Was quarterback development ever an issue?

how do you develop a qb unless you have an offensive scheme that allows them to put theory into practice ?

I don't think you can ever just pin it all down to one thing. The scheme may have been an issue, but I don't think we were recruiting the most talented throwers either.

Mettenberger came in here and lit it up so yes, QB development was an issue.

Perhaps Joe Brady might help a little bit in this area

Other than the one season with Mettenberger when LSU's defense necessitated doing away with the risk-averse approach, Les never put his QB's in a position to succeed. His approach to the QB position and offense in general was "just don't frick things up" instead of actually putting them in position to be explosive.

Les would rather eek out a win vs. a 20 point underdog than run the risk his QB could throw an INT by going over the middle of the field in the redzone. He went into every game hoping to "just enough" on offense to win rather than allowing the offense to potentially be great. Only when he was forced to throw caution to the wind did you get glimpses of what the offense could do.

2008 forever ruined him. From that point on he would rather have a terribly below-avg offense than ever run the risk of pick-6's again. The problem was he failed to realize a big part of the interceptions was Lee's proclivity to become absolutely panic-stricken in the face of even slight pressure

Yes because we were asking kids to come in and essentially speak an entirely different language in order to play Quarterback here.

Imagine going to a college where you speak English but you’re taught in Japanese. And the kids you’re competing with all are being taught in English. It’s just you that’s being asked to do it in Japanese. Not a recipe for success.

Harris was never going to develop as a QB. He was too much of a project and had zero patience. It didn't help that there were so few QB's on the roster that he was second string by default. Also didn't help that Les Miles was directly involved in his development.

Jennings could have been a good, not great QB. But he was also thrust into a starting roll too early and only had Harris (who was clearly getting under his skin) as backup / competition. After his soph year he was benched without a prayer of playing.

Those were the only QB's given a chance while the rest (Mett, Etling, and Burrow) were all transfers. Unless you want to debate the JLvJJ era all over again.

Brennan looks good. Orgeron thought he and McMillan weren't ready so he got Burrow. Therefore Brennan wasn't put in a bad spot too early and has had time to clearly develop. McMillan moved on rightly so, and there is no telling if Narcisse would have benefited from being patient and not moving on before year 2.

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Was quarterback development ever an issue?

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Recruitment, development and scheme. It all added up. Top it off with a coach who was set on ball control and playing it safe.....

Without this scheme Burrows would look very similar to last year at the end of the year. Good but not great.

There was a change in the plays called toward the end of the year that made us more of a passing threat. But the change of scheme has allowed us to morph into the extremely dangerous passing offense that we are today.

Most kids playing HS ball run spread offenses. That’s why you see freshman QBs come in and do so well. It was very difficult to take a high school QB that ran spread all his life and throw him into a Les Miles offense and expect him to succeed.

All I know is that we didn’t have QB/modern offense development before...and now we have it. I like now vs before.