March 27, 1999
First-year wide receiver Bethel Johnson grabbed a pair of touchdown passes for the Texas A&M offense but it was the Wrecking Crew defense that ruled the day at Saturday's scrimmage at Kyle Field with an estimated 1,500 spectators in the stands.
Watching the controlled scrimmage were over 600 12th Man "The Zone" donors, some 350 high school football coaches, many of Texas A&M's 1999 football signees and parents plus a large of number of maroon-clad Aggie fans.
"This was a fun deal today," Aggie coach R.C. Slocum said. " We had a former player reunion this weekend, we had The Zone folks in, we had our annual Coaches Clinic and we had our signees in for the scrimmage. They added a lot of electricity to the scrimmage. I couldn't be more pleased."
Slocum's Wrecking Crew defense clearly had the upper hand in the scrimmage, but Slocum said that was to be expected during the spring. The offense did manage three touchdowns and a pair of field goals.
"This time of year the defense is always ahead of the offense," Slocum said. "Some much of the offense is timing and execution, and if one guy misses his assignment it typically ruins the play. Obviously we have got a lot of work to do to get where we need to be for next year, but the players have been working extremely hard all spring."
But it wasn't all defense in the scrimmage with Johnson mixing a pair of long touchdown receptions in with a number of medium-range catches. Johnson was a partial qualifier in 1998 and sat out the Aggies' Big 12 Championship season last year, but he's made his presence felt this spring.
"He's a young man with a lot of potential," Slocum said. "He showed signs of becoming a good player for us. Most importantly, he works hard everyday to get better."
Also standing out for the offense was the hard running of big backs Ja'Mar Toombs and D'Andre "Tiki" Hardeman.
"I thought Ja'Mar and Tiki both ran extremely well today," Slocum said. "They're both big guys who are hard to bring down and they were making the defense work. I thought they both had a number of good plays."
Also drawing praise was the play of 24-year old freshman quarterback Mark Farris, who has been playing baseball in the Pittsburgh Pirates organization for the past five years. Farris signed a football national letter-of-intent with the Aggies in 1994, but opted for a career in baseball at the time. Saturday's scrimmage was Farris' first live football action since his final game with Angleton High School in 1993.
"Mark Farris came in and did a good job," Slocum said. "He's still rusty but you can see that he's a talented guy. This is his first live action in a long time, but he did a very good job."