Michigan State football ahead of schedule despite no spring ball?

Michigan State football coaches feel good about the progress they’ve made with players despite not being able to meet in person.

Mel Tucker has been a breath of fresh air on social media. He’s interacting with fans, posting pictures and stories about his personal life, dogs and family and he has weekly interviews with former players and media members where he gets to share even more with Spartan faithful.

The first-year Spartan head coach just completed his fifth Q&A session, following up Carrie Cecil (Ep. 1), Maurice Jones-Drew (Ep. 2), Jemele Hill (Ep. 3) and Robbie Gould (Ep. 4). Each episode is interesting and provides tidbits from inside the personal lives of famous journalists/personalities and former players as well as life inside Tucker’s world.

In the most recent Instagram live interview with NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah, Tucker spoke candidly about the progress of his team through Zoom meetings.

Tucker talked about how when COVID-19 hit and Zoom meetings were starting to be utilized, players were quiet and didn’t have much input and now they’re “standing up in their living rooms” and going over schemes and techniques with much more participation.

There was one quote from Tucker that stood out above the rest, though.

“I had one of my coaches tell me he thought we were further ahead X and O-wise than we would have been if we had spring ball,” Tucker said.

If that’s not an exciting development for fans who are looking for any reason to get hyped up about the 2020 season, I don’t know what is. Getting to learn an entirely new coaching staff and playbook remotely hasn’t slowed this team down and that says a lot about the players’ willingness to learn and adapt on the fly.

What this means for Michigan State football

While some may look at that quote and think, “Maybe this pandemic was actually good for the team,” it’s tough to really gauge what will happen when they actually hit the field.

Tucker feels good about his team and the willingness to learn the playbook and even practice it out in their own living rooms, but it’s a whole different thing when these guys get to campus and have to practice and play live.

Expectations for the 2020 season should remain the same from anywhere between 4-6 wins and a potential bowl berth, so don’t use this quote as a “MSU will exceed expectations” endorsement. It just goes to show that this team is motivated and ready to get to work and not having spring ball doesn’t put them at as much of a disadvantage as we originally thought.