “It felt great. I’m thankful to be out here. I’m thankful that God gave me another shot at this,” Ford said following Thursday’s practice. “I’m thankful that we came out here, full speed, ready to go as a team, as a unit, as a defense.”

  Ford ran around the field and looked like his old self during team drills. But the true test in the sophomore’s recovery will come in a few days when the Razorbacks put on pads and take part in contact drills.

  Asked whether he has prepared himself mentally to hit and get hit again, Ford said, “I can’t wait. I’m going to bring it.”

  The Morning News’ Robbie Neiswanger chronicled Ford’s injury and his extensive rehab in an April 11 article. Here is the link to the story.

There’s roughly 45 minutes until kickoff, but we have some injury news we can share.

Defensive end Adrian Davis, offensive tackle Ray Dominguez and offensive guard Grant Cook are all sitting on the bench right now in their jerseys, watching the Razorbacks warm up. Those three, it appears, won’t be available for today’s game. Unless they’re pulling an elaborate trick on Tulsa. Maybe that’s it.

Look for Damario Ambrose to start at defensive end, Grant Freeman to start at tackle and DeMarcus Love to start at guard. In addition, Rashaad Johnson will likely start at free safety in place of Elton Ford, who is out with a neck injury.

We’ll see how much the missing players affect the Razorbacks today.

Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino wrapped up his weekly Monday news conference not too long ago. Here are a few of the highlights from what he and several Arkansas players had to say.

The biggest topic of discussion was by far on how do the Razorbacks rebound after back-to-back blowout losses to No. 2 Alabama and No. 5 Texas. Petrino’s message was simply his players can’t “panic,” there is still a lot of football to be played and Arkansas’ last two opponents were pretty darn good.

Arkansas center Jonathan Luigs and tight end D.J. Williams echoed much of the same sentiment.

Petrino: No need to press just yet

Luigs said he has been forced to be a more vocal leader, even though it goes against his personality. He’d prefer to lead by example and not have to say much, but he admitted that he has had to step up and fill that senior leadership role.

Petrino said wide receiver Lucas Miller (concussion) improved over the weekend, and it appears that he’ll be able to suit up Saturday to face No. 12 Florida. Miller missed last Saturday’s 52-10 loss at Texas while still recovering from a concussion suffered the previous week against Alabama.

Arkansas middle linebacker Jerry Franklin and free safety Elton Ford also said there are things they can take from last week’s poor performance against Texas quarterback Colt McCoy to help them prepare for another dual threat in Florida’s reigning Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow.

Well, those are a few of the tidbits from the news conference. But there will be a lot more in Tuesday’s newspaper. So spend the two quarters and buy one.