After a couple weeks of recruiting and interest from both parties, Notre Dame has officially added quarterback transfer Riley Leonard from Duke on Monday. The rising true senior originally from Fairhope, Alabama on the shores of Mobile Bay had started 21 games for the Blue Devils and looked primed for a big junior year before an ankle injury suffered against the Irish limited him to just 2 more appearances in 2023.
Leonard entered the transfer portal 4 days after Duke’s regular season finale against Pittsburgh after having sat out the final 4 games in the Blue Devils’ season. A former 3-star recruit, Leonard committed to Duke in May 2020 just weeks after receiving an offer and would enroll in June of 2021 during the summer session. He played in 7 games as a true freshman backing up redshirt junior Gunnar Holmberg while starting at Virginia Tech after Holmberg suffered an upper body injury the prior week.
A dream come true. Go Irish ☘️ pic.twitter.com/2Ft09Ho4uj
— Riley Leonard (@rileyleonard13_) December 12, 2023
BREAKING | Notre Dame Secures Commitment from QB Transfer Riley Leonardhttps://t.co/PGdt851Ls3
— Matt Freeman (@mattfreemanISD) December 12, 2023
BREAKING: Fighting Irish head coach Marcus Freeman gets his guy. #NotreDame has landed a commitment from former Duke quarterback Riley Leonard.
The entire ☘️ staff played a huge role here.
Story: https://t.co/d0QIZ9PBlv@247SportsPortal @irishillustratd @247Sports pic.twitter.com/mz6UZQdzxu
— Tom Loy (@TomLoy247) December 12, 2023
In 2022, Leonard took over as full-time starter after Holmberg transferred to FIU. Since he was injured for a lot of 2023 it was this sophomore campaign that provided the bulk of Leonard’s hype and production. In 27 games participated he has totaled the following stats:
383 completions
619 pass attempts
61.7% completions
4,450 passing yards
7.2 yards per attempt
24 passing touchdowns
10 interceptions
229 rushing attempts
1,224 rushing yards
19 rushing touchdowns
Riley Leonard Scouting Report
*Rankings out of 100*
Accuracy: 84
Arm Strength: 85
Pocket Presence: 81
Escapability: 92
Anticipation: 82
Mechanics: 76
Leadership: 89
Decision Making: 88
Vision: 84
Size: 88
There’s lots of good tape on Leonard from 2022 and very little from 2023 after he missed so much time. I decided to look mostly at 2022 while focusing on his healthy opener in 2023 against Clemson.
For sure his throwing motion is a little different. He tends to drop down with a sidearm delivery quite often, especially on the shorter to intermediate throws. There was a replay in the Clemson game from the perfect angle to show this delivery:
If it works it works.
On this particular play Leonard launched the ball right into the approaching Clemson player’s chest and nearly caused an interception.
However, I can’t deny that his throwing motion works really well especially on short throws. He’s confident, throws a tight spiral, and displays overall good accuracy. I didn’t notice a bunch of complicated passing schemes nor a ton of playmaking ability from the Duke receivers and it was Leonard’s short-passing game and decision making that often kept the Blue Devils’ offense on schedule.
Take this play, for example:
The wheel route is open almost immediately, and while it’s not the most accurate pass you’ll ever see, I like the smoothness and confidence with his short passing abilities. If you’re an underneath receiver like Jaden Greathouse and Jordan Faison they should be excited and get a lot of targets.
While there weren’t a ton of downfield throws for Leonard at Duke the few that he completed were awfully pretty. I thought his receivers had a tough time getting open (lots of safe incompletions to receivers in 1-on-1 matchups who couldn’t come up with the ball) which Notre Dame is hoping will be less of a problem in South Bend. We hope!
Here are a couple of dimes, though:
It seems like his longer throws show a more over the top throwing motion. Leonard’s arm strength isn’t amazing and would probably qualify as a weakness for someone with his size. He doesn’t get a ton of velocity on the deeper throws but I was impressed with some of the touch and appropriate amount of air put under the ball right to a receiver.
Here’s one of the tougher throws I saw from Leonard:
That’s only 26 yards in the air but it’s across the field over the top of a pair of defenders. It’s not a cannon arm for sure, although there’s enough zip and touch to give his a receiver a chance to make a play, ultimately resulting in a touchdown after some poor tackling on the part of Wake Forest.
I rejoice whenever Notre Dame has a quarterback capable of running the ball, and folks, the 2024 season is going to be a wonderful change of pace from 2023 in this regard.
Leonard has pretty good pocket presence but at times you can tell he can get a little sketchy and restless because he know he’s a very good athlete who can do damage with his legs. After looking over several games, I was really surprised at his amount of burst getting out of the pocket and agility in the open field.
I wanted to spotlight a couple runs against Clemson this year where Leonard totaled 98 yards on the ground:
He makes a lot of guys miss. Almost as a rule, he will make the first guy miss if there’s enough space. I knew Leonard could run based on the Duke game preview this year but the breadth of skills that he displays with the ball in his hands is impressive. He doesn’t often get caught heavy-footed for a bigger quarterback, can get to the 2nd level quickly, and shows outstanding open field speed. Even mundane runs you get fooled with how quickly he’s moving and eating up real estate.
It was pretty amazing that Leonard scored a touchdown from 40+ yards like this against Clemson:
The pessimist might say that Leonard is far from a polished passer and hasn’t really turned heads in the NFL for his throwing ability. If we’re comparing him to Sam Hartman the latter had such a larger portfolio and history of being a successful passing quarterback in college.
Here’s what PFF had to say about Leonard in their 2024 NFL Draft position rankings for quarterbacks:
Leonard is a very intriguing quarterback prospect because of his two best attributes — his athleticism and toughness as a runner, and his natural touch on passes all over the field. His passing profile isn’t as consistent as some of the top guys in the class, but his five best throws can go toe-to-toe with almost anyone.
That seems fair. In many ways, Leonard is the antithesis of Hartman. He’s bigger, less experienced, a better athlete, and has started so few games (relatively speaking for a hot commodity on the transfer market) that Notre Dame is appropriately rolling the dice on someone with a little more raw passing repertoire but also someone with a very high ceiling in the college game.
If they can dial in the short passing game from day one this offense could really be tough to stop, which will be necessary in the 2024 opener at Texas A&M. I’m a big believer that Leonard’s running ability is going to be a godsend for Notre Dame’s offense and if they want to have a big year they’ll need to take the next step and work on his passing ability downfield to the revamped Irish receiving corps that’s already added FIU’s Kris Mitchell and Clemson’s Beaux Collins.
So he’s a rising SR in high school?
Not getting my hopes up too high this time, but I do think this is a smart move that fits Freeman’s overall strategy. I think Freeman is trying really hard to avoid a 3-9/4-8 disaster season early in his tenure in order to buy time to upgrade the roster, which will probably take until about 2025. Finished products like Hartman and Leonard help that plan a lot.
not just avoid disaster but dont waste an opportunity to notch a Year 3 playoff berth, a lot of the bones of a top-10ish team should return with a schedule that relaxes significantly.
depending on how the offseason shakes out, conceivably ND could be favored in all 12 games? Worst case slight dogs at A&M, vs FSU, or at USC, but I’d argue each of those programs has some bigger gaps to fill than we do. The middle rung of the schedule (vs Louisville, at GT, vs UVA, vs Stanford, at Purdue) also is significantly easier.
Well, we’ll see. A lot of us, including me, thought that about the 2023 team too.
I think the calculus here is that it’s better to steadily go 9-3 for a bit while Freeman makes the program his than to have huge variances that make it unclear what his future is.
Funny how so much of the conversation on offense boils down to “we have to just hold on until the new kids are ready to play”, since Del couldn’t get anyone to commit and stay, Quinn’s line recruiting has a few exceptions but is otherwise bust city, and as for Tommy, we had to bring in a transfer to play quarterback three our of the last four seasons.
Yep.
It’s a smart approach — don’t just stubbornly forge ahead with Our Guys (TM), don’t blow up the entire offense and start from scratch. Upgrade what you can one piece at a time and prevent disaster otherwise.
FWIW, I think this is exactly why Stuckey got fired.
Plus, 10-2 while looking good in some high-profile games (and no losses by a large margin) is probably enough to get in the playoffs (11-1 obviously would be a lock).
In the last 2 years 10-2 was good enough for at least 12th – so 1 10-2 team would be left out, but another 3-4 would get in.
I don’t think ND’s 2024 schedule, as it looks right now, is likely good enough at 10-2. You go 10-2 against that schedule you’ve possibly beaten 0 top 25 teams or lost to a bad team.
Obviously transfers and, well, everything about the randomness of college football, could change that.
I generally tend to agree but I’m just not sure that it’s really going to be much worse than all the other 10-2 teams’ schedules. And so I still suspect 10-2 is likely good enough to get in.
Glad we got him. Do we think he’s 100% locked to start or any chance Minchey/Angeli get the nod? I presume the former, which is fine. He looked good when healthy last year.
Yeah, I think he’s pretty much locked in to start.
Figured, thanks! It feels like less of a sure thing than Hartman but still a clear likelihood barring injury or one of those guys taking a BIG step up.
But wait! We’ve still got a chance to see Peanut Butter Angeli Time throw for 500 yds and 6 TDs (to RBs, I guess?) in the Tony the Tiger bowl and give us all something to debate over the long dark winter.
Gonna be sick when a lacrosse player is our top WR fr fr
When does he arrive? Will he get to take part in the bowl prep practices?
I read he’s attending Duke’s bowl game (2 days prior to ours) so I would assume he isn’t enrolling at Notre Dame until January.
Welcome, Riley! Kudos to the staff. If I’m a potential transfer in from an ACC team, ND has a better chance making the CFP than a second ACC team. From Eric’s previous article on ND’s transfer needs,
For our high needs now, OT, DE, and S are left. (And kicker?) R.J. Oben and Devin Grant would be nice additions.
Mitch Jeter from South Carolina is the guy to watch at Kicker.
I think Oben is or has visited too so that doesn’t seem so far-fetched.
Latest I read from Pete is that the number may be as much as 10 now instead of 7. My guess is probably one more receiver, not sure what we would target beyond that
Jahmal Banks from Wake Forest appears to be the next target at WR
Graham Nicholson, K, Miami (O) has entered the Portal. He won the Lou Groza award. He’s from Cincy and missed only one FG out of twenty-seven attempts last year.
Would be a good pickup but we’ve already had Jeter on campus so we probably stay focused on him.
Jeter’s 23/25 on FGs the last two seasons so he’s pretty dang good, too.
Best case scenario, is he comparable to Ian Book?
Seems like it but with a higher upside. He seems better at the deep throws than Book. Wasn’t that Book’s achilles heel? But then when he hit them one or two games (wasn’t one against Clemson) he was amazing.
And I thought for all of Book’s athleticism, he was never very good at the read plays, no? Leonard would seem to be better there too – but not sure.
I think Book could hit deep shots, we just called them very rarely and got addicted to him picking up cheap first downs with his legs.
It’s weird to think he was recruited for Leach’s air raid at Wazzu, and then ND decided to turn him into a scrambler. But that’s our QB coaching for the past decade for you.
Well yeah, Book ended up being a one-read-and-go guy, and we often times only had one reliable WR1 (there’s a chicken and egg problem right there).
After watching his highlights, I’d say he’s a better runner than Book. Probably about as shifty, but much bigger and breaks more tackles. Might be a bit faster in a straight line, too, thanks to his longer stride.
Leonard is much bigger than Book – he’s listed at 6-4/212, might be a bit heavier, and Book was listed at 6-0/206 his last year. I think Leonard has above average arm strength where Book had average arm strength. Honestly, this might be too soon, but I think a better comp for Leonard is what we thought we might be getting in Buchner – an above average passer and a near elite runner.
I don’t know enough about Leonard to make a judgment on how he is at read option – the clips I’ve seen are pretty much all designed runs or scrambles. But that’s OK, you can work with having things pre-called if he’s enough of a threat as a runner. That certainly worked fine with Wimbush – Josh Adams’s part-the-Red-Sea TD against USC was a perfect example, USC was so scared of Wimbush’s running ability that three guys went with him on the fake.
The problem with Book on deep balls IMO is that he didn’t look for them and/or didn’t feel confident enough to pull the trigger. Shots like the one to Avery Davis against Clemson were there in other games and he never let it go.
Just want to point out here too that I’m a big Ian Book fan, I loved watching him play, and the program would’ve been screwed without him milking every ounce he could out of his ability.
Seems good. Will be interesting if/when reporting comes out on the ND NIL strategy. Reading between some lines it’s clear enough that we were top bidders for Hartman last year and Leonard this year, so at least some reluctance on “acquisition fees”. Which, good!
Given that they’re budging on the principle there, will be interesting to see if (maybe when) similar payments start flowing to high school recruits. Or, perhaps the NIL strategy is that money is best spent on transfers, which may be a reasonable approach.
I think you’re spot on. Listening to the ISD guys, they seem to be hinting that ND will pay to get transfers and keep guys already on the roster, but they’re not going to be throwing money at high school recruits.
To wit, the Athletic guys have an article showing 12 of 32 of aTm’s all time 2022 recruiting class are gone, including 4 of 8 five stars.
We’ll see who Elko can keep.
So they still have more 5 stars from that one class than we have total? Sigh.
Also worth pointing out btw that Leonard and Beaux Collins are undergrad transfers, which makes as many undergrad transfers in a week as ND football had taken in the previous five years – Alohi Gilman in 2017 and Brandon Joseph in 2022. Not only did ND take them, but they did so with far less drama; particularly notable is the fact that Joseph was stuck in limbo forever coming in from Northwestern while Collins breezed through coming from Clemson. Collins is by all accounts a great student, but even so, that development feels very significant.
Kris Mitchell and Jordan Clark are grad transfers, if you were wondering. As are DE RJ Oben and K Mitch Jeter.
One other note on Leonard – he comes from something of an ND family as his great-grandfather, Jim Curran ’40, played football at ND. And Leonard’s favorite movie is, of course, Rudy.
Ah, Rudy, the fourth best movie about Indiana sports ever made. In case you’re wondering:
Very good info on all counts, Brendan. Merci!
We just landed RJ Oben, so cross DE off the needs list
Kudos to the staff, especially Al Washington.
Also the NIL collective… increasingly clear that we’re stepping up on that front. Hooray.
As far as the starting QB market specific for the BIG, it’s easier to note which teams have starters returning. Out of the eighteen teams for 2024, only six – llinois, Purdue, Northwestern, Maryland, Penn State and Iowa have returning starters (Cade McNamara is returning to Iowa, which still does not have an OC.) Out of those six only two – NW and Penn State – have starters who originally signed with them. All four former Pac teams’ QBs this year had starters who had transferred there and are moving on.
That’s a lot of churn. It puts ND’s QB situation and the recruitment of Leonard in some perspective.
I assume J.J. McCarthy is leaving for the NFL. Ohio State, who had made Riley a target, seems to be fine with the current roster QBs. Tua at Maryland is returning but reported last July an unnamed SEC school offered him $1.5 mill to transfer there. Rutgers is hosting former Minnesota starting QB – Athan Kaliakmanis.
Without some restriction affecting supply (transfer rules), the demands and subsequent prices will continue to increase for top tier QBs through the Portal. Unless there is unity among all the schools for a change, players’ arguments for restrictions will run into restraint of trade issues.
Question: will the Iowa offense be more effective next year without a coordinator than this year with one?
They just hired some guy named Dirk Berentz to be their new OC
They can’t be worse. Iowa ranks 130th in scoring offense and 133rd in total offense (out of 133 teams). Their QB, Deacon Hill, had a QBR of 22.3 ranking 126th out of 127 QBs. Iowa finished 2023 season with over 1,000 more punting yards than offensive yards and they are losing their punter.
If you are interested, Iowa football is beginning to accept applications for new offensive coordinator. The conference ranked Iowa was their fourth best team this year putting them in the Citrus Bowl.
This is art
Kiser back next year. Nice to keep him. D might be scary good next year if Oben develops like JBB did.
Also just picked up a QB from ASU. QB room is going to be loaded, especially if they can get the Alabama QB transfer on the team.
Getting the band back together? Former Notre Dame QB Drew Pyne will return to finish degree
lmao Pyne has 3 more years of eligibility remaining – can be throwing wounded ducks for Kent State in 2026
Can anyone figure out how he has 3 years left? Are we just working under the assumption that if you don’t play 4 games in a season you preserve eligibility indefinitely?
I assume this is it:
2020 – enrolls, doesn’t count thanks to COVID year
2021 – redshirt
2022 – burns year
2023 – injury
3 to go, at least he hopes
but the injury doesn’t get him an extra year unless he got the covid year.
There were some 7th year seniors who got injury years and the covid year separately: https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/38388211/college-football-senior-citizens-frank-harris-utsa-miami-clemson
Drew Pyne is also back. Not joining the team, but hey, if something terrible happens maybe we have an emergency walkon available.
So the two starting QBs from last season, 2022, don’t even play the sport of football anymore.
It’s almost like our QB evaluation and recruiting in the recent past had major issues.
Alabama made the playoff, a completely unprecedented occurrence, so it can’t be what you’re thinking of
Well surely they were an undisputed selection.
Transfer portal might get even more wild: federal judge issued a temporary restraining order against the NCAA and in favor of multiple time transfers, meaning there might not be any limit on transfers in the future. The wild Wild West might be getting wilder before the reins get pulled in.
https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/39105796/judge-ruling-favors-ncaa-athletes-seeking-2nd-transfer
The biggest take away i have from this is that it might force Congress to get involved with regulating college sports transfers, however, it’s congress, they can’t even get a bill passed to end daylight savings (or adopt it permanently). So the wait will be long.
What’s the over/under on Leonard’s blocked/tipped passes for 2024?
Why tipped passes? Was this a problem he had at Duke?
Or is he thinking it was a Hartman problem and maybe (he’s hoping) it’ll be less of a problem?
OK. I would be concerned if tipped balls have been a problem of his at 6’4″. A lot of his critiques are around consistency with mechanics, so this made me a bit nervous.
Leonard will be the tallest ND QB since Kizer, so I wouldn’t expect many tipped balls, unless it’s an existing problem.
I was mostly looking at his side arm throw, especially the one mentioned above into the Clemson defender.
Ahhhh. That’s makes sense. Seems in line with the general criticism of him. I’d say that would be a concern of mine now that you point it out. Hopefully it becomes a tool when needed, rather than a fall back way he throws.
Notre Dame sells itself to many recruits but there’s only so much room. Positive coaching relationships can secure a commitment in this era of undergrad as well as grad transfers. Here’s an example of a perceived negative one as a recruit carrying over to decisions to transfer out.
Sam Leavitt, MSU’s ’23 QB recruit, is from a Portland suburb (West Linn). He transferred from Michigan State because Jonation Smith was hired as HC. Smith wanted Leavitt to stay at MSU. When Smith was at Oregon State he pursued Aiden Chiles who signed with them. Leavitt did meet with Coach Smith this year prior to Portal opening for undergrads and brought up what happened in the past.
Leavitt told Spartans Illustrated:
When Smith met with Leavitt, reports were surfacing that Chiles could be transferring from OSU to MSU. MSU was on the verge of not having any scholarship QBs on the roster with two other roster QBs transferring out of MSU.
In contrast, Kenny Dillingham, who was OC at Oregon at the time of Leavitt’s recruitment, also did not offer Leavitt. They were recruiting Dante Moore. But Leavitt is now transferring to Dillingham’s Arizona State. When Dillingham was OC at Florida State they were one of the first to offer Leavitt. So there was an early connection and, evidently, a positive one. Leavitt is comfortable sitting behind ASU’s QB from last year, Jaden Rashada. From his point of view, the Portal worked for Leavitt.
Michigan State’s Smith and Brian Lindgren will need to build its QB roster from transfers. All Smith’s eggs are now in one basket with Chiles while nationally top transfer QBs continue to visit and make commitments.
We landed Mitch Jeter, the South Carolina kicker, today. Presumably he’ll wear #2…
So we’ve added a QB, two WRs, a DE, a nickel, and a kicker. Likely still looking to add a safety, possibly another WR, and an OT if a decent one becomes available (which I don’t think is likely, but who knows).
Questions.
Will we have more transfers this year than graduates from the 2012 recruiting class? I think we ended up with 10 in that class.
More total starts from this transfer class at WR or the 2019-2022 classes combined? Not sure where to look up all the starts, but it’s probably around 15 from Merriweather, Colzie, and Styles, who I think are the only ones from those classes to ever start.
Shoot, the transfer class of WR’s will probably have more starts at ND than the combination of Merriweather, Colzie and Styles at ND to date. Hopeful that Colzie puts together a monster year in 2024.
2nd post ever (don’t remember the first), but Rylie Mills is back babyyyyyy!!!
Keep up great news posts like this!!!