Dude has made a living off project QBs throughout his career. Bo Wallace, Chad Kelly, Malik Willis. He turned each of them into winners.
Then he gets another project QB through the portal (Thorne). He struggles his first year, but we acquire some weapons to make his life a lot easier. Payton does well in practice, does well in film study, seemingly understands everything you’re teaching him. During the off season, the expectation was he’d become Freshman Thorne again. Not great, sure, but an effective game manager who could make the routine reads and plays.
And why wouldn’t Hew expect that? Bo did it. Chad did it. Malik did it. And now he’s got another project QB who is coming along great in practice. In Hew’s mind, I’m sure he thought he was somewhere close to 95% certain about this.
And then the lights come on, and Payton falls apart. Again.
This is something Hew hasn’t really dealt with before and I’m interested to see how he navigates this. I find it hard to call the decision he made “stupid”, since it’s worked splendidly three other times before this. Was it the wrong decision? In hindsight, absolutely, and there’s a real possibility that this decision will cost him his legacy within 2-3 years. But I can at least understand where he’s coming from.
Then he gets another project QB through the portal (Thorne). He struggles his first year, but we acquire some weapons to make his life a lot easier. Payton does well in practice, does well in film study, seemingly understands everything you’re teaching him. During the off season, the expectation was he’d become Freshman Thorne again. Not great, sure, but an effective game manager who could make the routine reads and plays.
And why wouldn’t Hew expect that? Bo did it. Chad did it. Malik did it. And now he’s got another project QB who is coming along great in practice. In Hew’s mind, I’m sure he thought he was somewhere close to 95% certain about this.
And then the lights come on, and Payton falls apart. Again.
This is something Hew hasn’t really dealt with before and I’m interested to see how he navigates this. I find it hard to call the decision he made “stupid”, since it’s worked splendidly three other times before this. Was it the wrong decision? In hindsight, absolutely, and there’s a real possibility that this decision will cost him his legacy within 2-3 years. But I can at least understand where he’s coming from.
