01-11-2017, 10:57 PM
Remember also that when looking at freshmen QB's there is a certain amount of selection bias going on, in that you by definition are only seeing the freshmen QB's that were so good that they beat out upperclassmen. It would be interesting to find out what proportion of the battles between true freshmen and non-incumbent starter upperclassmen wind up being won by freshmen; my guess is that even in simpler systems, the true freshman wins a minority of the time.
If you are making the point that true freshmen quarterbacks can come in and play well in certain circumstances, I don't think you will find disagreement. However, I (and it appears others) don't think this is a common occurrence. Freshmen can come in and "hold the fort", but of the top 30 QB's in PER this year, only 1, Justin Hebert from Oregon was a true freshman, and he only became a starter midway through the season. One other QB was a redshirt freshman (Sam Darnold), and most of the rest were upperclassmen (6 sophomores/RS sophomores, 14 juniors/RS juniors, and 8 seniors/RS seniors). Jalen Hurts gets cited here, but his pass efficiency was 139, by comparison, Hogan's RS freshman year, his PER was 147; Chryst's this year was 133 (though not against SEC defenses). Rosen's PER last year was 134, Browning's was 139; Jared Goff's freshman PER was 123 (about what Burns' was this year, though to be fair to Goff, he had no offensive line). And those are mostly the positive examples.
So, if the point is that true freshman can start and be adequate, I'll concede, though for every Hurts out there, there's a Jacob Easen, whose PER of 120 matches Ryan Burns'. Nonetheless, if Mills is as phenomenal as some people here seem to think, then by all means start him.
If the point is that we would be so much better as a team if we regularly started true freshmen at QB, then I beg to disagree. That data points to even the best true freshmen quarterbacks as being ok, but hardly phenomenal.
And if the point is that we should be dumbing down our playbook specifically so that true freshmen can start, then I vehemently disagree.
BC
If you are making the point that true freshmen quarterbacks can come in and play well in certain circumstances, I don't think you will find disagreement. However, I (and it appears others) don't think this is a common occurrence. Freshmen can come in and "hold the fort", but of the top 30 QB's in PER this year, only 1, Justin Hebert from Oregon was a true freshman, and he only became a starter midway through the season. One other QB was a redshirt freshman (Sam Darnold), and most of the rest were upperclassmen (6 sophomores/RS sophomores, 14 juniors/RS juniors, and 8 seniors/RS seniors). Jalen Hurts gets cited here, but his pass efficiency was 139, by comparison, Hogan's RS freshman year, his PER was 147; Chryst's this year was 133 (though not against SEC defenses). Rosen's PER last year was 134, Browning's was 139; Jared Goff's freshman PER was 123 (about what Burns' was this year, though to be fair to Goff, he had no offensive line). And those are mostly the positive examples.
So, if the point is that true freshman can start and be adequate, I'll concede, though for every Hurts out there, there's a Jacob Easen, whose PER of 120 matches Ryan Burns'. Nonetheless, if Mills is as phenomenal as some people here seem to think, then by all means start him.
If the point is that we would be so much better as a team if we regularly started true freshmen at QB, then I beg to disagree. That data points to even the best true freshmen quarterbacks as being ok, but hardly phenomenal.
And if the point is that we should be dumbing down our playbook specifically so that true freshmen can start, then I vehemently disagree.
BC