It is Thursday and not only are we another day closer to everyone's St. Patrick's Day celebrations, we are also at the day of the week when the Your Best 11 Mailbag opens up. So, before people who drink all of the time have their favorite watering holes bombarded by folks who never drink, enjoy some football talk. Oh, and if you are partaking in the festivities be safe out there, folks, and avoid the table of people drinking way too much, way too early. It will not end well for them.

First question, talking spring ball, of course. My buddy, Barrett Sallee, talked about it over at the SEC Blog a little while back. I've skirted around it a few times, but since you asked, here's my take.

Start late. Not because of the weather, and not "super" late as in kicking it off into April. Just start after spring break. That's the idea of the late start that I am looking for, where spring is concerned. By starting after spring you add continuity to the entire ordeal.

Some teams start early in March, take their spring break, and then get right back to it. That is fantastic for the players' bodies because it lets you recover from taking a beating. However, mentally and conditioning wise, I'm a firm believer in finding your groove and settling in. You get used to talking ball, meetings, lifting and running, then you get a week off, and they expect you to be right back into things like you were.

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Forget about removing disinterested voters or eliminating those who cast their Heisman ballot well before the regular season actually concludes. The Heisman Trust has instead decided to crack down on the diligent participants who explain their logic before the results go public.

I suppose the actual glaring issues negatively impacting this peculiar process will have to wait.

According to Dennis Dodd of CBSsports.com, the Heisman Trophy Trust has made an ultimatum of sorts: follow our rules or you will no longer have a say—or specifically a ballot—to help decide college football’s most “outstanding” player:

As an exclamation point, the Trust included copies of stories that were posted this past year for each individual voter. Greetings, Big Brother.

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Johnny Manziel is going to be the chief offseason project for guys like Nick Saban, John Chavis and other defensive minds in the SEC. He gave folks problems last year, and as he improved, even the teams who handled him admirably to start 2012 will need to keep getting better.

That said, if I am Kevin Sumlin, or newly promoted offensive coordinator Clarence McKinney, I am not worried about schematic changes.

Nope. What I am worried about is Johnny Manziel growing up.

And not growing up in the petty, ridiculous and arbitrarily patriarchal way that a lot of folks mean it when they talk about Johnny Football. No, when I say that I'm interested in him growing up, I mean watching the rising redshirt sophomore evolve in the offense.

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The Florida Gators kick off spring ball today and the boys down in Gainesville have got an SEC East title on their minds. They came just short of getting to Atlanta in 2012, and this spring they start the push to get to the ATL.

Florida has some pretty big holes to fill on both sides of the ball and it starts with offense. Leading rusher Mike Gillislee is gone as are some pieces on the offensive line. Filling those holes is a must for quarterback Jeff Driskel and the offense to take that next step towards an SEC East title.

On defense the big questions come in the form of all the studs heading to the NFL. All three levels of defense absorbed some big losses and this spring there are plenty of positions up for grabs. Getting Dante Fowler and Dominique Easley back is a blessing for the Gators' front as Ronald Powell is still non-contact this spring.

The Gators were a team that played a physical brand of football, but certainly need to add a passing element to make their offense more complete. On defense, losing linebackers, safety Matt Elam and the big man up front, Sharrif Floyd, hurt, but this spring Will Muschamp will be using his physical practices to find replacements. 

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One of the nation’s best defensive tackles in the 2014 recruiting class will do much, much more than just take up space. He causes havoc on the line and in the backfield.

Chesapeake, Virginia’s Andrew Brown is regarded as one of the top players overall in next year’s class, and he's also one of a handful of gifted players from the state of Virginia. While we're not used to seeing Virginia turn out some of the nation's best talent, get used to this year.

Although we’re not accustomed to seeing the SEC lose many recruiting battles, that could change (at least slightly in 2014), and Brown could be someone that decides to take his talents elsewhere.

It is, of course, very early in the process, but here’s what our odds board looks like when it comes to his recruitment at the moment.

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The most remarkable statistic from Johnny Manziel’s preposterous 2012 season wasn’t the gaudy touchdown numbers. It wasn’t the yardage totals, which shattered SEC records, or his 229 rushing yards in the team’s Cotton Bowl win against Oklahoma. It wasn’t the endless amount of box score destruction he amassed, although we’ll certainly get to that.

The most impressive number in a seemingly endless list to pick from was the near 70 percent completion percentage he finished with—68 percent to be exact—in his first season as a college quarterback. Only seven quarterbacks in the entire country connected on a greater percentage of throws.

The highlights ingrained in your brain undoubtedly feature Manziel making would-be tacklers look horrid in their efforts, although this was only a portion of his greatness.

When evaluating the areas of improvement for Manziel, his arm is where most scouts and wannabe couch scouts would go first. And while there is certainly room for growth in this department and his mechanics could use some fine-tuning—after all, we have to talk about something—no number better captures the outlandish and potentially unfeasible expectations that will be heaped upon him next season.

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None. Or, more importantly, not enough for it to matter. You'll see some philosophy, you'll see some tone, but scheme, in the world of college football, is not something you should expect to see at a spring game.

Scheme is, for the most part, game dependent. It is how you attack the opposition's weak side linebacker or get after their right guard. Scheme is a very specific monster that coaches hold close to the vest and only expose when they think they can deliver a knockout shot.

Spring games are less about scheme and more about sating the masses. If your fanbase thinks you need to establish the run, you spend your spring game establishing the run. If your fans want a high octane, explosive team then you spend your spring game proving that is what you are. 

In other words, spring is not about showing scheme and how you plan to attack defenses; spring is about making sure that the masses stay in line and get what they want.

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Spring ball, in and of itself, was a blessing. It meant an end to winter conditioning. It also meant we got a chance to put on pads and hit people. For a guy like me, that was a treat from the Football Gods. As I told my buddy The Key Play, I wasn't much for weight lifting or running.

So, for me, spring was a true gift. No game plan, no scout team, real competition and aside from quarterbacks, no one was off limits. Those fifteen practices and the meetings that came with them were infinitely better than mat drills and hard gainer lifts and such.

We start with that point because perspective is key; the worst part of spring is still better than the best part  of winter conditioning, folks. That said, there are certainly worst parts of spring ball. There are also best parts. For fans, the spring game is a favorite part because that's when they get to see whole deal. For me, the spring game was only great because my parents came, and I got to go have a good dinner after.

I'll stop short of calling the spring game the worst. It is as middling as it gets, though. A time consuming show for the masses and, if you're a middle guy like myself, a game you have to play every snap of. The starters are done with their 15-20 snaps and they are making jokes, the terrible players are looking around hoping the coach remembers they are on the team, and then there's me who is just in for a thousand snaps because coach knows I won't embarrass him by blowing a coverage.

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