Kansas center Bryce Foster doesn’t necessarily think he’s been playing poorly, just not quite up to his standard.
The Jayhawks’ lone preseason all-conference pick this year, Foster concluded 2024 as the highest-graded qualifying player at his position in the Big 12 on Pro Football Focus with a score of 75.5. The same numbers this fall would substantiate his sense that he’s experienced a slight drop-off — 62.1 against Fresno State, 59.0 against Wagner, 49.0 at Missouri and most recently 66.0 in Saturday’s win over West Virginia for a season-long mark of 59.1.
The redshirt senior isn’t sitting idly by. He went in to meet with offensive line coach Daryl Agpalsa on Sunday — it was Foster’s idea — and shared some of his concerns about his own play.
As Foster said on Tuesday, he asked Agpalsa not to compliment areas in which he is doing well: “If he doesn’t tell me I’m doing something wrong, then I’m doing it right, I’m doing my job.” Instead, the two discussed where Agpalsa wants Foster to be right now, and potential sources of improvement going forward, beginning with Saturday’s game with Cincinnati.
“He didn’t even know I was coming to talk to him,” Foster said. “I told him, I was like, ‘Listen, this is what I think, what do you think?’ He was like, ‘Yeah, I agree.’ Your worst critic’s going to be yourself.”
Essentially, as he was evaluating his film from the start of the season, Foster felt he had been neglecting certain details in the course of his play.
“I did a lot of self-evaluation when I was watching my film and grading it and looking at things,” Foster said. “It was such little stuff that I was doing wrong that ended up being something big, something as little as finishing a block with my body in a specific place, and then in practice I wasn’t doing that, and it showed up in a game.”
The center provided several more examples of details he could attend to more carefully: the exact placement of a snap (as he noted, he was far too low on one against the Mountaineers, which almost cost KU a possession), the speed at which he gets his hand back in place, how vertically he moves on a wide-zone play, where he positions his body between a defensive player and a runner, and so on.
With these minutiae in mind, Foster felt he excelled in practice on Monday and Tuesday.
“Luckily we’re only like a third or a quarter of the way into the season, so I had that talk, and then I’ve strung together my two best practice days of the year, so far this year, so super excited for what I’m going to do this weekend,” he said.
That’s a good sign for the Jayhawks. It’s not quite that as goes Foster, so goes the offensive line, but he at least assessed the unit’s play in a similar fashion to his own: “I think we’ve played OK, not up to par to what we played at last year.”
The process has been a gradual but steady one for KU, as it incorporates a new left tackle in redshirt sophomore Calvin Clements, right tackle in Syracuse transfer Enrique Cruz Jr. (a recent standout) and a pair of rotational left guards in Amir Herring and Tavake Tuikolovatu. Foster and right guard Kobe Baynes are the longtime fixtures, although Foster did miss a chunk of preseason camp due to a late-summer medical procedure.
KU offensive coordinator Jim Zebrowski said the Jayhawks seemed to have improved in terms of “displacing the line of scrimmage,” with more work still to do.
“Obviously Daryl’s going to want more all the time, and we all do, Lance (Leipold) will, obviously, because that’s who we want to be, a physical football team,” Zebrowski said.
The Jayhawks will need to bring that play style into Saturday’s clash with the Bearcats, and it may need to start with Foster, as he could potentially have a matchup with nose tackle Dontay Corleone.
“I know the nose guard’s really, really good, so I’m super excited,” Foster said. “I know he was out with an injury for the past couple weeks, but I’m super excited for the challenge I see ahead of us.”
Indeed, “The Godfather” is widely considered one of the top defensive tackles in the country, but he suffered what is reportedly an ankle injury against Bowling Green on Sept. 6 and was seen in a boot on a mobility scooter the following weekend; Cincinnati coach Scott Satterfield has described him as questionable for Saturday.
“So yeah, we’ll find out, I guess come game day, but he’s physical, he’s what you want,” Zebrowski said. “Physical and strong and tough. Hard to block.”
If KU does come up against the 6-foot-1, 335-pound Corleone, it’ll be a test of Foster’s strength and pad level — and a test of his ability to improve his play from its early-season quality.
“It doesn’t matter who we play,” Foster said. “We could play the worst team in FCS, D-III, whatever, whatever you want to call it, or the best team in D-I, or even play a team in the NFL. I’m still going to attack my practices the same way, and attack them the way I should, and I haven’t been up to par with that in the first couple weeks, and this week I think I’ve taken a big step forward.”
Missy Minear/Kansas Athletics
