Pine Bluff @ Lake Hamilton last Friday night

[Hawgballz]

I went to this game for 2 reasons, 1 - I wanted to see a really good high school football game and 2 - I wanted to see a couple of the best high school QB prospects in the state for the next couple of years.  Phillip Butterfield (Jr) from Lake Hamilton (6A) and Claude Johnson (So) from Pine Bluff (7A) both showed that they will play college football.  Unfortunately the game did not live up to my hopes so I left with about 2 minutes gone in the 4th quarter and the score was 45-12 Lake Hamilton.

Disclaimer:  The stats that I give were simply the stats that I was keeping in my head, so they may be off here and there, but these were pretty close for the time that I was at the game.

Butterfield showed good accuracy & great touch on his passes although his arm strength was not as good as I had expected.  He was not a speedster by any means, but had enough to get to the corners on running plays when he needed to.  By my count he was 6 for 14 for 152 yards with 3 TDs & 2 interceptions.  His first TD was for 57 yards to a RB swinging out of the backfield (wheel play).  The LBer in coverage was trailing the RB back about 6 yards and the safety blew the coverage.  He hit the RB in stride and it was race to the endzone.  Butterfield's 2nd TD was a 34 yarder down the middle to an uncovered TE/H-Back.  Easy pass and he had no problem hitting the receiver in stride.  His 3rd TD was a play fake that the defense completely bit on and he found an uncovered TE in the back corner of the endzone for a 9 yard TD.  His 1st interception came 1 play after the slot receiver dropped a sure TD down the middle.  On the next play he threw an out to the WR that went off the WR's hands and popped up for the defender to make an interception.  His 2nd interception was a bad read/poor pass, but in his defense he did hurry and run down the defender to make the tackle.  Butterfield also plays safety and may actually be a better prospect on the defensive side of the ball.  He had 2 passes defensed and an interception on which he played center field, read the QB's eyes and broke extremely well on the ball.  He also ran the ball 10 times for 50 yards and 2 TDs.  His speed will not be such as to allow him to run the ball at the D1 level.  I would say that Butterfield was in the 6'2"-3" range, weighing in at just under 200 lbs with about 4.8 to 4.85 in the forty speed.

Claude Johnson has a very strong arm for a 10th grader and was right on the money with nearly all of his passes.  Johnson appeared to have speed to burn, however Lake Hamilton played great team defense and keyed on Johnson on every play of the game which did not ever allow him to really show his speed in the open field.  By my count Johnson was 12 for 19 for 79 yards with no TDs and 2 interceptions.  His 1st interception was a 20 yard throw down the middle that Butterfield made a great read and cut in front of the receiver on.  His 2nd interception was his worst pass of the night, a 35 yarder that slipped out of his hand and hung in the air allowing 1 DB to go up and tip it to another DB who made the interception.  Johnson had 40 yards on 10 carries which was very good when you consider that some of those were 6 yard carries where he had to break or avoid 4 tackles or more just to get 6 yards.  He was also sacked twice for a minus 17 yards.  I would say Johnson was a 6'1" weighing in at around 180-185 lbs with good speed (maybe in the 4.5s) but he never had enough room to know for sure.  The one real drawback for Johnson seems to be his hand size.  I was not very close to him, but he had 1 deep throw slip out of his hand and twice when he pulled back to throw the ball slipped out the back side for fumbles which he recovered himself both times and at least made in back to the line of scrimmage.

Lake Hamilton by far had the best team as the score shows.  Both QBs had some passes dropped, but the real difference in this game was fumbles by Pine Bluff and the fact that Lake Hamilton was just so much better defensively than Pine Bluff.  The whole game Pine Bluff DBs would be standing flat footed as Lake Hamilton receivers went past them, while Lake Hamilton defenders were everywhere.  It was obvious that Lake Hamilton's DL was keying on the QB and trying to contain him with little concern for Pine Bluff's RBs.  Patrick Wright (RB) of Pine Bluff had 158 yards & 2 TDs on his first 7 carries, but he fumbled the ball twice (not good out of 7 carries) and was pulled from the game until late in the 3rd quarter (when the game was over).  Yards after catch were almost none for the Pine Bluff receivers also due to the fact that the Lake Hamilton secondary (including Butterfield) always seemed to be right there when a catch was made.

In closing, Lake Hamilton is a very good team and I may try to catch them again later this year.  Pine Bluff is not a real good team.  Phillip Butterfield is a college QB prospect, but if he gets the chance to play upper D1 level football, I think it will be as a DB.  He can play QB at the college level I just don't think it will be major D1.  Claude Johnson on the other hand is the real deal athletically (good arm, good accuracy & good speed).  As he grows & matures, if he can progress skills wise, he will be the top QB recruit in Arkansas in 2 years.  I will definitely try to catch more of his games in the next 2 years.