STARKVILLE — Cory Thomas is the veteran of Mississippi State football’s defensive line room now.
It’s the natural progression of things — one that MSU coach Dan Mullen often reminds his players of — that younger players make their improvements in large, easily noticeable chunks, while older players with those days behind them get better in minuscule increments.
Such is the case for Thomas as he prepares for his junior season, and he manages it meticulously.
“Before I go out, I write something in my notebook, what I want to work on that day,” Thomas said. “(Defensive line coach Brian) Baker tells me something that I did bad in in that practice and I’ll write it down. I start from there.”
The culmination of it all is a transcendent spring to date, on in which Baker is seeing, “the light has come on a little bit.”
“He’s making far fewer mistakes than he made last year. The tape tells me that,” Baker said. “I think he is starting to hold himself a little more accountable for his assignments, his technique and that kind of stuff.”
One technique in particular has been in Thomas’ crosshairs: his first step. Dating back to high school, Thomas said he has the bad habit of stepping laterally along the line of scrimmage when his steps should be forward, penetrating that line.
Thomas calls it a simple, “mental problem,” a revelation Baker was pleased to hear came from Thomas’ mouth. If he can get it straightened out, both Baker and MSU defensive coordinator Todd Grantham can see Thomas developing into a behind-the-line force.
“He’s a big, powerful explosive kid. If he’s changing the line of scrimmage by going forward, he’s affecting the game in a big way,” Baker said. “That’s what defensive linemen should do: whether we’re making the play or not, we should be disruptive and make the ball go somewhere it wasn’t supposed to go.”
Grantham thinks the same way, but maintains Thomas can do more than disrupt: “I think the style in which we play is better suited for him: we’re more of a attacking the man front, get off the ball and play the run as you’re going after the quarterback. The style we play lends itself to more tackles for loss for guys up front, and I think his body type and the way he plays, he can excel at that.”
Thomas agreed with his coaches on that emphasis — and that was no guarantee last year.
Baker looks at effective coaching as a two-way street between player and coach, and he didn’t feel he had that last year, his first at MSU, with Thomas.
“I think he’s a far less resistant to that kind of stuff, and some of that might be comfort with me,” Baker said. “I think there may have been a little bit of an intimidation factor coming in last year, the idea of, ‘They got a pro guy,’ and all this stuff. Man, I’m a coach. I think he got a chance to get to know me outside of what I’ve done. Now he understands that I care about him and I’m trying to make him the best he can be.
“When I fix something, I have a little more confidence now that he understand what I’m trying to fix and he understands why he shouldn’t do it the way he did it. I didn’t always have that feeling last year correcting him; sometimes I felt like I was talking to the wall. I haven’t had that feeling much this spring.”
Beyond accepting coaching in his advancing age, he has reached the point of providing his own. He is the one of just two upperclassmen defensive linemen with experience at MSU, as the other juniors are in their first springs as junior college transfers.
Thomas remembers his days of, “not knowing what in the world was going on,” well, and is quick to offer words to his new position mates when he feels they are needed, noting the junior college transfers tend to approach him asking for advice.
Follow Dispatch sports writer Brett Hudson on Twitter @Brett_Hudson
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