Schulz is far from out of the running and will get number one reps in spring camp until someone knocks him out of that spot- something that neither Cox nor Manning did last year. I'd put the odds on our starter next year, if Thompson comes, as:Originally Posted by sancho
Wilson: 25%
Schulz: 20%
Thompson: 20%
Manning 15%
Cox 10%
Thomas 5%
Isom 5%
I am not connected to anything other than what I hear on this board and utefans, so I could be very wrong. My understanding is that Manning looked better than Schulz but they (1) didn't want to burn the RS and (2) didn't want to put Manning in front of a line that was barely functioning.
I think we've all seen what Schulz can do. I'd guess Manning is the frontrunner coming out of Spring. I also think Isom will be the second best coming out of the fall, but they'll want to redshirt him, so Cox will be #2 on the depth chart. I wouldn't be surprised to see Schulz end up somewhere like Weber St after spring is over. Jay Hill would make room for him. If the OK guy does some here, the coaches would have to believe he's got a shot to beat out Manning.
That's a popular narrative for sure, but doesn't fit with KW's general disregard for RS'ing game ready players. People in the know have a lot more confidence in TW returning, give Schulz a chance, and are pretty silent on the prospects of our RS freshman. Some people are burnt out by our QB injuries, which they attribute to having a running/mobile QB, and have grabbed on to our only remaining QB upon whom they can project aspirations for a great pocket QB. That narrative is based on a few quotes and a lot of wishful thinking IMO.
Whit made it pretty clear Schulz was playing because they didn't want to burn a redshirt, not because he was necessarily the best option.
He's also made it clear that unless Wilson is 100% and able to be #1 there is no front runner for the job and it would be a wide open competition, which I can't see anyone saying Schulz wins.
I think you're right.
"It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
--Antoine de Saint-Exupery
"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
--Yeats
“True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”
--John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell
KW has said that there is a "wide open" QB competition every year, and it's yet to really play out that way. Also, I don't believe for a second that KW went 5-7 when he had a superior game ready QB on his bench. That just didn't happen.
It's yet to play out that way? Are you saying we have deliberately gone with lessor QBs when better players were available?
I think KW knew that our superior but green QBs on the bench would not be enough to beat Oregon in Oregon with a dysfunctional offensive line. Maybe he should have burned a RS for the WSU game. At that point, it was experience vs talent. Can't blame him for going with experience, even though it backfired. Maybe if he had gone with Manning, we win, and Whitt is not a part of any "hot seat" discussions. But we can't know that.
Of course, if you want to make this about Whit looking out for Whit, then you have to realize that if he had started Manning or Cox against WSU and won then the narrative would be that Whit panicked and burned a RS (just like McBride with Alex Smith) when Schulz could have won that game. Now, if he starts Manning and the Utes lose, then not only did Whit panic, but his panicked decision cost us a bowl game.
As above, there was a little risk for KW in burning a RS late, but if there was a clear advantage of Manning/Cox over Schulz, the reward of winning 6 would be big enough to take that risk. Schulz was not playing well prior to the WSU game. The bar for being clearly better than Schulz to the point of justifying that risk was obscenely low. Neither Manning nor Cox passed that bar.
Also, remember that TW's RS was burned the first game in 2012 to run a few wildcat plays. TW was nowhere near a game-ready QB at that point, and KW had no hesitation burning that RS. KW burns a lot of RS's for limited special teams play as well. He just isn't a coach who systematically clings to the RS in such a way that it explains the decision to stick with Schulz.
As for the open competition, there has been a strong incumbent advantage with respect to reps that is counter to a truly open competition. Not that a lesser QB is selected, but the guy who started the leader got the coaching required to stay the leader.
Last edited by jrj84105; 02-17-2014 at 04:42 PM.
Interesting game theory for Coach Whitt.
It may well be that what you're saying is depressingly true -- Manning/Cox were so "not ready" that Whit really was forced to stick with Schulz. Don't you think that means the Oklahoma transfer makes a lot of sense, assuming Utah can land him? FWIW, I can't believe that if KW runs spring practice assuming that Wilson isn't coming back, the coaches will stack the QB reps in the spring to favor Schulz. I never want to see Schulz on the field again for Utah, so I hope I am right about what will happen in the spring.
"It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
--Antoine de Saint-Exupery
"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
--Yeats
“True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”
--John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell
I'm still not buying. I just don't see enough evidence to conclude that Manning/Cox look worse than Schultz in practice, especially when everything else I read says that Manning has looked great.
TW redshirt was burned because they were intentionally trying to establish him as a change of pace, option QB. Something of a poor man's Bell-dozer. Whittingham seems to value QB redshirts quite a bit.Also, remember that TW's RS was burned the first game in 2012 to run a few wildcat plays. TW was nowhere near a game-ready QB at that point, and KW had no hesitation burning that RS. KW burns a lot of RS's for limited special teams play as well. He just isn't a coach who systematically clings to the RS in such a way that it explains the decision to stick with Schulz.
Here are some facts:
Schulz is not a PAC-12 QB. He can't move like a running QB, he can't throw like a PAC-12 QB.
Whitt has played three true freshmen QB's: BJ, Wynn, Wilson. All three spent the rest of their careers hurt. Don't underestimate how much this played into Whitt's decision to start Schulz.
Last year, Whitt could have burned Manning's RS, and played ANOTHER freshman QB (risking wasting him like he did BJ, Wynn and Wilson to injury) or known he would lose to Oregon no matter what, and unless Schulz threw two pick sixes (damn) he would beat WSU and Colorado.
Here is my opinion:
Whitt made the right decision. Utah should have beaten WSU last year, and it took Schulz playing dumber than a brick to have Utah lose. Also, remember how we played against Colorado?
Recovered fumble - led to a touchdown.
Recovered fumble - led to a touchdown.
one pass, 7 rushes - TD
Whitt made sure Schulz didn't touch the ball. He did what should have been done in the WSU game: let WSU play against our defense and tell Schulz to get the heck out of the way. We go bowling if we do that.
NOW, all that being said, and I admit I think Whitt is a great coach and should have two more years regardless of what happens this fall, BUT if Schulz ever sees the field again, I think Whitt should be fired on the spot. When you have Manning, Cox, Thomas, Isom and the transfer kid (maybe), then there is no excuse for playing Schulz. NONE.
Last edited by Utah; 02-17-2014 at 10:26 PM.
Brian Johnson backed up Alex as a true freshman and was injured the second to last game of his true sophomore year.
Manning did have a great RS year, but that's not the same as being a game ready QB. I didn't say he or Cox were worse than Schulz, just that they weren't decisively better. IMO there is still a lot of ground between decisively better than Schulz and adequate. Now part of that is that Schulz was grossly misused in an offense that didn't adequately adjust to the difference in skillsets between Schulz and Wilson. I don't think that Schulz is as bad as he was made to look last year. I'm not very confident that our staff has gotten the most mileage out of the sometimes limited QB ability we've had. I gave up on the 2012 team when I saw Jordan Wynn drilling read option during fall practice. I won't have any confidence in the 2014 offense if Manning or Schulz are doing the same come fall.
The decision to use a change of pace QB was made to get Chase Hansen involved as a true freshman. Wilson was put in that role despite the fact that he was TERRIBLE at running the option his freshman year. It was a pretty willy-nilly plan B redshirt burn IMO.
I think JRJ34598345 (name change, please!) is owning this thread. Whit is a smart dude so he knows (1) about how game-ready certain players are, (2) that by winning at WSU (and bowling) he would have saved himself a LOT of heartache. All Utenation is crying for his head right now, but if he won one more stinking game everyone would be saying Utah is back! Given that, I can't see him sitting Cox when he knew he had a better shot of winning with him than with Schultz.
That, my friend, is a fantastic line. I remember when Schultz dominated his redshirt year.
I think everyone agrees with this. The real question is whether Schulz is the frontrunner for the starting job if Wilson is out. I think he is not, and the WSU choice is not evidence to the contrary.
I do agree with JR on Schultz. He is not a bad QB; he was put into a bad situation. He has a strong arm and experience. But I don't think he will be our QB next season.
I'm sorry, but Schulz was a bad QB. Borderline terrible. His adjusted QBR is one of the lowest in the nation. He single hand idly gave WSU 14 points and a bowl game. His record was 1-5, including two games where the opposing team scored less than 21 points.
With a a half decent QB, we go AT WORST 7-5 last year. AT WORST.
I love Whitt, but if Schulz ever plays again and we aren't up 30 pts...that would be unacceptable.
The bottom line is that we didn't have a game ready number 2 QB last year. I think there were a few contributing factors.
1) Cox looked like a legitimate second option in spring camp. He certainly impressed DE in that respect. Then Cox was injured which either caused him to fail to progress or possibly led to some regression. I suspect that had DE not been so impressed with Cox, he would have brought in a transfer rather than enter fall camp with Schulz as #2.
2) Now if we still had Chow's offense, I think Schulz could have performed better than Hays and eeked out enough W's to get us into a bowl. Schulz didn't have that advantage though. I don't think DE had the energy to prepare a new offense for Schulz or Manning, and BJ simply lacked the aptitude. Watching Schulz try and sell the read option while being completely ignored by a WSU defense that was collapsing on our RB's was sadder than watching the interceptions. It was a farce of an offense to be running with that QB, and the hard truth is that Manning wouldn't have fared any better.
I think we have some serious concerns at QB heading into 2014. The question is whether or not DC can tailor an offense to get the most out of limited talent/experience like what Chow did with Hays, or if we'll continue to have questionable talent that still manages to underperform as we saw in 2012 and the end of 2013.
Last edited by jrj84105; 02-18-2014 at 02:04 PM.
I agree 100%
The hard truth about Manning...huh. How many games has anyone seen Manning play? How much has anyone see Manning practice? Schulz was just a terrible QB. The problem was, the rest of this Utah team was really, REALLY good. We beat Stanford. We had 6 TO's vs UCLA and almost won. We held an amazingly explosive ASU team to 20 pts. The rest of the team went toe to toe with an energized USC team.
Here is where we were with two games to go: We needed two wins and both teams we played weren't better than us with NO QB. All we needed was Schulz to go out and not throw picks. Heck, had he done nothing but sat down, we would have beaten WSU.
WSU is NOT a good team. They aren't "up and coming" like everyone likes to say about them. We went toe to toe with them, and we had NO QB. NONE. We were completely one dimensional, just like they are. The game came down to two plays, and both those plays were pathetic plays by Schulz.
Hays never had bone head plays like Shulz did. I was a Hays hater, but we probably go 7-5 with Hays this year. Schulz is that bad.
Again, how can anyone say that Manning isn't better when we haven't seen him play? We should have beaten WSU, even with Schulz. We were good enough. The only player that didn't belong on the field at that time was Schulz. Once we lost that game, there was no point in playing Manning the last game.
Just because Manning didn't play says nothing about his talent, ability, or progression in comparison to Schulz.
Wow. We see two completely different Utah teams. Utah's QB situation is the best it's been since...forever. We've never had this much talent at QB at once in...ever. Look at us in the PAC-12:
2011: Wynn and Hays
2012: Wynn, Hays and Wilson
2013: Wilson and Schulz
2014: Manning, Cox, Thomas, Isom, Schulz and maybe Wilson
I have concerns at QB as well, but I feel better about the QB position than...ever. We actually have options.
DC has done quite well with Freshman/RS Freshman QB's. DC doesn't have limited talent. He is surrounded by talent at the QB position. Hays overachieved at QB. Wilson overachieved at QB while healthy. Schulz underperformed big time.
We don't have questionable talent. We have talent. And, most of out talent hasn't underperformed. Most has overachieved.
What we need is depth (which we have). Look at last year. When Wilson was healthy, we were 4-2, with a win over a top 5 program, running a top 25 offense. When Wilson was hurt, we went 1-7. But the rest of our team was good.
In our first 6 games, Wilson had 13 TD's vs 10 INT's. The offense was putting up 38 points per game.
Our last 6 games, we lost to Arizona by 11 points, and Arizona only scored 35 points.
We lost to USC by 16 points, and USC only scored 19 points.
We lost to ASU by 1 point, and ASU only scored 20 points.
We were killed by Oregon.
We lost to WSU by 15 points, but Schulz threw two pick sixes, and WSU scored 49 points.
You can't tell me that a healthy Wilson, who was leading a top 25 offense and had just beaten a top 5 team, would not have won at least two more games last season.
If we would have had a real QB instead of Schulz, we are all on here talking about how great Whitt is, how we destroyed CSU, how awesome we will be this fall, blah, blah, blah. Imagine if Hansen didn't go on his mission. Instead of having a terrible walk-on at QB, we have a RS freshman come in, in his second year of being on the team, who can run the read option very well...we win at least 7 games.
Our problem has always been QB depth. We have depth now. I'm excited to see what happens this fall. Better depth everywhere and an easier schedule. Fun stuff.
jr's whole stance is because Manning didn't play against WSU and Schulz did, Manning isn't as good. Not the strongest argument.
Schulz never dominated his RS year. The only people that talked about him were fans who saw one pass go for a TD against Utah's third string defense, which at the time was terrible (no depth). Never once did anyone around the team imply Schulz had any future with this team. Schulz was so terrible, Whitt went with Wilson who couldn't throw over Schulz. The only reason Schulz saw the field last year was Wilson's LIFE was in danger. Basically, until it looked like Wilson might DIE, Whitt chose Wilson over Schulz. Not the biggest endorsement. And even then, Whitt almost went with Manning. BUT, Whitt probably didn't think that Schulz would do the stupid thing and throw two pick sixes..that's what freshmen do.
Again, all Schulz had to do against WSU was sit down, and we would have won. He was a terrible QB, and him playing has nothing to do with Manning or Cox's talent, but everything to do with how good the rest of this Utah team was.
Last edited by Utah; 02-18-2014 at 10:18 PM.
Except he did. Pick 6 against USC late in the third quarter or early in 4th. Pick 6 against Georgia Tech. I think they are basically the same quality of QB. There is no way that Utah goes 8-5 with Hays without a very good OL and a dominant John White IV. Add those two elements and Schulz at QB and the records are the same.
And Chow knew how to run that offense and manage Hays effectively (relatively).
All of this- I'd also add Shawn Asiata.
What year did Shreve switch to baseball? Wasn't losing him the reason we had to pick up Hayes?
Shreve was still at Utah when they picked up Hays, but his lack of progress was a big reason that they needed to go get Hays.
The craziest thing is this:
Here we are debating Schulz like crazy, when the most likely thing that happens is Schulz is the starter come opening day...for Weber State.
Speaking of QB transfers...
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/col...ech/?eref=sihp
We have a lot of QBs now. We will probably see both position changes (Thomas, Hansen, Thompson?) and transfers.
My understanding is that Shreve was dumber than dirt. Hard to play qb at that level if that was indeed the case.
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