’Bama WR should have been on returns
The silliest controversy in college football unfolded Saturday shortly after Alabama star receiver Jaylen Waddle suffered a broken ankle on the opening kickoff at Tennessee, an injury that end his season and likely his college career.
Some commentators suggested Waddle, who is arguably the fastest most explosive playmaker in the country, should not have been used as a kick returner. Even ESPN’s top play-by-play announcer, Chris Fowler, gave legitimacy to the discussion in a tweet in which he said it’s “always a debate” about whether teams should risk using their top players on kick and punt returns.
There is no real debate about it. While it’s sad and unfortunate that he will not be able to finish the season – and could potentially slip in the NFL draft due to injury concerns – there is no cogent argument for using Waddle nearly every snap at receiver but not allow him to do the thing he’s better at than any college player in the country.
Waddle came into Saturday with three career touchdowns on returns and averaged 35 yards on kickoff returns last season. He also averaged 24.3 yards on punt returns last year. So beyond the fact that Waddle is a threat to take it to the house every time he gets the ball, just the threat of him out there is something that can help Alabama get better field position because other teams have to really try and kick it away from him.
At some point, when Waddle is drafted by an NFL franchise next year, his value on special teams is going to be a huge part of the package.
The risk of injury is something everyone involved in college football needs to take into account, including the player. In fact, that’s why several of them who are projected to be first-round draft picks opted out of this season.
Once someone decides to play, the coach’s responsibility is to put him in the best position to succeed. For Waddle, that includes returning kicks. Here are other Week 8 takeaways.
1. You’ll never see a closer call than the replay that upheld Indiana quarterback Michael Penix Jr.’s two-point conversion leap and gave the Hoosiers a 36-35 OT win over Penn State.
No matter how many times you look at that play, there’s no way to come to a firm conclusion about what happened first when Penix dove for the end zone. Did he break the plane? Did the nose of the ball touch out of bounds or did he hit the pylon first? It’s practically impossible to tell, which is why the call on the field – that Penix scored – ultimately stood. And nobody associated with
Penn State should be upset with that.
Give Indiana coach Tom Allen all the credit for taking the risk on the twopoint conversion and deciding it was time to win or lose the game right then. Though making that call opens up a coach for significant second-guessing, it’s a risk worth taking when you’re the underdog and you’re fortunate to be in that situation to begin with and your program hasn’t beaten a top-10 team in more than three decades.
2. Speaking of which, the fact Penn State lost after taking a 21-20 lead is one of the all-time head scratchers.
The Nittany Lions had played poorly on offense and made so many mistakes earlier in the game, but here they were with the lead and the ball back with 1:47 on the clock. Even better, Indiana had just one timeout. Mathematically, the game was practically over if the Nittany Lions just took a knee four times.
Instead, they handed the ball to Devyn Ford, who ran for the end zone, couldn’t slow himself up in time and scored a TD with 1:42 left. That’s coaching failure No. 1 for James Franklin. At that point, Franklin should have gone for a two-point conversion because if the Nittany Lions had made it, they’re up nine points. Instead, Franklin kicked the extra point to go up 28-20, all of which opened the door for Indiana to mount a 75-yard drive that tied the score after a two-point conversion. That’s two pretty bad game management failures on Franklin’s watch.
3. Are we sure Clemson’s Trevor Lawrence is QB1 in the 2021 NFL draft?
Because Ohio State’s Justin Fields sure made a great impression in a nearly perfect season debut, completing 20 of 21 passes for 276 yards and two TDs in a 52-17 evisceration of Nebraska.
Though NFL teams and analysts have been fascinated with Lawrence since
his freshman-year destruction of Alabama in the national championship game, Fields has closed the gap.
Lawrence is an amazing prospect who’s got the arm, the height, the movement that indicates he can be an elite NFL quarterback. But so does Fields, who is plenty big at 6-3, 228 pounds, and he might throw just as good of a ball. Fields’ deep throws looked almost effortless and highly accurate Saturday, and it’s possible he’s reaching even another level from what he showed last season when he threw for 41 TDs against just three interceptions.
Fields’ debut suggested that the race for the Heisman Trophy and the No. 1 pick still has a long way to go.
4. It’s pretty strange how unspectacularly steady Oklahoma State has turned out to be in reaching 4-0.
We’ve been used to seeing Mike Gundy’s good teams over the years fit into the Big 12 archetype of high-flying, warp-speed offenses paired with flawed defenses that don’t feel like they’re built to last. But this Oklahoma State team has allowed only 48 points in four games after a 24-21 win over Iowa State. Just for context, two years ago the Cowboys gave up that many points to Iowa State alone, which is a testament to the significant improvement they’ve made on defense under Jim Knowles.
The issue now is whether Oklahoma State is good enough on offense to assume the role of Big 12 favorite. We finally got a look Saturday at what the Cowboys are going to be with sophomore quarterback Spencer Sanders, who was back on the field after suffering a high ankle sprain in the opener against Tulsa. Oklahoma State had to kind of grind it out without Sanders, relying heavily on running back Chuba Hubbard, but showed some signs of being dynamic, racking up 462 yards of offense. If Sanders can make up for lost time, the Cowboys could be formidable.
5. Though his reputation may have been tarnished a bit by having the Tennessee job rescinded after a fan revolt and the under-performance of the Ohio State defense in his last year there, you have to remember why Rutgers was so eager to reunite with Greg Schiano. He was a really, really good coach there the first time.
One game isn’t enough to determine whether Schiano can do it again, but beating Michigan State 38-27 in his second debut was an eye-opener. Just like that, Rutgers’ 21-game losing streak in the Big Ten was over. Just like that, the Scarlet Knights are no longer the punchline to every joke about ineptitude and hopelessness in college football.
Obviously, Rutgers is not on a rocket ship to the top of the Big Ten. It’s still a rebuild, and probably a long one. But for a Rutgers team whose closest conference loss last season was three TDs, bringing Schiano back has already been validated in a sense. People forget that when he left for the NFL after 2011, Rutgers had been a consistent eight-plus win program and was putting players into the NFL.
6. If there’s one question that remains about Clemson, it’s a familiar one. Is the O-line good enough?
Over the past half-decade, the Tigers have generally been pretty good up front but rarely dominant. When they’ve gotten great play from their offensive line, they’ve been able to beat Alabama. When they don’t, they get physically overwhelmed by LSU.
The good news for Clemson is that running back Travis Etienne doesn’t need huge holes to be productive. But what if he’s hurt? It’s probably no coincidence that Clemson’s offense stalled out in the third quarter against Syracuse while Etienne was in the locker room having an injury worked on, allowing Syracuse to pull within 27-21.
Etienne eventually came back and scored two TDs to finish off a 47-21 victory, but Clemson ran for only 147 yards on 37 carries against a defense ranked sixth worst in FBS against the run.
7. Don’t look, but Michigan looked about as interesting offensively in a 49-24 victory over Minnesota as it has ever been under Jim Harbaugh.
The fact Harbaugh got through five years without recruiting or developing an elite quarterback is a fairly shocking reality, but Joe Milton might end up breaking that streak. He showed off his mobility and arm strength, completing 15 of 22 passes for 225 yards and appearing pretty smooth in his ability to operate Josh Gattis’ offense. He also ran eight times for 52 yards and a TD. Michigan gave Milton a lot of freedom and he was able to spread the ball around to nine receivers. At least for one night, Milton justified some of the preseason buzz coming out of Michigan’s camp.