It feels like forever ago that Texas Tech celebrated winning the saddle. Those Thursday night screws with my equilibrium in a big way, but we still need to list our offensive and defensive player of the week. On the defensive side of the ball, the honor rests with a strong return to force in limited action; Jacob Rodriguez.

Rodriguez returned from injury only playing about 30-35 snaps, but despite that he led the linebackers in total tackles. He clearly needs to get his legs under him more, but there was otherwise no rust for him out there. He is your top backer, and he helped contained TCU’s rushing attack, limiting the total to 87 yards. I hope he continues to stay healthy and help bolster a young and stressed linebacker.

Rodriguez reportedly is planning to play against KU and UC, yet not Texas in order to preserve his redshirt. So expect at least two more games from him to continue to prove he has the makings of a future all-conference linebacker once he can play a full season healthy.