For what seems like the 8th or 9th time in the Kelly era an offensive output in the first half threatened several school records only to see things slow down in the second half for a much more boring win and few to no records broken. On Saturday evening, the Irish scored touchdowns on 6 out of their 8 drives in the first half (plus a field goal) and down-shifted the offense from thereafter to cruise to an easy and quite dull 52-17 over Miami of Ohio.
PASSING OFFENSE
Pretty much this…
Maybe we thought Wimbush’s solid performance on the road at Michigan State meant his struggles were behind him. Or if he was going to not look great and keep improving at least he’d never have another stink bomb with his arm. Well, that wasn’t the truth.
I’m at a loss of words, to be honest. Wimbush finished 7 of 18 for 119 yards and I’m not sure how to describe things. So many things look wrong (what the hell was that true side arm screen thrown 48 yards behind St. Brown?) and yet it also looks like he’s not that far away from putting the passing game into higher gear. He seems weirdly panicked in the pocket at the strangest times with perfect protection, but maintains a calm demeanor in between snaps all the same.
If we can take away a positive only 2 interceptions on 132 attempts this season is good! Plus, Wimbush did throw 3 touchdowns passes, one almost every other completion! He’s also still only averaging 1 touchdown pass per game, with 52.2% completion, and 156.4 yards through the air. You’d think Notre Dame is 0-5 looking at that stat line–lots of room for improvement!
The #BookClub got some quality meeting time last night and it was largely a success. Ian finished 3 of 5 for 51 yards, including a pair of first down throws. A full 8 passes into his career and I think we’ve got a solid backup at the moment.
The offensive line protected phenomenally well, I thought. There were 3 sacks and I think they were all on Wimbush being indecisive, plus Miami only mustered 1 quarterback hurry.
RUSHING OFFENSE
What more can you say about Josh Adams? How about this…he’s on pace to break Vagas Ferguson’s single-season school record by nearly 300 yards–assuming 13 games played and Ferguson did only play 11 games. Even more impressive, he’s on pace to do so while averaging almost 13 fewer carries PER GAME than Ferguson. Adams is averaging 9.0 yards per carry!
| Player | 1st/2nd Yes | 1st/2nd No | 3rd/4th Yes | 3rd/4th No | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Adams | 5 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 87.5% |
| Jones | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 75.0% |
| McIntosh | 1 | 9 | 0 | 2 | 8.3% |
| Book | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 100.0% |
| Wimbush | 3 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 50.0% |
| Young | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Total | 15 | 14 | 4 | 3 | 54.2% |
For the second straight week the Irish obviously shut things down very early in the 3rd quarter so these numbers are a little deceiving. Notre Dame did start the game with 9 out of 11 successful runs and that’s largely why the offense put themselves so far ahead of Miami early on in the first half.
Tony Jones’ 32-yard fake punt rumble really helped out his season average, up from 2.5 per carry to 5.4 now!
How about Ian Book showing he can make some plays with this legs?
We can give McIntosh credit for being consistent. Last week, he scored on a nice touchdown run and then didn’t do so well the rest of the way. He had a similar performance against Miami of Ohio, too. His first carry came on the second-to-last series of the first half and he got plenty of time with the first-team offensive line. McIntosh’s 5 for 24 success rate has torpedoed the Irish average over the last couple weeks.
PASSING DEFENSE
It feels like the defense is starting to earn some respect before they even step on the field. On Saturday, Miami sustained themselves on pretty much three pass plays. One, a quick seam throw to the tight end. Two, a quick out to a tight end. Three, a low-risk sideline pass to James Gardner.
It actually worked well at times, but this seems to be the MO of the 2017 Irish defense. They’ll give up some small stuff but clamp down eventually. They picked up a couple more turnovers from which the offense scored 14 points and allowed one touchdown on Miami’s 2 red zone trips.
Quarterback Gus Ragland was harassed immediately any time he didn’t throw quickly and that clearly limited Miami’s gameplan. There were 5 hurries and 3 sacks, featuring Khalid Kareem’s first nom nom of his career.
We hadn’t seen much of corner Nick Watkins so far this season. Not so against Miami! During the first half he was in decent coverage against Gardner but allowed 4 receptions and 2 touchdowns due to poor ball skills. Give the defense credit though. Gardner picked up his 5th and final catch on Miami’s first series of the 3rd quarter and then didn’t record a reception the rest of the way.
RUSHING DEFENSE
I remain pretty happy with these performances. On the one hand, the tackling wasn’t great and in typical Chuck Martin fashion the run game existed only in a supplementary role to try and open up the passing game.
Nevertheless, we’re seeing a very encouraging pattern of A) limited long runs and B) quality success rate from the rush defense. Miami had long carries of 27 and 20 yards (5 of their longest carries accumulated two-thirds of their 115 total yards) which is nothing worth writing home about but when paired with a 34.4% success rate it’s more than plenty fine.
If you really want to drink the kool-aid if this defense continues to severely limit long runs (6 runs of 20+ yards through 5 games) the only way this side of the ball is going to be in a position to lose a game is against a really good quarterback. How many of those are left on the schedule?
On the other hand, the tackling has to improve but really the havoc rate overall isn’t super promising. For example, this was the second straight game with just 4 tackles for loss. Since the opener’s amazing 11 TFL it’s been only 18 over the last 4 games. This may be one of the areas holding the Irish back from becoming a good-to-great defense.
Here’s another fun stat: Notre Dame has surrendered 1 rushing touchdown so far this season. Just as fun, the Irish are currently 2nd nationally with 20 offensive rushing touchdowns. Being +19 in rushing touchdowns is good stuff, that’s exactly where the 2012 team finished the season.
SPECIAL TEAMS
Tyler Newsome had a bit of an off day punting the ball, he was probably pretty cold on the sidelines. Walk-on Jeff Riney got an opportunity late in the game culminating in a 20-yard stink bomb.
Miami kicked short and neutralized Notre Dame’s kickoff returns being scared of I’m not sure what exactly. Neither team had a punt return. Yoon and Doerer split the kickoff duties, while the former hit a 43-yard field goal and clanged a 44-yard attempt off the left goal post.
TURNING POINT
During a super long 1st quarter that saw 45 out of the game’s 132 total plays there was a sequence of plays that effectively sealed the game for the Irish. The score was 21-7 and Notre Dame had just finished perhaps its worse offensive series of the day–two incompletions targeted to Stepherson followed by an ugly sack.
Then, the defensive line went to work.
On first down, Jonathan Bonner forced a hurry and incompletion. He did the same thing on second down, forced Ragland up into the pocket for the strip sack by Jerry Tillery. Five plays later, Wimbush found Chase Claypool in the end zone for the Canadian’s first career touchdown.
3 STARS
- Josh Adams
- Jerry Tillery
- Greer Martini
FINAL NOTES
Three more red zone trips and 3 more touchdowns for Notre Dame. They are now tied for 23rd nationally in total red zone attempts, haven’t turned the ball over, and the 20 touchdowns on 22 attempts is the best among Power 5 programs.
RIP to the game manager who has to replace all of the gold flakes on Tony Jones’ helmet.
Kevin Stepherson didn’t go over on my pre-game 2.5 receptions prediction during his first game back in the lineup. I believe he was targeted 3 times and only had one screen pass reception blown up for a loss of 3 yards.
Weird stat, we’ve seen 17 players catch a pass for Notre Dame through 5 games. That’s already a Brian Kelly-era record in South Bend.
Sneaky good game alert for middle linebacker Jonathan Jones who led the game with 4 solo stops and broke up a pass all in very limited snaps.
Freshman tight end Cole Kmet touched the ball for the first time of his career, taking a short kickoff for 11 yards. He also had a beautiful block on McIntosh’s touchdown run.
Chuck Martin did Notre Dame a solid late in the first half while punting on 4th & 2 from the Irish 44-yard line. There were just over 2 minutes left and Notre Dame scored on 5 plays to cover 81 yards for 45 points in the first half.
I don’t expect too many people to be impressed by Notre Dame’s +116 point differential right now due to the competition played, although this is hardly the first Irish team to play 4 not-great teams out of their first 5 games. Still, it’s a positive indicator for now. Only 3 other Kelly teams have finished the season reaching the century mark in the positive:
+132 (2015)
+169 (2012)
+111 (2011)
Perhaps a better indicator right now is the +1.6 yards per play average which is a tick above the 2015 team as the best since 1997. Here’s why I think this could be a big deal, even with competition duly noted. Right now, the Irish defense is allowing 5.0 yards per play which is basically Notre Dame’s average since Lou Holtz left town and pretty much a spot-on reversion to the Bob Diaco mean. This is good news and pretty much all you can ask for most years–anything under 5.0 YPP is typically Top 25 nationally.
The schedule is back-loaded so an increase to 5.3 YPP for the defense might happen but also might be worst-case scenario. However, the Irish offense is at 6.6 YPP without throwing the ball all that well. If Wimbush can find some steady improvement through the air this offense has the capability to be closer to 7.0 YPP at seasons end. The history suggests if Notre Dame stays north of 1.5 YPP differential they should be in the discussion for an important bowl game and maybe 10 wins.
Two things I wonder about:
One you mentioned briefly with Wimbush being hurried in the pocket for no reason. He seems skittish at times when you said he had perfect protection and apparently no one open he started to run around – sometimes in the pocket because there was so much room IN the pocket but at times leaving the pocket leading to actually being pressured. That’s a real concern. I know QB’s should have a clock go off in their head after a few seconds but it should be different when there is no actual pressure. A secondary concern is whether the receivers are just never open or whether Wimbush is missing the open receiver. This issue seems to lead to the prior problem of being skittish in the pocket at times.
I wonder in this vein whether a game-manager type QB would actually be better because we’d be more consistent. Of course if only Wimbush could make a few more completions per game this offense would be fantastic (and some of that I’m willing to think is on the WRs too with getting open and catching balls).
The second is whether this is in fact the weakest schedule we have had in a long time (especially so far) or is it simply that we are pretty decent and beating the typical low teams on our schedule like a good should – soundly. I can’t remember having this many boring games in a season!
And as the time goes on I wonder whether the full schedule will turn out to be rather weak if Stanford is not top 25 and USC (whether because of injuries or whatever) are not really top 15. Normally we end up with 3-4 really good teams on our schedule (whatever the weaker teams are). Georgia is definitely one and Miami I really have no idea how good they are. But the other two usc/stanford are looking weaker than originally thought.
Could we get an article comparing schedule strengths from years past? Perhaps its a little early for it to be meaningful though. I suppose part of me thinks this is too good to be true to beat bad teams soundly so it must be that the teams we are playing are just uniquely weak.
My 2 bit observations:
IMHO Wimbush is just thinking too much. One of the downsides of a great offensive line is that he has too much time to think about his progression instead of just doing it. He’s waiting for the perfect situation to open up instead of going with one that will work. If he can get to the “unconscious competence” level (yes, I know), then he’ll look like Deshaun Watson out there.
I still wonder what the pass/run ratio is at practice.
I’ve read lots of other articles complaining about how they left Watkins on an island all night. It looked to me like they didn’t want to leave the base defense so Chuck Martin kept going back to the well with the 3/1 formation Flutie kept trying to explain. Other than 3 or 4 plays last night, Watkins has been an unsung stud on defense this year.
Isn’t there a BC game somewhere that Flutie can call?!? He’s gotten worse over the past few years.
I think they left Watkins on an island for the same reason they had Wimbush throw 4 or 5 passes in a row. It was a blowout, so they wanted to let him get some work in. I liked it.
“then he’ll look like Deshaun Watson out there”
Let’s dial that back *a bit* until he’s shown he can be an average passer, much less a good one.
Why should we dial that back a bit? He has made some spectacular passing plays. The only reason he’s below average is that he has made equally spectacularly bad passing plays. If he can get rid of the yips, there’s no reason to think he won’t look like Watson or Jackson or any other top QB. That’s certainly a big if, but I agree with MTI98 that his ceiling is as high as anyone’s.
Yeah, no. See below, but look at these stats – https://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/players/deshaun-watson-1.html
68% completion percentage and over 10.5 ypa as a freshman! We can hope that, if Wimbush improves a lot, he might get over 60% over the course of the year, but that seems unlikely right now. They’re not comparable, other than to say they’re both fast and play the same position.
Watson is the ultimate hindsight is 20/20 player. I definitely didn’t appreciate him as a college football great until after his last game, partially due to all those INTs. Beating Bama in a heroic performance was a great way to cement a place in history that he should have already earned.
If you didn’t appreciate Watson as a college player, you probably just weren’t watching him enough. It was pretty clear he would be great even as a freshman (which was kind of his best passing year).
So what’s the best Wimbush comp? Young Michael Vick? Cannon arm, questionable pocket passer, ludicrous speed?
Young Michael Vick was also much better than Brandon Wimbush. Vick was a (far) more dangerous runner who had a stronger arm as well. While the stat profile is somewhat similar, Vick was not playing behind a line nearly as good as Wimbush has and without the same skill talent, even with our not-great WR corps. Also, Vick’s first-year YPA was 2x what Wimbush is doing right now, and it’s not like our non-Georgia competition has been particularly noteworthy.
If we need to compare Wimbush to an all-time great college QB, then fine, Vick isn’t a terrible comp given the points that you mentioned. But my suggestion is to not compare our not-good-yet QB to all-timers, for now at least.
I think the post-BC discussion on Wimbush here (I think from Michael Bryan) was quite apt. His comps are a rich-man’s Nick Marshall (though Wimbush is bigger and has a bigger arm, so more upside there, though he’s not quite the runner Marshall was), or Jalen Hurts (I think Hurts is closer to him as a runner, though may not have quite the deep ball potential Wimbush has). Kelly Bryant is probably an aspirational peer.
I am hoping for Braxton Miller (he even had a 5/13 2 TD game as a frosh). He came out as a freshman and looked bad throwing it (54%, 7 games at or below 50%, 7.4 Y/A, 13-4 TD-INT, 715 rushing yds).
And while he never blew anyone away as a passer, in his third year he was completing 63% for 8.2 Y/A and 24-7 TD-INT.
Wimbush looks like he may have a higher ceiling than Miller in passing, But, more QBs don’t reach their ceiling than do reach it. I would be ecstatic if Wimbush develops into a QB with that JR year Braxton stat line (and hopefully he can finish this year with the FR stat line as well).
That is a totally reasonable aspirational comp! And I think Eric was joking a little with Woody Dantzler, but that isn’t so bad either, really.
Much more reasonable and realistic (though, frankly, both would be optimistic, still) than Deshaun freaking Watson
I was 98% serious!
Hold me closer Woody Dantzler
Tate Forcier!
thumbs down
I just threw up in my mouth
Matt Millen had to slide a book over his lap
Why won’t it let me give thumbs up and down?!?!
Jerrod Heard
Couldnt throw the ball a lick, but could run like the lightning. Eventually turned into a WR when Shane Buechele became a better player.
http://www.cfbstats.com/2015/player/703/1065481/index.html
He’s a young Woody Dantzler. Everyone just got the wrong Clemson quarterback.
Literal laugh-out-loud rec.
I simply meant the sky will be the limit on how good he CAN be. I don’t think anyone doubts how high his ceiling is.
Come on. His ceiling is *not* Deshaun Watson, who was one of the better college quarterbacks of my lifetime. Deshaun Watson was a much better passer the first time he took the field as a freshman than Brandon Wimbush has shown at his best moments as a 4th-year junior.
If you want to say he’s a better runner than Deshaun Watson, fine! That’s even probably correct. But they are orders of magnitude different as passers, to the point that Wimbush would have to improve in an almost unprecedented manner to get nearly as good as Watson was.
Pass the kool aid, y’all.
*(Third year sophomore)
Whoops, yes. Still, I mean, c’mon. This would be like if Georgia Tech’s qb ripped off a couple long ones in an otherwise pretty eh day in a blowout against a Sun Belt school and people on GaTech boards were like “well, if he could only do this more often, he’ll be looking like Tommie Frazier out there!”
No I know. Wasn’t trying trying to diminish the point or anything. Just noting he has 2 more years of eligibility after this.
I think the original point was more that Wimbush will “look like” Watson, not put up identical stats or grow into a Heisman caliber QB exactly like Watson.
And my point is that he will look like Deshaun Watson in the same way that Navy’s quarterback looks like Tommie Frazier (to reemphasize my joke above).
The best QB in your lifetime is Deshaun Watson? Are you 10?
“one of the best”
I was born in 1987. I think the guys to consider since then are Tommie Frazier, Peyton Manning, Vince Young, Tebow, RGIII, and Watson (arguably Cam Newton had the best single season of all, but it was only one season, and Mike Vick’s injury-riddled second season I suppose keeps him off the list as well). Lamar Jackson might be joining that company over the course of this year. But Watson deserves to be somewhere in that group, for sure.
LMFTFY:
Is there too much sleeping on Watson here?
116 touchdowns in just over 2.5 seasons worth of games.
32-3 as a starter.
463 total yards and 4 touchdowns in an epic upset of Alabama to win a National Title. That’s 4 fewer yards than Vince Young against USC in the 2006 Rose Bowl.
His arrival at Clemson perfectly coincides with the term “Clemsoning” being officially retired. Dude was amazing.
I can’t believe I’ve spent a non-negligible portion of my day defending the proposition that Brandon Wimbush is not going to be as good as Deshaun Watson and that it’s kind of ridiculous to suggest so, both of which are an extremely cold takes and are such uninteresting opinions that they almost border on fact. But here we are.
Hey, I understand that I’m one of the more negative posters on the board, and that gets me downvotes even when making obvious (but negative) points, but apparently *somebody* has to keep the overly enthusiastic masses in check around here 😉
Just imagine if Watson had his career at Notre Dame.
We’d have 4,000 statues of him on campus right now.
…and a national championship
I gave you an up vote for spite.😎
For the record, when someone’s “ceiling” is discussed, to me it typically means what they potentially COULD become, not what they WILL or even MIGHT become. Comparing Wimbush and Watson’s first year statistics don’t illustrate their ceiling or potential. It illustrates how they performed in their first season.
In my mind, if Wimbush gets great coaching, has a great supporting cast (WRs, OL, RBs, and Defense), remains injury free, stays out of trouble, stays humble and works hard, then he COULD be as good as Watson. That was my entire point.
I don’t think its overly optimistic to say that.
I do think it is overly optimistic to say he WILL get the same coaching and have an equally strong supporting cast.
It is overly optimistic to say that. Brandon Wimbush, at his best, cannot and will not be able do the things that Deshaun Watson did consistently.
And that’s fine! That’s just saying that he will not and cannot be a top-10 quarterback of the last 30 years. I think he is likely to be a top-10 quarterback in the country in 2019 if he stays that long, and *has the potential* to be one of the ten best in the country next year. But that’s what his potential is – good to very good, not great, certainly not all-timer-ish. To say he can be Deshaun Watson is, like I said, wildly, wildly optimistic.
I love Deshaun, but I don’t think he’s on the same level you do. A big part of our disagreement!
Pretty sure you meant “4 less”
Watson was under appreciated until he beat ‘Bama. Then the NFL draftniks followed suit.
Watkins spent the whole game guarding a 6-4/220 future NFL receiver who pushed off almost every time he was targeted. I wouldn’t read too much into what happened. I would guess the staff just wanted to let him take on a physical receiver in a low-risk situation.
That’s exactly my thinking, Brendan.
Moi aussi!
I like Sampson and Prister’s read, that they were intentionally putting Watkins in that position in a game they knew they didn’t have to worry. Which, is pretty much your read. So I like your read too.
Maybe it’s my imagination, but it seems to me that most of Wimbush’s spectacular passes come when he doesn’t have much time to throw them. He seems to put the ball on a dime when he’s on a dead run with half the defense after him. And then, when he might as well be playing catch in the park, he gets all jumpy and throws the ball away.
That’s my point exactly — when he doesn’t have time to think, he does well.
I’ve done a little looking around at our opponents’ performances against other teams. Of course, we have been Georgia’s toughest opponent so far, and they dismantled two SEC teams that have been seeing more love in the polls than we have. So, that loss looks like a pretty “good” one so far.
But also, Clemson had more trouble with BC than we did, and MSU beat Iowa worse than Penn State did. Those two wins are beginning to look like they might be pretty high quality, too, especially the MSU win. Temple and M of O, not so much.
Meanwhile, NC State and Wake Forest look pretty good. NC State beat FSU, who beat Wake Forest, who beat BC pretty convincingly. Maybe our schedule will turn out to be weak, but it looks like most of the “weaker” teams on it have been giving some of the top teams a run for their money.
Speaking of opponents, who would have guessed preseason that after 5 weeks the highest ranked team remaining to play for Notre Dame would be a 1-loss Miami team?
Wake at 4-1 while hanging really tough with FSU is a great story too (aside from them not really beating anyone; Presbyterian, BC, Utah State and squeaking out a 1pt win over App State). Clock might be at midnight with Clemson up next but it’ll be interesting to see how they compete with the Duke’s and NC State’s of the conference. My hunch is they’ll be lucky to get past 6 wins, despite the great early record.
Miami hasn’t lost yet…
Whoops! Misread that.
I was at the Michigan State game this weekend on the Iowa side with my sister’s in-laws. Michigan State did not look good. Long story short, they’re probably a 6-6 team and will easily lose to the top 3 in the Big Ten. I would think that the Ohio State game in particular will get ugly for them.
Wait, BC as a possible high quality win??
Great write up Eric. I’m not sure I understand the opening paragraph. Are you expressing frustration at the offense taking their foot off the gas? I’m both excited and concerned about the passing game. Concerned because of the obvious, but excited about the potential if BW can get out of his head and throw the ball somewhat successfully.
Not frustration, really. Just is what it is you know?
Gotcha.
A couple thoughts:
1. God bless deon McIntosh but he’s a giant downgrade from Adams/Williams. Feel like he left tons of yards and points on the field yesterday and that’s reflected in his success rate. And I feel like at that position you either hav it or you don’t, hard to imagine a jump as he gets older
2. After the Georgia game a small part, alright maybe big part, of me couldn’t help but think this was just a redo of the Texas game last year. Really competitive game between two storied, but ultimately flawed teams. But both teams seem to be putting that theory to rest. Holy hell, Georgia had looked good
3. There were questions above about our schedule to this point and I totally agree. Regardless of USC ultimate finish that will be the game that lends credibility to things. Having said that ND had played some underwhelming schedules in recent past and never dominated teams the way the have this year. 2012 was only year during Kelly era with 2 power 5 blowouts until this year, and this was done on road in first 4 weeks. I’m still skeptical until SC game but there is certainly reason to hope
On point #3… We topped 300 rushing yards twice from 2007 to 2016 – 2012 Miami and 2015 UMass. We’ve done it three times in the first five games this year.
And there was much rejoicing.
Yeah, our offense is probably better at this point than it was in 2012, even with Wimbush’s passing problems.
You know how they introduced that character in goodfellas foe like a half second–i think his name was Frankie Two Times. He would say everything you guessed it two times. Well Bob I hereby dub you Bobbie Three Times. You’re welcome. You’re welcome. You’re welcome.
Criminally under-rec’d.
McIntosh isn’t great, but he’s the fourth-string RB. Completely fine to have as depth but probably shouldn’t ever be the starter. Even if Adams left early, you’ve got Dexter and Tony Jones before you get to CJ Holmes/Markese Stepp/etc.
Speaking of Josh Adams though, hopefully he’ll get some national recognition at some point. The guy has quietly put together the most productive career for an ND running back in a long time but he’s been overshadowed by CJ Prosise and 4-8.
I’m still trying to figure out why Chase Claypool wasn’t starting from minute 1 this season.
Uh oh, apparently you angered Freddy Canteen’s mom.
Another great write-up. I always enjoy these.
I hope the running backs get healthy. Adams is having such a ridiculous season so far.
You wrote, “Miami kicked short and neutralized Notre Dame’s kickoff returns being scared of I’m not sure what exactly.” I don’t know if they talked about this on the TV broadcast, but I listened on the radio, and they mentioned Miami has been very bad in kickoff coverage so far this season. They gave up two kickoff return TDs against Marshall earlier in the season. Coming into the game, I think Miami was giving up 31.6 yards per kickoff return (near the bottom of FBS).
See, this is the quality info our readers bring to the table!
Josh Adams doesn’t get talked about enough on a national level. His yards per carry is just ridiculous. I think he is a stud and depending on how fast he runs at the combine I can see him goings in the second round. NFL teams won’t like how high he runs but if he can run in the 4.50 range he’s a lock to go on day 2 of the draft.
I guess we will have this same convo every time Wimbush has a off game. What we are seeing is nothing but growing pains. At times he does looks very uncomfortable in the pocket and he rushes things. It throws off his mechanics which lead to some ugly throws. Kelly isn’t worried one bit about it and neither should we. Pick any dual threat QB in the country and Wimbush ceiling is second to none. Teams are selling out to stop him from running. It’s only a matter of time before he starts punishing defenses with his arm. Having Stepherson back will help out BW a ton. We just have to be a little patience with Wimbush.
“Pick any dual threat QB in the country and Wimbush ceiling is second to none.”
To the points above, come on people, let’s dial back the Wimbush hype a bit until we’re sure he is actually good. Off the top of my head, let me name 4 dual-threat QBs with higher ceilings than Brandon Wimbush: Lamar Jackson (obviously and inarguably), Baker Mayfield (obviously and inarguably again), Shea Patterson (who looks like the second-coming of Manziel, notwithstanding a terrible performance this past weekend), and Deondre Francois (unless we’re not counting him as dual-threat). This doesn’t even get into the QBs who all evidence points to being better, but I guess we could argue doesn’t have the “ceiling” of Wimbush: Quinton Flowers, JT Barrett, Trace McSorely, Jalen Hurts, Nick Fitzgerald, Justin Herbert, etc.
Right now, he is, at best, an average D-1 quarterback. Yes, his potential is high, and if he puts it all together, maybe he could one day be almost as good as Baker Mayfield is. But let’s not plan on that.
Hey, ESPN has him 33rd in QBR! Only 2 spots behind pre-season Heisman winner Sam Darnold!
Speaking of QBR, look at the Brandon Wimbush comp who is leading the NFL right now! – http://www.espn.com/nfl/qbr
Sadly, look who’s on the bottom of that list.
Can’t be a shock- every piece of pre-draft coverage included “needs time to be groomed within the right system and gradually worked in as starter”. And what hand gets dealt to him? Cleveland drafts him and starts him from Day 1 with little to no good supporting pieces on offense.
‘Twas doomed to fail from the beginning, just hope he escapes sooner than later while he’s still in one piece and retains a perception of having some talent and potential for a second chance somewhere else.
Dial it back for what? For the first time in forever I am actually excited about where this program is heading and Wimbush is a huge reason why. This ND program has a idenity and again Wimbush is a huge reason why. ND fans can be a funny bunch. We get excited when we shouldn’t and we finally have a kid at QB that has the potential to elevate this program to heights not seen in decades and we continue to take shots at him. It’s getting silly. Is he on the level of the upper echelon players like a Jackson or a Mayfield right now, of course not? But to dismiss this kids potential like there is no way he will ever get there is a little stupid in my opinion. It’s only start #4 for this guy. The passing part of his game will come. And when it does he will truly be elite. You watch what kind of player he develops into moving forward.
Nobody has said “there’s no way he ever gets there.” We’re disputing your claim that he definitely will. Honestly, I haven’t seen a mancrush like this since a certain someone loved a transfer to FSU. Wimbush is a good player–please stop acting like anyone is saying he sucks as a player. He’s not a good passer. It’s not “taking a shot” to state a fact. You’re acting like anyone who says anything negative is trying to hit on his sister. He might get better as a passer. We all hope he does. It’s not a given–you saw the careers of Golson and Zaire, they had downward, not upward, trajectories. No one is saying Wimbush will follow that, but it’s far from proven that he won’t.
Also, yes, it’s start #4. Of his third year in the system. And he’s a 50% passer. That’s not a good thing. Listening to the Irish Ill. podcast on the way home, Sampson had a good point–Wimbush is clearly waiting for his receivers to get open, rather than throwing to the open spots they will get to. To me, that’s coaching. It’s very troubling that he’s playing like this 3 years into the system, regardless of how many starts he’s had. The nonsense ahead of him (Golson vs. Zaire, Zaire vs. Kizer) resulted in him not getting the developmental reps he should have had. We can blame that on the coaches. But it doesn’t change the fact that he’s not performing well as a passer.
There is no evidence to point to Wimbush turning into Jackson or Mayfield beyond “he runs fast and can throw deep”, which we’ve known since he signed. Jackson and Mayfield’s first-year starter stats were (in Mayfield’s case, much) better than what Wimbush is doing now – and Wimbush has had more time to develop than both did… and neither had the supporting cast that Wimbush does.
It’s hardly stupid to think he won’t turn into Jackson or Mayfield, because it is overwhelmingly likely that it won’t happen. It’s not impossible, but wildly, wildly unlikely. He has shown nothing to indicate he is an elite quarterback, especially because usually those guys are good from day 1. He is not good right now. I think/hope he’ll get to “good” – and I suspect it will even happen at some point this year – but let’s take these things one step at a time.
The concern I have is that things will “click” for him in seeing the field and passing over the bye week, and then we play a whole bunch of better defenses, starting with USC & NC State. So he may legit get better as a passer, but with the same results because he’s not passing against Miami(OH). Wake is solid on D, Miami’s got athletes. I don’t worry so much about Navy’s defense (though their offense puts pressure on ours to score every possession), and we’ll run all over Stanford, their defense is not good this year. Basically, he’s got to be a difference maker overall, and a threat rather than a liability with his arm, against USC, NC State, and Miami for us to win. I’ll absolutely take him going full Tony Rice, running all over USC, hitting one bomb to Rocke…I mean Stepherson…and us winning the game, no matter what his pass % is. But I think Wimbush has to improve quite a lot or we’re going to have problems in those three games.
Look, I think he’s a long way from Lamar Jackson too, but let’s not pretend Lamar Jackson’s first 5 college games were something otherworldly:
Jackson – 52/97 (53%), 598 Pass Yards, 435 Rush Yards, 9 TD, 4 INT
Wimbush – 68/131 (52%), 783 Pass Yards, 402 Rush Yards, 14 TD, 2 INT
It’s fine to think Wimbush has lots of flaws, but those are pretty similar numbers.
Lamar Jackson and Brandon Wimbush were in the same high school class year. Wimbush is doing this in year 3 of college development with a much better supporting cast (and, very importantly, a much much better offensive line), whereas Jackson was doing that as a true freshmen. Those numbers aren’t comparable other than to show that Lamar Jackson is way, way better than Brandon Wimbush. Which, like, duh.
You’re the one who started comparing their first year stats. I just pointed out that their stats are comparable.
To be fair, the entire off-season after Lamar Jackson’s first year was spent chuckling that he couldn’t throw the ball worth a lick.
All I’m seeing here is that you agree Wimbush will win a Heisman next year.
It’s happening.
Need a 8-TD spring game in 2018 first, though.
Fire Elko!
One thing to point out here.
Lamar Jackson’s first 5 games were against:
Auburn, Houston, Clemson (only threw one pass), Samford, NC St, FSU (including because not sure if you counted Clemson).
Wimbush’s were against Temple, UGA, BC, MSU, Miami(bad)
“Every time Wimbush has an off game” So….like….all of them so far, in terms of passing?
So, I exaggerate. He had a decent day (70% comp percentage) against Michigan State. His next highest comp % was against Temple, at 56.9%. Every other game was below 50%, and against Miami (OH) it was 38.9. Maybe he’ll progress–we all better hope so–but acting like he’s in the same league as Lamar Jackson or Mayfield or even Kelly Bryant as a PASSER is rose-colored fandom at its finest. He’s 4/5 for “off-games.” That’s nothing to diminish him as a player, a person, or someone to root for. I love what he can do with his legs, and he’s clearly talented. But don’t throw out ridiculous hyperbole and then act like everyone just needs to clap their hands and wish on a star, because if we just BELIEVE more he’ll become Tom Brady. I think with some work and some coaching he’ll be a serviceable passer, maybe even a good one. I’m quite concerned that he’s in his third year in the program and can’t get into the 60% range against a schedule of bad teams (I’ll happily forgive the UGA game).
“Off game” if you only look at passing %. He’s been able to operate the offense efficiently with his legs, and really his WR weapons have left a lot to be desired in terms of quality and some drops. This offense overall has solid yards gained and the red zone has been awesome. And also with 171 passes+ rushes, Wimbush has taken care of the football with only 2 INT’s.
I get the point you’re talking to, and certainly Wimbush has been inconsistent with some of his throws, and that’s worth noting. I’m not saying carry the kid off the field, but overall for how many pure “bad days” that he’s had on a football field for Notre Dame? I don’t really think that many at all, in the total picture, low completion percentage and yards per attempt be darned.
Slightly new topic. If the coaching staff was looking to get Wimbush reps as a passer, but didn’t they work off the play action instead of just solely dropping him back? It would make for easier throws and I’d think 50% of his passing attempts will be off play action in this offense anyways.
I’m hoping that’s the plan for when we play USC, NC State, etc. I wouldn’t read anything into the play calling against Miami, as that was clearly being used as a scrimmage from the 2nd Q on.
Passing is what we’re talking about. Like, precisely what we’re talking about. Hell, I was the biggest Tony Rice fan in the world when I was in junior high, and he won us a national championship, but the dude couldn’t pass the ball. I’d love for Wimbush to win us 10+ games with his legs. That has nothing to do with an objective assessment that he’s not a good passer. Perhaps he’ll get better. Nothing yet has demonstrated that he will. The one thing we know is that it’s not physical talent–he has arm strength, and as others have pointed out, he CAN make good throws. So I hope the coaches can fix it. On the flip side, I think Wimbush’s problems passing have made the offense better, because it means we RTDBK. So once again, I’ll reiterate that I haven’t once said Wimbush needs to be benched. Book wouldn’t have won us the UGA game. We’re a better team with Wimbush taking the snaps. But KK is making the argument that he’s got a ceiling like a Lamar Jackson, and that’s objectively and demonstrably wrong.
I definitely agree that you can’t mention Jackson or Watson or any Heisman player in the same sentence as Wimbush. No doubt about that. My point was more along the lines of in the full-scope of things Wimbush has been a relatively effective QB for this offense, even with inconsistent (and at times, yes poor!) passing. And I was just making that point since I feel it gets lost in the shuffle a bit as nits are picked as folks drill down into Y/A and all that stuff. It adds context but I was just looking bigger picture, but certainly without comparing him to the best in the game.
That’s fine. As I said, that’s not what I understand the argument to be about. Kenny thinks Wimbush will be a great passer and anyone who doubts that is crazy, and wants to die on the hill. Evidence thus far shows reason for doubting that Wimbush really has as high a ceiling as “any dual threat QB.” “Dual-threat” doesn’t mean “running QB”–that would be “single threat.” Has he won us games and been effective? Absolutely. He’s not a good passer, which is half of the equation in “dual threat.”
Just pointing this out because it amused me, but FSU got their first win of the season in week 5 and after that was the first time they’ve dropped out of the top 25 in both the AP and USA Today polls. Obviously they should have just kept doing what they were doing, they could have been the first 0-11 team to make the CFP.
It seems to me that the big difference between Wimbush’s passing against Michigan State and Miami was just how quickly he got rid of the ball. And it didn’t seem a matter of guys being open – Wimbush would have guys running free against Miami and still not get the throw off. To me, against Miami he just looked like a guy who didn’t really trust his receivers to go make a play for him. I’d like to see them focus on him getting the ball to his best receivers, St. Brown and Mack. Make it simple and easy, both guys are talented and should win contests against coverage.
Also, it’s seemed like Wimbush has struggled mostly with the touch passes along the flats – those throws that are basically supposed to be percentage boosters – which has had the cascading effect undermining that whole goal. But he’s thrown really nice balls up the field. I’d like to see more of those. Of course, it’s dependent on him actually being willing to get the throw off. But if the goal is to build confidence, might as well lean into what’s working.
And Josh Adams is just awesome. Dude looks like a young Adrian Peterson.
Completely agree. Pete Sampson tweeted a gif of the end zone incompletion to Weishar; Wimbush obviously saw him and should’ve let the ball go at least a full second earlier. It’s another example of the perfect as the enemy of the good – Wimbush almost looks like he’s waiting for a perfect window instead of a good window. Just trust what you’re seeing and chuck it, man.
To over analyze… He seems to do a pretty good job with seams, corners, and fades, which is weird, because corners and fades in particular are pretty tough throws. Deep middle is decent, not spectacular but certainly not bad. I don’t think we’ve seen much intermediate stuff. Screens and crosses/drags are kind of hit or miss, which if I had to make a very amateur guess about I would say are a mechanics problem.
I also think that, like with Watkins, the staff dialed up a bunch of stuff they knew Wimbush needs to work on. They could’ve run the ball all day for 10 yards per carry, but they wanted him to get some work in on the throws that he has trouble with right now.
Yes, this, exactly.
And I pray to sweet heaven that Rees isn’t the one coaching him on the mechanics of throwing a swing pass to a back….
If I may join the “ceiling of B Wimbush as a passer” debate: is it not possible that BK has it about right, and that Brandon is simply undergoing an apprenticeship? I am very taken by Lou Somogyi’s article in the 2 Oct B&G issue, where he laid out in compelling detail the struggles of previous ND QB greats in their first, even in most cases their second years:
— Joe Theismann, 1969, as a junior with previous starting experience: bad passing (for example, 18 ints in 219 passing attempts (!)
— Tom Clements.1972, also bad passing; eg, Orange Bowl, 9/22 for 103 yds and three picks
— Joe Montana 1975: 42,4% completion rate, ints off the chart; 1977, first game, 8/23 and three ints, next game v Army, 7/17 and two more ints.
— Tony Rice 1987: 42.7% ; first two games in 1988 5/23 (!!)
— Brady Quinn, 2003-2004: barely 50% completions over BOTH years, 6.4 yards per attemot, 25 ints.
— Jimmy Clausen 2007-2008: skipping over the disaster of 2007, even in his second year, Jimmy has some truly bad outings, like vs Boston College, with 26/46 and 5.0 yds/attempt, and four interceptions…
I am in the camp of the kid can throw and he will get a lot better.
—
Clements and Montana were different eras (especially Montana in college, when we think of him in the pros). Rice was never a passer. The comparison for modern QB’s would be Quinn and Clausen, I suppose, though I’d argue those aren’t fair to Wimbush since they were both pocket passers. But the point is valid–they get better with more experience. However, Quinn started as a freshman. Clausen started as a freshman. Wimbush is a junior. Third year in the system. As I said above, we can blame the coaching for not getting him better reps to fix issues before he saw the field. But if (as also mentioned above) his problem is he’s waiting to throw to a receiver when he’s open rather than reading the field and anticipating when a receiver will come open so the ball gets there on time, that’s an issue that needs to get fixed. This isn’t 1988. Offenses have progressed even at the HS level so much that outside of an academy or Ga Tech, no QB should be having that problem in their third year. Can it be fixed? Probably fairly easily. I don’t know, I’m not Thoma Rees, QB guru. But pointing out the kid ain’t a good passer isn’t the same as saying he never will be. He may be apprenticing, and maybe it’s not his fault he’s been neglected by his supposed masters until he was the starter, but a third year apprentice should be better. We all hope he gets there, sooner rather than later.
I think I’ve made this point on here before, or somewhere anyway, but about his reps… Spring 2017 is the first time he really had serious reps above QB3. In Fall of 2015 he was QB3 until Zaire went down, and then they had to kick Kizer’s development into overdrive (because he himself had gotten QB3 reps in Spring 2015 while Everett pondered the meaning of existence).
In Spring 2016 he was QB2, but everyone knew he was really QB3. I’m guessing Zaire probably got a lot of film room work while he was rehabbing the ankle, too, which ate into time for Wimbush (not saying Wimbush got screwed there, just saying). Fall 2016, and throughout the season, he was back to clear-cut QB3. So much so, in fact, that he asked to move to the scout team so he could get live reps against the big boys.
That was an admirable move, as has been discussed elsewhere, but I wonder now if he wouldn’t have been better off not playing with (sorry guys) substandard athletes that might have conditioned some bad habits like being jittery or waiting for guys to come way open. I don’t know, pure spitballing, but I do wonder.
Thanks, Brendan, good points.
KG, I appreciate your rejoinder but let me make a rebuttal of sorts:
I do think the older comparisons are valid, in the sense that all those older generation QBs I mentioned were “dual threat” and winners; in each case, it was their passing skills that needed quite a lot of development time. In fact, you could argue that each and every one of these great QBs were not great passers in their early efforts and required patience and experience to so become. Even Tony Rice’s passing percentages and especially yards per throw increased substantially in the rest of 1988, contributing mightily to our last Natty.
Both Quinn and Clausen (given what Brendan just said) got much more prep (given all their starts) than BW, and still displayed many problems for quite a while.
Luckily none of our coaches for any of those QBs gave up on them too soon!
Finally was able to make it to a game this year with my oldest son (who sent his student application to Notre Dame a few weeks ago; keeping our fingers crossed). Couple observations:
1. The jumbotron was utilized very well. No adverts whatsoever, except for some university programs. The tv timeout award presentations are so much better on the board, rather than through the PA only. The music was well done, and loud at the right times. The board even attempted to encourage the crowd to make noise! For the most part, it didn’t work. The player profile videos were exceptional. We really liked the player chosen songs.
2. Josh Adams CAN NOT BE STOPPED!
3. The helmet exploding hit on Tony Jones Jr. was one of the weirdest things I have ever seen live at a football game. It literally looked like a burst of sparkly pixie dust sprinkled on the field.
4. The student section was rocking the entire game; the rest of the stadium, not so much (see #1). I wasn’t sitting in the down-in-front section by any means, but probably half a dozen times we were the only people standing.
Overall very pleased with the renovations and the experience. Now if only we can get some MOAR NOISE!
Good luck for your son!!
Amen to that — I was 1 for 2 on my boys; hope your guy makes it.
Plus, thanks scttmtclf, for the informed comments on the game day experience. I will pass on the point about the players picking songs to the video board director, he had told me they were working on it.
Sorry about the non-student crowd — but they have never been loud — or at least when they have occasionally gotten loud, they are always loud too late in a play to matter.
My next game is against USC, gonna be interesting to see if the orchestration continues to improve. We are really going to need a genuine home field advantage for that one!
I have a hard time criticizing the noise in the stadium when the outcome of the game was clear after a few minutes into the 1st quarter.
My first time at the new stadium as well. I was/am not a fan of updating the stadium so take this with a grain of salt:
1) I actually thought that the ribbon boards worked well – I still would prefer not having them, but that ship has sailed.
2) The volume on the video board is WAY too loud if you are sitting in the South end zone. I’m guessing that they are going to continue to tweak that to try to find a happy medium.
3) On some of the videos there is a sync issue with the video and audio (I think someone mentioned this from the Georgia game as an issue – if so, it’s still not resolved).
4) They did not show any replays on plays where there were injuries – which is fine. But they did not show a replay on at least 1 of calls that were under review – which would seem to defeat the purpose of having video replay.
5) I still had no cell service at my seat (AT&T), but the service was fine in the concourse.
6) On the play on the field it was obvious that at some point in the second quarter they just threw out the game plan and decided to get BW work to try to get him back on track. I don’t have an issue with that. I guess the bigger issue is that BW didn’t respond all that well. To my eye he looks to be waiting for the receivers to get open before throwing, instead of throwing them open or trusting that they will get open. This isn’t just on him, the receivers need to do a better job of getting separation. He also seems to be aiming the ball instead of throwing it. Bottom line is he needs to get his confidence back.
7) There is a clear drop off from Adams and Williams to the other running backs. Tony Jones looks like he’s running in quicksand, he has no burst. But I guess worrying about your 3rd string running back (yes, he should be 3rd string) is a nice problem to have.
8) I thought that, for the most part, the defense was in good position to make plays (especially in the passing game), but just needs to do a better job of finishing plays. Our coverage was generally very good, we just didn’t have great ball skills when the ball was in the air.
Soooooo….what’s the story with Wimbush’s foot? Read he’s in a walking boot…? Guessing that’s not good if true.
Sampson did tweet (in a reply) that hes in a boot with a foot injury. Thats all i got.
I feel very, very weird when I spend time digging through twitter to find the health status of a 21 year old.
Lol same here. I saw the Sampson tweet and stopped looking there. So, I turned here looking for some info.
Maybe he had that new surgery to add ankles for those lacking in ankles.
Good possibility. Since he’s been at ND, I’ve yet to hear any reports on him having an ankle.
Reports are Adams has two ankles. I worry about the injury situation with our RBs.
How did that happen? Was it from practice or the game?
The very rumory rumors are that it was a non-football injury. If there’s anything to any of them I suspect we’ll get limited, but actual info from BK’s normal Tuesday press conference.
BK said there’s no new injuries that would keep anybody out for Saturday’s game, so I’m guessing this might just be post-game soreness. As Scarponi mentioned, there’s a rumor that it happened at a bar, but multiple beat reporters have said that they wouldn’t believe that.
Hopefully it’s just a little morning after the game soreness and the boot is overly precautionary.
I am curious why so many people are sooo sure that Wimbush is going to be a great passer, and reach his super elite passing ceiling. I assume it is because of the recruiting rankings, maybe because of a few blurbs about him at practice.
I think Wimbush is already a good college QB, but a below average passer (being avg in college isn’t great). I have mentioned a few times that I hope, and think he will come close, to Braxton Miller levels. But statistically that ain’t super likely.
Just so people are aware. MOST 5 star QBs do NOT end up being great QBs.
Here are the top 5 QBs in the 2013-2016 classes. It is pretty clear that once you are in college what you did in HS doesn’t matter much.
2013: Max Browne, Christian Hackenberg, Shane Morris, Cooper Bateman, Kevin Olsen
2014: Kyle Allen, Deshaun Watson, Will Grier, Keller Chryst, Jerrod Heard
2015: Josh Rosen, Blake Barnett, Kyler Murray, Jarrett Stidham, Brandon Wimbush
2016: Shae Patterson, Jacob Eason, KJ Costello, Malik Henry, Feleipe Franks
If you keep going back, the trends are similar. Generally 1/5 had really good careers. 1 ends up average, most don’t do much at all.
Probably easy to look super elite playing HS ball in NJ too. Not nearly the level of competition many of those guys faced in HS.
Not really true, NJ has very good football at the Prep level. His school (St Peter’s) plays Don Bosco and Bergen Catholic, which are nationally ranked programs in any given year, in addition to out of state games against other top programs. I just think that some players adjust quicker to the jump to college, and so far BW has struggled with that.
Also, competition is generally baked in to recruiting rankings. It is very hard to become a top 100 player if you don’t play fairly good competition.
I guess. But “out of state games” is against, what? Other teams from football cold beds like NY, MD, MA? If he was, say, in Kansas or NM playing teams from TX and Oklahoma then sure. Proof is kind of in the pudding right now. He’s really not anywhere close to a top 100 player.
Quick Google search, BW played (I think he only started 2 years) the following out of state teams in high school:
Wise (MD)
IMG Academy (FL)
Eastern Christian (MD) 2x
Gonzaga (DC)
Red Lion (DE)
With a few of the New Jersey heavyweights that’s about a strong as you’ll get in the Midwest/Northeast.
Most people here don’t seem to be certain at all that he is going to be a great passer. Most people here seem to think there’s a very good chance that he’s going to improve and 5 games aren’t indicative of his ceiling.
Also, if Wimbush puts up the passing stats of any one of those 2014 QBs (other than Heard, who is now a WR) while continuing to be a great runner, our offense is going to be incredible.
Let’s hope he doesn’t transfer, like 3/5 of them. Which is weird, since they all started as freshman and were all pretty good for freshman.
And to your first paragraph. I guess that’s fair. Maybe it isn’t a lot of people and it’s just that a few are very very high on him.