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*****
Don't look now, but Texas isn't really in the Big 12 anymore. I know, I know, Texas played its last Big 12 football game in the conference championship versus then-ranked No.18 Oklahoma State, but the University of Texas -- as you well know -- has still had baseball and basketball seasons, volleyball and softball games, track meets, swimming and diving competitions ... heck, there might still be a rowing event or two out there left to play out under the auspices of the Big 12 umbrella, but for all intents and purposes, it's on to the SEC for the Longhorns.
While Texas won't officially join the Southeastern Conference along with longtime rival Oklahoma until July 1st, it really hit home for me seeing the emotional goodbye from LHN baseball commentators Greg Swindell and Keith Moreland over the weekend signing off for one last time.
I don't watch many Longhorns sports besides football, but my position on Longhorn Network is that it was a colossal waste of what could have been a nuclear weapon in the media to help Texas elevate its profile, aid in recruiting, and cement its brand even deeper into the wider college-sports ethos. But that's not the point. The point is that (while I'm not sad to see LHN go) I do feel sad for those two dudes and all the others who've done good work for the network who are going to be looking for work as LHN goes the way of the Frank Erwin Center. To see it happening in real time is when it hits home.
It really is over.
But that didn't keep a few Big 12 coaches from getting in a few parting shots on Quinn Ewers in a recent Bruce Feldman article on the Athletic. (article is behind a paywall).
Some samplings:
“I’m not that high on him,” said a DB coach who played Texas last year. “Overhyped. He has a good arm, and he did have a lot of talent around him, but you just see a bunch of stuff where you wonder what he’s doing out there.”
and
"Sark (Steve Sarkisian) does such a good job of setting things up for him, and so you’ll see times where he’ll rip it, but then there are other times, he just seems to be a little timid.”
and
I’m very curious to watch him this year,” said a Big 12 defensive assistant. “The last two years he had superstars around him. There’s some ‘Oh My God!’ throws on film that he made against Alabama, but he was just so inconsistent. I think he’s about average athletically.”
and
“I do think he’s come a long way from 2022,” said a Big 12 DC. “There was too much of the (Patrick) Mahomes comparisons around him coming into college. He does have a good arm, but he’s not anywhere near as athletic nor the playmaker Mahomes is, or has that kind of presence. It’s kind of a strange deal because people want to talk about that, about what he was supposed to be, or they want to talk about Arch Manning behind him. But that isn’t the kid’s fault.”
These anonymous Big 12 coaches, man. What a bunch of sour grapes.
I understand that I'm writing for a very, very hyper-informed and enthusiastic audience here to say the least. If you're reading these words, you are borderline insane about the Texas Longhorns and most things even tangentially associated with the football program. So, you probably have your own little gripes about Quinn Ewers as a player. It's not like there are no items on the "cons"-side of the ledger that you would be able to point out -- and many of those would be fair.
You can say you have concerns about his lack of chemistry and consistent connections with receivers on deep balls, or that he can be too freewheeling and inconsistent. You can say he relies too much on his natural abilities and arm talent. You can say that you don't think he plays with the type of fiery energy as a leader that you may remember from guys like Colt McCoy, Vince Young or even Sam Ehlinger. You can think he's a little too injury prone. Although his footwork has gotten better, some could still say it needs refinement.
My personal area of improvement I've noticed with Ewers is that you'd like him to be a little more mobile in the pocket under pressure. PFF can be cockamamie, but comparing him to some other QBs in the SEC in their percentage of pressures turned into sacks metric shows he can definitely improve here. In 2023, playing behind an excellent offensive line, 25.2% of the time Ewers was pressured, it turned into a sack. He can improve in this area to get a rate closer to Carson Beck last year (13.7%), Connor Weigman (7.3%) or Jackson Arnold (12%).
There isn't a perfect QB prospect out there, there never will be, and Quinn Ewers is not the singular individual who is going to change that law of the football universe.
Look at the last draft class where Caleb Williams went first overall, Jayden Daniels went second, Drake Maye went third, Michael Penix Jr. went eighth, JJ McCarthy went 10th and Bo Nix went 12th. Well, Williams was the cleanest, but people still nitpicked his deep ball accuracy and his decidedly "Gen-Z" temperament as a leader. People said Jayden Daniels was too slight of frame and made too many plays off-platform rather than within the structure of the play design. Don't get me started on the knocks people had on Drake Maye, ranging from sloppy footwork to bad processing ability to not showing improvement in his final season. Michael Penix was called as a Jeckyl and Hyde type of passer with legitimate injury concerns and a "project" despite already being 24 years old. McCarthy was considered more of a game manager and a system quarterback and his natural arm strength was questioned. Bo Nix was old like Penix and relied heavily on an RPO-heavy scheme where his average depth of target raised concerns about his downfield placement and processing abilities.
So, we know that Ewers will never find himself immune to similar criticisms, even if he has the kind of season in 2024 that he's certainly hoping for -- one that will land him with a similar landing spot in the NFL draft to the six guys listed above who were all nit-picked like molting chickens. But if we're solely going by what the scorned women .. ahem .. anonymous Big 12 coaches told Bruce Feldman, you'd literally get the following scouting report for Quinn Ewers coming into 2024:
Pros:
- "Good arm"
- He'll "rip it" at times
- Has "Oh My God" throws
- Has come a long way since 2022
Cons:
- Overhyped
- Was a product of the talent around him
- You sometimes wonder what he is doing
- Was a product of Sarkisian setting up things for him
- Timid
- Inconsistent
- Average athletically
- Nowhere near as good as Patrick Mahomes
- People still think about him as the player he was supposed to be
Quinn Ewers has gotten better and better under Steve Sarkisian at Texas and Sark has complete trust in him. He's a co-favorite to win the Heisman in 2024 alongside Georgia's Carson Beck. He led Texas to a Top 4 spot in the nation and a CFB playoff berth. He's got undisputed natural arm talent and his arm is a strong one. Legit alien stuff. He has the universal respect of his teammates. He's on the cover of the NCAA '24 video game. He's only played in 22 games at Texas and he's 8th all time in yards already and 7th all time in passing touchdowns, and he's been on the commissioner's academic honor roll basically the whole time. He lit Oklahoma State on absolute fire in the last championship game on Texas' long-overdue way out of the pitiful Big 12 conference en route to a better life for all of us in the SEC.
I wonder why these Big 12 coaches who Texas is leaving behind didn't have nicer things to say about him?
