The reality of college football is that in most cases, teams need good quarterbacks to win. Alabama might be able to rely on a strong running game and a powerful defense, but it became apparent that Clemson’s superior quarterback was a difference maker in the national championship game. Teams generally need that strong field general in a pass-oriented world in order to win conference championships and become leading contenders for the College Football Playoff. Several programs which expect to contend for a playoff spot have uncertain quarterback battles. Here are four of them:
Clemson Tigers
The Tigers watched Deshaun Watson become an all-time great college quarterback over the past two years. Now, they have to begin life without him. These are enormous shoes to fill, even though the Tigers have a solid defense and a winning tradition made possible by head coach Dabo Swinney. The two leading performers in the new Clemson quarterback derby are Hunter Johnson and Kelly Bryant. As the older player, Bryant should probably be considered the favorite for the job, but that’s no guarantee he will win it. Remember that a year ago, USC went with junior Max Browne over freshman Sam Darnold, and it turned out that the freshman was the far better player than the junior. Maybe that will happen here with Clemson. At any rate, this competition is worth monitoring this college football offseason.
Stanford Cardinal
There are two uncertain options for head coach David Shaw. One is Ryan Burns, who was the opening day starter last year but was thoroughly mediocre and never left a strongly positive impression on anyone. Burns was replaced by Keller Chryst, who stabilized the team and the offense in November but did not do anything special; the tougher teams on Stanford’s schedule came in the first half of the season, before Chryst got on a roll. Chryst then got injured in the Sun Bowl against North Carolina. Burns is underwhelming and Chryst is rehabbing from injury. The Cardinal will need to be very discerning in the offseason as they try to search for the quarterback who will lead them back to the top of the Pac-12 North.
Stanford has a challenging early schedule and whoever starts at quarterback will only get one game to get warm. The Cardinal should roll the Rice Owls in their opener but then they’re at USC, at San Diego State and then home to UCLA. That’s no cakewalk.
LSU Tigers
When Brandon Harris and Danny Etling battled for the starting spot last year, there was no clear consensus. Etling enjoyed a very good game against Texas A&M on Thanksgiving, but neither man was all that steady over a longer period of time. Next season, Etling will be joined in the QB battle by Justin McMillan, Lindsey Scott and Lowell Narcisse. Brandon Harris transferred in February, taking himself out of the picture. This is a wide-open competition under a first-year offensive coordinator, Matt Canada. No one should presume to know what’s going to happen.
Florida Gators
The young quarterback who played for the Gators last season but was injured, Luke Del Rio, is back for another season. His familiarity with the offense is a plus, but when he played, the Gators were hardly dominant on offense. A contender for the starting job is Feleipe Franks, who received praise from former Florida quarterback and coaching legend Steve Spurrier. Franks has more upside; the question is if Del Rio’s comfort level within the offense will enable him to get the opening day nod and establish himself as the number one quarterback on the depth chart. It’s also possible that Del Rio will look a lot crisper having received some in-game experience and now some offseason to improve.
One key factor to keep in mind with this battle is that the Gators have a very tough opening schedule. Del Rio is experienced and he might get the first crack at the job because of that. The Gators start with a neutral-site affair against the Michigan Wolverines on September 2nd and then host the Tennessee Volunteers two weeks later.
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