How Would I Recruit Quarterbacks To BYU? - 247 Sports

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In this series, we are putting our coach hats on and putting ourselves in their shoes. For these articles, we will be each position coach at BYU and we will put together what we feel is the most compelling recruiting pitch that they can offer high profile recruits who are deciding between multiple schools. It's meant to be fun and to shine a light on some of the accomplishments of this coaching staff, as well as opportunities that BYU football can offer.

Aaron Roderick was magnificent as BYU's offensive coordinator last season. He has been equally magnificent as BYU's quarterbacks coach since he took the full time job in 2018. He truly is one of BYU's best weapons on the coaching staff because of his ability to get the most out of his players and design an offense that is easy to execute and difficult to defend. He has done a great job.

If there is one think we have yet to see from Roderick, it is his ability to reel in top quarterback talent on the recruiting trail. It's not that Roderick can't do that, it's that he hasn't had to. Zach Wilson (which, admittedly, could be attributed to Roderick but also gets a large assist from Kalani Sitake, Fesi Sitake and Jeff Grimes) held down the BYU quarterback spot for three years. Jacob Conover was coming to BYU no matter who the coaching staff was. And Roderick inherited Jaren Hall who had signed with BYU during Ty Detmer's tenure. Can Roderick recruit elite quarterbacks? There isn't any reason to believe that he can't, we just haven't seen it yet because the pipeline has been so full.

That's going to change, however. BYU needs to add more quarterbacks to their pipeline. If we were Roderick, this is what our pitch would be.

"I can't promise you the NFL, but I can promise you that you won't have a drop of unwasted talent in your BYU career."

Roderick managed to beat a really tough Wisconsin team on the road with Tanner Mangum as his quarterback. This is the same Mangum who was post-injury and not the same quarterback that he was during his high school days when he was winning Elite 11 awards. This was a quarterback who was limited in what he could do and seemed to lack confidence to play outside of those limitations. And Roderick managed to beat two P5 teams with Mangum, including the sixth-ranked Badgers.

After Mangum came Wilson. The Corner Canyon product started as a true freshman and ended up leaving BYU as the most accurate quarterback in Cougar history. He had an immense amount of talent, even though his recruiting profile didn't really show that, and he ended up being the #2 overall pick in the 2021 NFL Draft.

Wilson suffered a couple of injuries during his career and BYU had to throw in Baylor Romney as a backup. The walk-on and former Nevada signee came in and played well enough that many fans thought he should start over the guy who is the face of the New York Jets. Romney beat a ranked Boise State team in his first game as a starter and he never really fell off of that pace. He finished his college football career having completed 67% of his passes with a 14:3 touchdown to interception ratio.

Finally, we move to the Jaren Hall era. All that he has done as the starter at BYU is manage to beat six different P5 programs a year ago. He is poised to lead the 2022 version of the Cougars to great things and is already starting to garner legitimate NFL buzz. His injury history and his age might hurt his draft stock, but there is no denying how special he is at the college level. He is one of the best in the country.

All four of these quarterbacks had different amounts of raw talent and they had different ceilings. Roderick wasn't able to turn all four of them into 1st round draft picks, but he was able to squeeze out as much as he could from each of these players and that is what the message to recruits should be. "If you have the raw talent to become a starting quarterback in the NFL, we'll get that out of you and show the world how talented you are. If you are destined to be a backup college quarterback for your entire career, we'll make sure you are the best backup quarterback in all of college football. There will be no wasted talent in your body. You will become the absolute best version of what you can be."

"It doesn't matter who is on my roster, if you come in and show that you can play better than the starter, you will take his job."

Every coach says this, but Roderick has a track record that proves this and it starts in his first year on the job.

It didn't matter that Mangum was a senior in his third year as a starter, an 18-year old Wilson had every opportunity to take that job from Mangum. And when it became clear on the practice field that BYU would win more games with Wilson than Mangum, the true freshman unseated the senior.

After Wilson's injury-riddled 2019 campaign, there was an open competition going into 2020 - the same 2020 season that ultimately led to Wilson's NFL talent being put on full display. Hall, up until his injury before the season starter, was really pushing for the starting job. Romney was right there with Wilson and Hall, pushing each of them to be better. That competition brought the best of all three of those quarterbacks out. Wilson, even though he had the NFL calling him, knew that he couldn't get complacent. Because Roderick would not have been shy about pulling Wilson and replacing him with a quarterback who was ready to win more games. Because that's exactly what he had done in 2018.

"Going into the Big 12, we're going to need a new face of this team. And there is value in being the face of BYU football."

Barring something wildly unforeseen, Hall is leaving BYU after this season. The internal frontrunner to take over for Hall is former four-star Jacob Conover. Behind Conover? Boise State transfer Cade Fennegan and former three-star recruit Sol-Jay Maiava. Between all three of these players, there are a combined 38 total passing attempts at the college level. They may have the inside track on a quarterback who comes into the program after the 2022 season is over, but they haven't proven anything on the field that would make it impossible to beat them out for the starting position.

Simply put, every quarterback on the roster - whether currently on the roster or yet to be added - has the potential to be the face of BYU football.

Some other names who have been the face of BYU football: Jim McMahon, Steve Young, Ty Detmer, Steve Sarkisian, John Beck, Max Hall, Taysom Hill, Zach Wilson.

These are great college quarterbacks. Some went onto win super bowls. Some went on to wildly successful coaching and training careers. Some are still in the NFL playing. That's a span of 40 years where the face of BYU football was among the biggest names of the sport during their respective eras.

Going forward, the face of BYU football will be able to capitalize on NIL deals like none of the players of the past were. If current recruit can go to BYU and gain the hype of any of those names, there is plenty of reason to believe that player will make millions of dollars as BYU's quarterback before ever taking a snap in the NFL. The stage will be bigger for BYU in the Big 12 and the money will be coming into the program like it hasn't ever before. Someone has to be the face of it all.

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