Monday, January 12, 2015

QB Most Eligible

One of the easiest and laziest ways to look at a football game is to compare the teams' quarterbacks. As the highest profile position on the field, QB is just a natural starting point. In the case of tonight's national championship game, it's an interesting contrast between Oregon's Marcus Mariota, a senior QB and by all accounts a good guy, and Ohio State's Cardale Jones, who will be making his 3rd career start and once famously tweeted about OSU, "We're not here to play school."

As usual, tonight's game is on a Monday which means, as usual, it's going head to head with ABC's The Bachelor. And as it just so happens, Mariota and Jones share a lot in common with two of the ladies who seem to be in pole position to either win or become the next Bachelorette: Jade Roper and Britt Nilsson.



Let's get one thing out of the way with Jade: she's got naked pictures on the Internet. A time honored tradition of any Bachelor(ette) watcher is judging the appearance of the contestants on the first night. After all, you know nothing else about them other than what they look like. And of course, this is important to the Bachelor himself as well. With Jade, there's no mystery. Everything's already out there. Chris doesn't need the fantasy suite to see her at her most revealing. Of course, that still leaves the important questions of personality, chemistry, etc. Will Jade need these to get through the show? Probably, but not always. We've seen plenty of relationships go on based on purely physical attraction (think Ben F/Courtney, Juan Pablo/Andi) before crashing down either during or after the show when they actually had to spend time with each other. Can Jade show that she's more than a pretty face?

There is very little we don't know about Marcus Mariota. He has an exceptional career at Oregon, displaying skills and athleticism sure to catchy even a casual football fan's eye. Mariota has top-end speed, always seems to make the right play, and has flat out won, and won a lot, in the past couple years. He has all the intangibles you'd want in a quarterback. But there are still important questions. Much of his success has been predicated on being a better athlete than his competition. He's shown to be very capable at making reads after the snap and hitting the open man. But in the NFL, the playing field is more level. Mariota will have to take snaps under center, adjust his protections and read the defense before he gets the football, and he'll have to fire passes into much tighter windows than he's used to. Will we see this tonight? Probably not. He's been fine playing in Oregon's system, and of course it does not mean he can't succeed at the next level. But we've seen enough QBs with similar skillsets and who didn't have to play in pro style offenses in college get drafted and struggle. Can Mariota be the exception?



Britt didn't have the most memorable limo entrance. She didn't bring out a portable karaoke machine, didn't bring a (I hope) fake human heart, and didn't tell Chris that he could "plow the f*** out of her field any day." But there was something about her that just clicked. She was attractive, smiled a lot, and most importantly, she seemed real. Chris kissed her and gave her the First Impression rose, clearly making her a favorite for the season. Of course first impressions can fall apart quickly. What he thinks one night might not carry throughout the whole season. Can Britt keep up this relationship and lead the competition from beginning to end?

Not every school could start their third-string quarterback and win a game, much less have the level of success OSU has had. Heck, the Cardinals closed out the season starting their third-stringer and looked awful, and he's an NFL caliber player (supposedly). Though Cardale Jones started down on the depth chart, he's given OSU fans good reason to have confidence going into this matchup. He doesn't have the experience of Braxton Miller and is not as skilled a rusher or passer as JT Barrett, but when he hit the field for the first time, there was just something that felt right. Jones is humongous. When he barrels down the field, it's not a quarterback coming at you, it's a tight end, and the way he trucks people leaves no doubt. He is not the most polished passer, but there is no doubt that he has NFL-level arm strength. His throws have incredible zip and he routinely makes amazing deep throws. But we've seen this before, and no one wants to hear whispers of Jamarcus Russell. Jones has to prove that he doesn't just look good as an NFL prospect, but that he is a legit one. Can Jones show that he's the full package?

Enjoy the game, enjoy the show.