Quarterbacking Case....The Freshmen

Bolden hasn’t had enough time in the system to start the season, another month of games and practice may get the coaches to a tolerable level of comfort.

Deciphering Paterno speak, I don’t think he mispoke saying Newsome was essentially a freshman. I believe he was implying that Newsome has not progressed as much as he would like and has not separated from Jones and Boldin. I expect we’re in for a frustating and exciting season watching this battle play out.

Tate will go west, and hang out with his brah.

That’s the UD uniform.

Offhand, I can think of Aikman, obviously pretty good, Mallet seems to be doing well in Ark and Dan White did well at Arizona after leaving PSU in the early nineties but there has to be a lot of guys like Mitch Mustain and Josh David Booty that see their NFL dreams die.

Oh yeah, that Flacco kid and Jeff Hostettler made out OK. It appears the odds of succeeding post-transfer aren’t insurmountable.

I don’t know Newsome personally, but he seems like a humble guy. I also don’t know if he’s dead set on only playing QB for the rest of his life without question like Pryor. I mean I’d be kind of crushed if I had his talent, was recruited as a QB, then asked to switch positions, but this is the only way I see all three recruited QBs staying, which is still probably not all likely. Unlike Clark (and this is no bash on Clark), Newsome, to me anyway, is the only one of the 4 potential QBs who could pull off the MRob pre-2005 role and play multiple positions (WR, RB, QB, etc.).

I guess my problem is I’m too big of a puss and would hate to piss one of them off and lose them to a transfer (even if they aren’t the starting QB). They all seem like great guys, great athletes, and fantastic competitors. It’s been said before, this competition is nothing but a great situation to have for the team, but on the other hand it may force one of them to transfer, which I hate, but is a likely reality. My only comfort is that they knew the situation they were entering (at least Jones/Bolden did) when they came here, and weren’t afraid to compete, even though they could have gone to another school and played. I hate being so sensitive about this, it’s really kind of pathetic.

If you are a blue chip QB do you wait around, burn your redshirt year on the hopes that the guy who beat you out decides to leave a year early?

Paterno’s admitted this was probably a bad decision but I wouldn’t call it ignorant. I think the coaches make the personnel decisions on a number of factors including maturity as well as athletic and play making ability. This isn’t an exact science.

I think people are impressed with what they see in Bolden, but I would bet he hasn’t been asked to do much. He’s only been on campus a month or so, so I bet the coaches gave him a basic package of three formations and 15 total plays and told him to learn them really well. He may look like the best QB in running those plays, but the coaches have to ask themselves if the offense will be too predictable with just 15 plays, or if they would be better served letting McGloin or Newsome play while using the entire playbook.

I equate this, although with slightly different circumstances to the BW game. After that game, everyone wanted Jones to be the starter because he threw 2 TDs (only TDs of the game) against the career bench squad. This isn’t to diminish Bolden’s work at all. He’s clearly worked his ass off to be able to throw his name into the hat because he knew he was going to be the least experienced, and with the first team O vs. 1st team D to boot. I just worry that people are jumping to irrational conclusions based on fragments we get off of reporters observing practices. Sort of drawing on what Mike said, everyone’s on the Bolden train now because he’s looked good in practice, but the kid has yet to take a snap against a D1 team, and most importantly a hostile D1 defense (not that our own defense is slacking off against the 1st team O)

the dude isn’t even tall enough to see over the line

The dude is 2" shorter then ZOMG 5 star Jones. 2 inches isn’t the difference between “NFL talent” and “not tall enough to see over the line” You make it sound like he’s 5’6". And he is fast enough to roll out, hell Morelli was fast enough to roll out of the pocket and he ran like he had wooden peg legs.

I don’t know why you’re so down on the guy, it seems to me you feel like there’s no way someone who didn’t originally get a scholarship offer could be good enough to start for Penn State. To that I think you need to consider Butler, Hull, and Zug. Maybe you just feel like we need a fast mobile QB to run this offense, but to that I think you need to consider Clark’s play from last year. Maybe you just hate the Irish, but so does Joe and he’ll be starting one at QB soon… If he can get over it surely you can too.

since when does experience trump talent? if experience was so great then Jim Thome would still be the Phillies First baseman and Tommy Maddox would be the Steelers QB. McGloin is not good. I dont care if he understands the playbook because hes been there three years. If thats the case Brackett has been there 5 years and understands the playbook even better so maybe he should start.

Can’t stand this man love for a kid that has shown nothing to date. At least Newsome’s raw athletic ability is evident on the tape. My only thought about this unwarranted love is that there are too many Scranton mics, I mean Irish-Americans, on this site with an agenda to will McGloin into the starting QB role.

Jim Kelly would have been an excellent linebacker.

They decided last week.

On the BTN’s Penn State Football Preview tonight, the four analysts all said Bolden is the guy and gushed all over him. Cited as a better passer than both McGloin and Newsome.

The kid is like Daryll Clark in a lot of ways, but to actually be bigger than Clark already is pretty crazy. He’s a big framed kid from the couple of times I’ve met him, but 246 I really doubt.

not saying it can’t happen, but I doubt it will