As we wind down to only 100 days left in the off-season, the minds of Mountaineer fans are racing. Is this the year we do something special, can one of our own actually win a Heisman, are we being too optimistic again, are Mountaineer fans doomed to always being a bridesmaid and never the bride?? I'll tackle some of these questions, and give an outlook on the season, and hope to get you pumped up for the season.

Mountain Jesus' Heisman Claim: Buy or Sell?

An argument I saw for Will Grier not the win the Heisman was how our offense can take quarters off, and how he started against Virginia Tech.. my question is how much of that stems from Grier itself, and how much stems from Spavital's play-calling?? In the Kansas game, after half time the first drive went 6 plays 23 yards, on the first set of downs, we threw on first, then ran with McKoy, and Grier completed another pass for the first down on 3rd, the next set of downs we ran McKoy twice and then Grier and Sills couldn't hook up, Kansas gets it, comes down and scores, we 3 plays for 13 yards with an interception, then next possession run it with Crawford a few times, etc. I think you see where I'm going, the play-calling was pretty questionable at times, and though it seems balanced, it didn't seem like we were balanced, and other times other teams were eating out the clock running like mad men on our defense. Grier isn't as accurate as Baker Mayfield, but guess what, most quarterbacks to play the game weren't as accurate as Baker in college. What we have is a damn good signal caller that can transcend offenses behind center, and I see no reason why he can't be holding that trophy and join an elite group.

I think Grier has all the intangibles to win the Heisman, he makes the throws like Geno did in his time, he has a good pocket presence, and knows how to feel pressure, it's not like he has weird mechanics or anything. In his FIRST full year under center he threw for 3,490 yards, with 34 TDs and 12 INTs completing 64.5% of his passes. Those are some pretty gaudy numbers, and let's not forget he didn't play the full game against Texas or the bowl game, which most likely would have seen him as a 4,000 yard passer in our offense. I think we also need to remember the differences from year one to year two in our quarterbacks..

For reference, let's choose Trickett who was pretty serviceable and also a transfer that had 2 years in the system: Trickett played 8 games his first year and had 1,605 yards passing, 7 TDs and 7 INTs at 52.8%, BUT in his second year, Trickett in 11 games threw for 3,285 with 18TDs and 10 INTs at 67.1%; the improvement was massive; hell even Skylar Howard improved 7% in completion, 200 yards, and had 4 less INTs. It's proven QB's grow in their second year under Dana, and so it'd be silly to think Grier regresses. I think he had to knock off some rust of being almost 2 years without playing a meaningful football game against VT, and he really wasn't THAT bad against them. I'm buying Grier is a real deal Heisman candidate, and if you think that's WVU optimism/homerism just look at what the experts have to say, I don't think he'd be projected second overall in a mock draft if they didn't believe in him as well.

Why Did We Not Have A Back-Up Last Year/Depth Issues

Another argument is that we had no true back-up quarterback last year, and worst case scenario happened with Grier going down. It's completely unacceptable to be in a Power 5 conference, and not have enough depth to field a back up quarterback. I agree with this argument, but if we take a step back and look at what's happened in the QB department the last few years, it might shed a light on why things were so bad. My biggest thing I think not having a Spring Game hurts in the "serviceable QB" argument department for us. I would have loved to see what Allison, Lowe, etc. could have done, and I think it might have helped ease some doubts. This set looks to be the deepest QB depth chart we've had in a long time, and if you look at big time programs, all of them have deep QB charts. Ohio State with Cardale, Braxton, and JT; Alabama last year with Tua and Hurts; hell even Clemson has had a 5* QB transfer out this off-season. Even though it's unacceptable to not have a back-up QB, we've had some of the worst luck in the injuries/transfer departments, so let's take a look to how we got ourselves in this situation.

Look at Cody Saunders (4* out of high school), he had a very solid spring game, pretty sure he had a couple TD passes, no INTs and there was some optimism around this program until a injury cut his career short. Crest never developed, Ford Childress transferred out also dealing with injuries, we didn't have any QB stability. I don't necessarily think it's for a lack of recruiting, just some bad luck on our part. Yes we should be recruiting as many bodies as possible so even when the recruits don't pan out, we still have SOMEONE that is competent behind center, but it just seems our luck was a bit worse than others, I have a feeling we won't see that too often again. Our defense has also gone through those swings of losing key players to ACLs, etc. and it just seems the injury bug seems to hit us hard, I don't know if it's the strength and conditioning program, but there's no way that trend can continue, right?

What I Want For Next Season; Other Tid Bits

I'm a Holgy supporter as I've stated, I truly do like what he's done for the program, and think he has grown into his own as a coach, he's done a serviceable job moving into the Big 12 where it's a shootout every game. I've written about that before, but let's dig deeper. The Big 12 is an absolute monster of a conference, that doesn't get much respect, but I think it's one of the hardest to run the gauntlet just because everyone is so high octane that it's almost impossible to go undefeated, you can never really be comfortable with a lead. Any of these teams can come back with even a 20 point lead, hell just look at us against Baylor or Kansas last year. Arguments will be that "we shouldn't get ourselves in that situation in the first place" and I agree, but we can't just brush away the fact that we play in the Big 12. A lead of 20 is safe in the Big Ten, where they don't have the guns to keep up offensively due to general strategy and scheming, but in our conference, everyone plays fast, and it takes a toll on our guys, could you see yourself going through that many plays and still being fresh without being prone to making mistakes?

For Holgy and our program this year, I'm looking forward to seeing: growth in our program, can we compete for the Big 12 championship? This is our best opportunity in years, there was a mass exodus of quality quarterbacks at almost every team, we need to show that at least once in a few years we have the chance to be special. 05-07 was lightning in a bottle, and it sucks we never got our National Championship from it, but we need to be realistic. Being able to win 8-10 games in the Big 12, with the resources we have in Morgantown, West Virginia is impressive. Nobody is lining up saying, "Man Morgantown, now that's a place with amazing weather, and so much stuff to do," and it's not a slight, but it's just a fact of the matter. We've been developing in-state talent better over the course of the last few years, but we still aren't going to be a state like Georgia, Florida, or Ohio, and those kids dream of playing for their home state school. The way we've been recruiting and building, we're doing amazing. Think of all the guys our staff has developed and gotten into the NFL, we're putting a pretty good product out on the playing field, and just need to find ways to get more than a few, and move it into a WHOLE product. However, if we can keep up, keep growing in this aspect, and compete for championships every so often, we're doing fine. The better on-field product we produce, the better talent we'll attract, and that's just a fact of life. We'll never be a 5* factory, but we sure as hell have the ability to get some of these 3*/4* guys that are raw and developing them into beasts, it's the Mountaineer way, not only from football, but look at what Huggy is doing on the basketball aspect as well.

Another thing I want to see is play-calling, I hope Dana and Spavital had a long heart to heart and tweaked some of the system for this year. I think we didn't have the most amazing line to run behind, but hopefully with the outlook that we're supposed to improve there, we can be a bit more balanced, and kill some clock a few more times rather than the huge plays that leaves our defense tired, I'm hoping Spav shows a lot of growth this coming year too, because we'll need it. If we can control the clock a little more, we can help cut down on that injury bug as well, with guys being a bit fresher. We have the most potent Mountaineer offense we've seen in years, we have tight ends that can contribute, a good stable of running backs, and some receivers that will turn some heads, the blueprint is there, now we just need to assess how to properly utilize these pieces. A balanced attack from two years ago helped a Skylar Howard led team that I'm sure a lot of us didn't expect to win 10 games exceed expectations, if Dana can channel some of that into Spavital, just imagine the possibilities with this core.

And as for speaking of defense, we look good on paper, just not that much depth, it's been addressed with some great transfer pick ups from Papa Dana's Transfer Hut, but we have to see how they mesh, and pray the injury devil that's ruined our lives the past few years stays away. Our linebackers and corner backs are our biggest question, but I think our defensive line has improved greatly with all the bodies, we're deep there now. If we can keep them rotating, and can cause pressure on new opposing QBs, it can truly help us out a lot, taking some pressure off our secondary. The biggest thing is that we're not going to be going up against the QBs we have been the past couple years, and though the new ones will be competent, they're still green and need some breaking in. I'm looking for Gibby to draw up some pressure from different angles, and really help out on that aspect. Sure, the Big 12 has seen the 3-3-5 now time in and time again, and it's easier to prepare for, but the beauty of college football is that there's new guys out there every year, and even if you have the perfect scheme for it, you don't really learn against it until you experience it first hand.

Final Musings

Let's face it, we've all been hurt by West Virginia football, the expectations come crashing down when we finally drink the Kool Aid numerous times, and it leads to doubting, which I blame nobody for. It's frustrating, it's maddening, so many times I've said: "That's it, I'm done, I'm going to stop caring, it's just a damn game." But Mountaineer football holds a special place in our hearts, and we care because we've been conditioned for this our entire lives. As much as we want to let go, we still come back, time after time again. How many times do we hear "next year, that's it, it's our year", just to be let down? However, I'm still here, I still keep unwavering optimism in all things WVU, I still wear my shirt on gameday, and I still have faith in this program. I genuinely do believe this is the year we make some noise, and I hope that we take advantage of our opportunity unlike that one game in 07 that still makes me queasy to this day. Maybe I'm drinking the Kool Aid, maybe I'm an optimist, or maybe it's what brings me comfort in sports. It's fickle, and has ways to really annoy you. I understand the concept of how silly it is to be emotionally wrecked due to the outcome of 22 guys fighting on a greased up patch of grass, but it's a disconnect from things going on in life, and something to bring joy. I also know that football season is 100 days away, and I'll be there waiting to take on Tennessee, wearing the Old Gold and Blue, blasting Country Roads as loud as possible. Because as a fan, that's all we can do, appreciate what we have, be excited for the future, and hope it's the year the stars align, it's the beauty in the struggle.