Baker Mayfield led the Oklahoma Sooners to a Big 12 championship and the conference’s first College Football Playoff berth last season. After announcing his return for his senior season, expectations are even higher heading in to 2016. Mayfield is at the top of the list of talented seniors looking to go out on a high note this season with a legitimate chance to lead the Sooners to another conference championship and perhaps even a national championship if everything goes according to plan. Here is a look at the top Big 12 seniors heading in to the 2016 season.
QB: Baker Mayfield
Oklahoma Sooners
After sitting out for a year following his transfer from Texas Tech, Mayfield delivered an outstanding performance in Oklahoma’s Air Raid offense last season with 3,700 passing yards and 36 touchdowns. Mayfield added an additional 405 rushing yards and seven rushing scores to complete one of the most impressive performances by any quarterback last year regardless of conference and all eyes will be on the star passer to see what he has in store for an encore. Mayfield has talked a lot about his motivation to go out on top and in addition to helping the Sooners contend for championships he can also improve his draft stock. Mayfield is clearly the best returning senior in the Big 12 heading in to the 2016 season and by the time the year is over he could be the top quarterback available for the 2017 NFL Draft.
QB: Seth Russell
Baylor Bears
Oklahoma isn’t the only Big 12 championship contender that will be led by a star senior at the quarterback position in 2016. Russell returns to Baylor after missing most of last season because of injury and expectations are that he will put up some monster numbers as long as he can stay healthy. He was already one of the centerpieces on this offense but now that head coach Art Briles has been fired, Russell’s role takes on even more importance. Briles rebuilt this program and helped Baylor become a national power. This year, they were expected to contend for a Big 12 title and a spot in the College Football Playoff. With that leadership gone now, the focus is on Russell to lead the way.
The good news is he threw for at least three touchdowns in each of his first three games last year and he was on pace for some of the best numbers in the country at his position after throwing for 2,104 yards and 29 touchdowns in just seven games. The Bears will have a ton of talent lined up at the skill positions and there is a good chance that Russell will maximize the weapons he has in order to put up some big numbers over the course of a full season. As long as the offense can maintain what it was even without Briles, Russell will put up some spectacular stats.
RB: Shock Linwood
Baylor Bears
One of those weapons will be Baylor’s star senior running back Linwood, who is coming off a pair of 1,000-yard seasons but had his 2015 campaign cut short because of injury. Linwood ran for 1,329 yards and 10 touchdowns in 12 games last season and he needs just 213 yards to move past Walter Abercrombie as the school’s all-time rushing leader. The fifth-year senior is motivated for a big year and all indications are that he will be healthy and ready to perform at a high level by the time the fall rolls around. He completes what should be one of the most explosive backfields in the country. The coaching situation is still unsettling but this duo should be two of the best seniors in the Big 12 this season.
WR: Daikiel Shorts
West Virginia Mountaineers
The Mountaineers also return a ton of weapons on offense and the senior wide receiver Shorts is among the most dangerous of them. Shorts had 45 catches for 528 yards and five touchdowns a year ago and another year of experience to develop should make him that much more dangerous. At 6’1’’ and 200 pounds, Shorts has the size, speed and hands to make a tremendous impact and West Virginia is banking on some strong production from him in 2016.
It’s last call for head coach Dana Holgersen. He needs the offense to deliver this year if he wants to save his job and having a guy like Daikiel Shorts will help his cause.
