Craig Haley's FCS QB's to Watch in 2018

[ilovethecats]

That sounds about right. Either 11-10 or 12-10 and that ought to end any discussions as to who was the more effective leader (without getting into what we all know now was going on within that locker room during his time there)...

So Prukop led his team to a winning overall record as a starter with an abysmal defense and the coach got fired after his RS-Jr. year. Meanwhile MSU has gone 4-7 and 5-6 the last two seasons, and the coach brought in a transfer to compete with the incumbent starter and stated directly that MSU needs to be better at QB in order to compete for championships.

Mmmmkay

Chris Murray's freshman year he was 2-3 or 2-4 as a starter I believe. Again, I think he's going to have a good year, as young and inexperienced as he is still.

i'm not getting involved in this little pissing match...but young age or not...at some point we can't use the "young and inexperienced" as an excuse right? he's entering his 3rd year as a starting qb. seems he's getting much more experience than many kids do.

Here are Murray’s numbers over the last eight games:
8 games 87 - 161 - 6 54.0% 1148 yards 10tds 127.0 passer rating. That’s not great, but it’s #8 among BSC QBs of which there are 13. I don’t think that they’re reflective of a young, inexperienced QB.

exactly. i'm a big murray supporter. I want so badly for him to do great these next two years. and I think he has the tools to do so. however, if he doesn't for some reason, I don't think being young or lacking experience is a legit excuse any more.

[RickRund]

Christ oh mighty! Why can't you give the kid a break and just a little bit of credit? Go back and look at the records of the teams the one that left beat. Dang. I look forward to watching improved OL play and a few receivers who can catch the ball the next two years.

I haven't said a negative thing about Chris in this thread and I appreciate what he's done at MSU as both a player and a student-athlete. I did post what Coach Choate said about the QB position, so your issue is with Choate, not me. You're the one sh*tting on Prukop as a "leader," whatever that means, however. It made much more sense for Dakota to play his senior year in the Chip Kelly/Cramsey offense at Oregon than it did to learn a new offense in what was obviously going to be a rebuilding year. I know you had a complete meltdown over it and haven't gotten over it, but he is an MSU graduate and always will be an MSU graduate.

Take a look at the scores from the 2014 season. That team easily could have been 9-2 with an average defense or 2-9 with an awful offense, yet it made the playoffs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Mont ... tball_team

The guy says give the kid a break, when he references Chris. When it's Dakota, no problem ragging on that kid.

Chris Murray is still playing for MSU. Prukop is long gone. Big difference.

A bunch of old turds get together and argue about who the best ball players were and invariably somebody will mention how good Paul Dennehey was and for some unknown reason, somebody will start badmouthing him. Same way with Dennis.

I personally enjoy quarterbacks who understand ball control and clock management and are only concerned with the final score and ensure their other teammates--defense and special teams--are physically able to contribute the entire game.

Since you are talking about Paul Dennehy maybe we went to a bunch of games together. That was in the middle years when I was going to CAT games. Used to get a little upset at times with some of his passes but he got the job done. He was not necessarily stylish but his record speaks for itself as I remember.

[Cat Grad]

Christ oh mighty! Why can't you give the kid a break and just a little bit of credit? Go back and look at the records of the teams the one that left beat. Dang. I look forward to watching improved OL play and a few receivers who can catch the ball the next two years.

I haven't said a negative thing about Chris in this thread and I appreciate what he's done at MSU as both a player and a student-athlete. I did post what Coach Choate said about the QB position, so your issue is with Choate, not me. You're the one sh*tting on Prukop as a "leader," whatever that means, however. It made much more sense for Dakota to play his senior year in the Chip Kelly/Cramsey offense at Oregon than it did to learn a new offense in what was obviously going to be a rebuilding year. I know you had a complete meltdown over it and haven't gotten over it, but he is an MSU graduate and always will be an MSU graduate.

Take a look at the scores from the 2014 season. That team easily could have been 9-2 with an average defense or 2-9 with an awful offense, yet it made the playoffs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Mont ... tball_team

The guy says give the kid a break, when he references Chris. When it's Dakota, no problem ragging on that kid.

Chris Murray is still playing for MSU. Prukop is long gone. Big difference.

A bunch of old turds get together and argue about who the best ball players were and invariably somebody will mention how good Paul Dennehey was and for some unknown reason, somebody will start badmouthing him. Same way with Dennis.

I personally enjoy quarterbacks who understand ball control and clock management and are only concerned with the final score and ensure their other teammates--defense and special teams--are physically able to contribute the entire game.

Since you are talking about Paul Dennehy maybe we went to a bunch of games together. That was in the middle years when I was going to CAT games. Used to get a little upset at times with some of his passes but he got the job done. He was not necessarily stylish but his record speaks for itself as I remember.

Paul has always been one of my favorites. In fact, I think Chris Murray throws a better ball than he did.

If you get to Butte the next few days, we could lift a brew or few to Ron. Hope Don and Sheila are doing okay.

[TomCat88]

That sounds about right. Either 11-10 or 12-10 and that ought to end any discussions as to who was the more effective leader (without getting into what we all know now was going on within that locker room during his time there)...

So Prukop led his team to a winning overall record as a starter with an abysmal defense and the coach got fired after his RS-Jr. year. Meanwhile MSU has gone 4-7 and 5-6 the last two seasons, and the coach brought in a transfer to compete with the incumbent starter and stated directly that MSU needs to be better at QB in order to compete for championships.

Mmmmkay

Chris Murray's freshman year he was 2-3 or 2-4 as a starter I believe. Again, I think he's going to have a good year, as young and inexperienced as he is still.

i'm not getting involved in this little pissing match...but young age or not...at some point we can't use the "young and inexperienced" as an excuse right? he's entering his 3rd year as a starting qb. seems he's getting much more experience than many kids do.

Here are Murray’s numbers over the last eight games:
8 games 87 - 161 - 6 54.0% 1148 yards 10tds 127.0 passer rating. That’s not great, but it’s #8 among BSC QBs of which there are 13. I don’t think that they’re reflective of a young, inexperienced QB.

exactly. i'm a big murray supporter. I want so badly for him to do great these next two years. and I think he has the tools to do so. however, if he doesn't for some reason, I don't think being young or lacking experience is a legit excuse any more.

You’re right. One way or another no one will be using that excuse.

[1984TwoMinutesHate]

Not about to argue for any reason. I'll simply state the majority of those 5600 yards came from garbage and pad the stats times of the game. Chris Murray, as a sophomore, equaled the one stat that mattered by a senior: a 5-6 won-loss record. He has two more years of eligibility ahead of him and his senior year, he'll be one year younger than the kid who left for Oregon, right? I think Chris Murray has a tremendous upside ahead of him and with an experienced OL and dependable receivers his passing will obviously be better.

Go back and look at how many dropped passes the Cats had the last two years.

What was Prukop's record as a starter? Thanks in advance.

Q: Did Prukop play within an air-it-out offensive scheme conducive to putting up big statistics?
A: Yes

Q: How many big games that actually mattered did Prukop win as a Bobcat?
A: 0

Q: How many times did Prukop get his ass whooped by the griz?
A: Every time he faced them

[85CatGrad]

Not about to argue for any reason. I'll simply state the majority of those 5600 yards came from garbage and pad the stats times of the game. Chris Murray, as a sophomore, equaled the one stat that mattered by a senior: a 5-6 won-loss record. He has two more years of eligibility ahead of him and his senior year, he'll be one year younger than the kid who left for Oregon, right? I think Chris Murray has a tremendous upside ahead of him and with an experienced OL and dependable receivers his passing will obviously be better.

Go back and look at how many dropped passes the Cats had the last two years.

What was Prukop's record as a starter? Thanks in advance.

Q: Did Prukop play within an air-it-out offensive scheme conducive to putting up big statistics?
A: Yes

Q: How many big games that actually mattered did Prukop win as a Bobcat?
A: 0

Q: How many times did Prukop get his ass whooped by the griz?
A: Every time he faced them

Come on man. Do you really believe that's a fair assessment? Prukop was a very good quarterback and did the best he could with the tools he had. Very few FCS quarterbacks could have done better in that situation. End of story. Time to let go and move on.

[VimSince03]

Not about to argue for any reason. I'll simply state the majority of those 5600 yards came from garbage and pad the stats times of the game. Chris Murray, as a sophomore, equaled the one stat that mattered by a senior: a 5-6 won-loss record. He has two more years of eligibility ahead of him and his senior year, he'll be one year younger than the kid who left for Oregon, right? I think Chris Murray has a tremendous upside ahead of him and with an experienced OL and dependable receivers his passing will obviously be better.

Go back and look at how many dropped passes the Cats had the last two years.

What was Prukop's record as a starter? Thanks in advance.

Q: Did Prukop play within an air-it-out offensive scheme conducive to putting up big statistics?
A: Yes

Q: How many big games that actually mattered did Prukop win as a Bobcat?
A: 0

Q: How many times did Prukop get his ass whooped by the griz?
A: Every time he faced them

Come on man. Do you really believe that's a fair assessment? Prukop was a very good quarterback and did the best he could with the tools he had. Very few FCS quarterbacks could have done better in that situation. End of story. Time to let go and move on.

Dakota played against the Griz once and actually played relatively well. I'm pretty sure its safe to say our defense let us down that day.

[allcat]

catgrad just wants to hate on the guy for wanting to try and improve his chances in the draft. It did not work out for the kid, so let's be sure we kick him.

[iaafan]

I'm not into the whole winning record by QBs when they didn't play on the same team during the same year. This isn't baseball.

Time to let the Prukop vs Murray thing go. Pointless.

I think we can all be encouraged by the trends under Murray. He was a project when he came to MSU with very little passing experience. He was never intended to play as a true freshman due to that.

He was 2-5 in his first seven starts with losses of 18, 24, 17, 31 and 4. Since then he's 5-4 with losses of 8, 12, 2 and 1. He was 0-3 in his first five conference starts. Since then he's 7-3 in conference starts.

He was 37-for-81 with 8 interceptions 550 yards and 6 TDs in his first six starts for a 107.4 QBR; in his last 10 starts he's 115-for-221 with 8 interceptions 1,569 yards and 15 TDs for a 126.8 QBR. That's a 19.4 jump in QBR. I don't expect another big jump like that, but even if he gets it into the mid-130s it'll be adequate. Case Cookus was only 131.3 last year and I'm pretty sure we'd all be happy if Murray could equal Cookus.

[catsrback76]

I'm not into the whole winning record by QBs when they didn't play on the same team during the same year. This isn't baseball.

Time to let the Prukop vs Murray thing go. Pointless.

I think we can all be encouraged by the trends under Murray. He was a project when he came to MSU with very little passing experience. He was never intended to play as a true freshman due to that.

He was 2-5 in his first seven starts with losses of 18, 24, 17, 31 and 4. Since then he's 5-4 with losses of 8, 12, 2 and 1. He was 0-3 in his first five conference starts. Since then he's 7-3 in conference starts.

He was 37-for-81 with 8 interceptions 550 yards and 6 TDs in his first six starts for a 107.4 QBR; in his last 10 starts he's 115-for-221 with 8 interceptions 1,569 yards and 15 TDs for a 126.8 QBR. That's a 19.4 jump in QBR. I don't expect another big jump like that, but even if he gets it into the mid-130s it'll be adequate. Case Cookus was only 131.3 last year and I'm pretty sure we'd all be happy if Murray could equal Cookus.

Murray is now a 3 year starter and is expected to produce as such. The season will be fun to watch...or agony...but I suspect fun as Murray learns how to play passing football.

[95bcfb]

Chris doesn't have to ba an all American passer. What he needs to be able to do is lead the team, make good decisions, protect the football, and be an average passer. If he can do that we are going to have a great year. I didn't get to watch a lot of spring practice but I did watch the spring game and walked away with the impression that Chris was definitely more comfortable leading the team. He didn't make all his throughs but it seemed to me that he was throwing to the right guy and making better, quicker decisions. I liked what I saw. I don't know if he can be an average passer. If he can't then the coaches are going to have to find someone else but right now he is clearly the best we have and I am really excited for fall.

[Hell's Bells]

https://athlonsports.com/college-footba ... tch-2018#1

It's an annoying click-bait story, but...
Other Quarterbacks to watch include
Chris Murray, MSU
Kevin Thomson, Sacramento State
Sean McGuire, Western Illinois

QB's of note in his top 10 watch list include:
8. Jake Meier, UC Davis
5. Taryn Christion, South Dakota State
4. Case Cookus, NAU
1. Gabe Gubrud EWU

Bobcats will face 3 of these quarterbacks in the first 5 games of the season, McGuire, Christion, and Gubrud.

Thanks for posting this. As usual, the Patriot and Ivy Leagues got more ink than deserved but such is life. It ought to be an interesting fall to see if the MVFC continues their dominance over the other conferences. Notice not much love for the Southland for whatever reason.

Relative the quick note about Murray--I couldn't help but notice how much he had grown in comparison to his freshman year without any noticeable loss of speed this spring. I think with just that slight increase in strength, a lot more experience on the OL and a couple receivers he can trust to catch the ball this year he's not going to take off like that kid who left for Oregon did before him. Should be a great season this year.

If you mean "take off" as in giving up on the pass and running; lets hope Murray can approach Prokop's numbers of 5600 yards over 2 seasons.

That is doubtful to happen since Chote wants to run the O at a slower tempo

[Bobcatsinmso]

Which is pound the rock, eat the clock, run it between the tackles and steal their souls. When they load the box we will burn them with slants , screens over the middle and touchdown bombs. Murray should be able to handle that all, and take off and gash em for a few random 30 yard scrambles as well. Its going to be a fun ride for a while. Go Bobcats!

[TomCat88]

I'm not into the whole winning record by QBs when they didn't play on the same team during the same year. This isn't baseball.

Time to let the Prukop vs Murray thing go. Pointless.

I think we can all be encouraged by the trends under Murray. He was a project when he came to MSU with very little passing experience. He was never intended to play as a true freshman due to that.

He was 2-5 in his first seven starts with losses of 18, 24, 17, 31 and 4. Since then he's 5-4 with losses of 8, 12, 2 and 1. He was 0-3 in his first five conference starts. Since then he's 7-3 in conference starts.

He was 37-for-81 with 8 interceptions 550 yards and 6 TDs in his first six starts for a 107.4 QBR; in his last 10 starts he's 115-for-221 with 8 interceptions 1,569 yards and 15 TDs for a 126.8 QBR. That's a 19.4 jump in QBR. I don't expect another big jump like that, but even if he gets it into the mid-130s it'll be adequate. Case Cookus was only 131.3 last year and I'm pretty sure we'd all be happy if Murray could equal Cookus.

No question he’s gotten better. I thought he took another step late last season. Sounds like spring ball was another step forward as I don’t think Cole and Choate did anything to make it easy for him.

[1984TwoMinutesHate]

Not about to argue for any reason. I'll simply state the majority of those 5600 yards came from garbage and pad the stats times of the game. Chris Murray, as a sophomore, equaled the one stat that mattered by a senior: a 5-6 won-loss record. He has two more years of eligibility ahead of him and his senior year, he'll be one year younger than the kid who left for Oregon, right? I think Chris Murray has a tremendous upside ahead of him and with an experienced OL and dependable receivers his passing will obviously be better.

Go back and look at how many dropped passes the Cats had the last two years.

What was Prukop's record as a starter? Thanks in advance.

Q: Did Prukop play within an air-it-out offensive scheme conducive to putting up big statistics?
A: Yes

Q: How many big games that actually mattered did Prukop win as a Bobcat?
A: 0

Q: How many times did Prukop get his ass whooped by the griz?
A: Every time he faced them

Come on man. Do you really believe that's a fair assessment? Prukop was a very good quarterback and did the best he could with the tools he had. Very few FCS quarterbacks could have done better in that situation. End of story. Time to let go and move on.

Yes, I believe it's a very fair assessment. I'm not saying Prukop was a bad QB. In fact, I think he had a lot of physical potential and could've been one of the great Bobcat QBs of all time. He even managed to become an FCS All-American in 2015, despite amassing most of his statistics in "garbage time" against sub-par Big Sky defenses. But it's still a shame he didn't finish his career as a Bobcat.

My point in that post raises the question of how do we best assess QBs? We live in a sports world obsessed with player statistics. I'd argue these statistics are severely overemphasized in evaluating players, especially QBs. I believe Choate is a believer in this concept as well, which is one of the reasons he's becoming a great head coach.

Gawdy offensive statistics was the great hoax of the Ash era, in my opinion. Big numbers, but never any big wins. NEVER BIG WINS!!

My main point is that Prukop never won a single big game as a starting Bobcat QB (or any college team's starting QB I don't believe), despite his superior ability & potential. This is a very important fact that can't be ignored. This manifested itself against the Griz both times he played them. Big time QBs play their best in big games. If not, you're not a big time QB.

Fortunately, Murray is 2-0 against the Griz & will likely be an FCS All-American this season (at the ATHLETE position, if they allow it).

But in the end, what matters are Bobcat wins & losses. Not individual player fantasy football statistics.

[91catAlum]

Not about to argue for any reason. I'll simply state the majority of those 5600 yards came from garbage and pad the stats times of the game. Chris Murray, as a sophomore, equaled the one stat that mattered by a senior: a 5-6 won-loss record. He has two more years of eligibility ahead of him and his senior year, he'll be one year younger than the kid who left for Oregon, right? I think Chris Murray has a tremendous upside ahead of him and with an experienced OL and dependable receivers his passing will obviously be better.

Go back and look at how many dropped passes the Cats had the last two years.

What was Prukop's record as a starter? Thanks in advance.

Q: Did Prukop play within an air-it-out offensive scheme conducive to putting up big statistics?
A: Yes

Q: How many big games that actually mattered did Prukop win as a Bobcat?
A: 0

Q: How many times did Prukop get his ass whooped by the griz?
A: Every time he faced them

Come on man. Do you really believe that's a fair assessment? Prukop was a very good quarterback and did the best he could with the tools he had. Very few FCS quarterbacks could have done better in that situation. End of story. Time to let go and move on.

Yes, I believe it's a very fair assessment. I'm not saying Prukop was a bad QB. In fact, I think he had a lot of physical potential and could've been one of the great Bobcat QBs of all time. He even managed to become an FCS All-American in 2015, despite amassing most of his statistics in "garbage time" against sub-par Big Sky defenses. But it's still a shame he didn't finish his career as a Bobcat.

My point in that post raises the question of how do we best assess QBs? We live in a sports world obsessed with player statistics. I'd argue these statistics are severely overemphasized in evaluating players, especially QBs. I believe Choate is a believer in this concept as well, which is one of the reasons he's becoming a great head coach.

Gawdy offensive statistics was the great hoax of the Ash era, in my opinion. Big numbers, but never any big wins. NEVER BIG WINS!!

My main point is that Prukop never won a single big game as a starting Bobcat QB (or any college team's starting QB I don't believe), despite his superior ability & potential. This is a very important fact that can't be ignored. This manifested itself against the Griz both times he played them. Big time QBs play their best in big games. If not, you're not a big time QB.

Fortunately, Murray is 2-0 against the Griz & will likely be an FCS All-American this season (at the ATHLETE position, if they allow it).

But in the end, what matters are Bobcat wins & losses. Not individual player fantasy football statistics.

Again - Prukop played the griz one time, in Rob Ash's last game in 2015 in Bozeman. That's it. It's hard to lose to the griz twice when you only play them once.
Prukop missed the 2014 griz game due to injury, Bleskin started that one.

[The MICKSTER]

I'm not into the whole winning record by QBs when they didn't play on the same team during the same year. This isn't baseball.

Time to let the Prukop vs Murray thing go. Pointless.

I think we can all be encouraged by the trends under Murray. He was a project when he came to MSU with very little passing experience. He was never intended to play as a true freshman due to that.

He was 2-5 in his first seven starts with losses of 18, 24, 17, 31 and 4. Since then he's 5-4 with losses of 8, 12, 2 and 1. He was 0-3 in his first five conference starts. Since then he's 7-3 in conference starts.

He was 37-for-81 with 8 interceptions 550 yards and 6 TDs in his first six starts for a 107.4 QBR; in his last 10 starts he's 115-for-221 with 8 interceptions 1,569 yards and 15 TDs for a 126.8 QBR. That's a 19.4 jump in QBR. I don't expect another big jump like that, but even if he gets it into the mid-130s it'll be adequate. Case Cookus was only 131.3 last year and I'm pretty sure we'd all be happy if Murray could equal Cookus.

+1
The reasons I think Chris Murray will continue to improve are (in no particular order);
• This will be his Junior year and 3rd year with Coach Choate & staff
• Bob Cole (nothing against Denarius)
• A ‘deeper’ offensive line
• Tyler Natee
• Travis Jonsen pushing him
• A better defense which will mean there will be less of a need to score lots of points in order to win, which in turn let’s Brian Armstrong & Co. call plays that Chris Murray and the offense can have more success executing.. It’s been proven to work……last season WSU lead the BSC in Scoring Defense only allowing 15.8 PPG, but were 2nd to last with only 395 YPG of Total Offense.
GO CATS!

[TomCat88]

I'm not into the whole winning record by QBs when they didn't play on the same team during the same year. This isn't baseball.

Time to let the Prukop vs Murray thing go. Pointless.

I think we can all be encouraged by the trends under Murray. He was a project when he came to MSU with very little passing experience. He was never intended to play as a true freshman due to that.

He was 2-5 in his first seven starts with losses of 18, 24, 17, 31 and 4. Since then he's 5-4 with losses of 8, 12, 2 and 1. He was 0-3 in his first five conference starts. Since then he's 7-3 in conference starts.

He was 37-for-81 with 8 interceptions 550 yards and 6 TDs in his first six starts for a 107.4 QBR; in his last 10 starts he's 115-for-221 with 8 interceptions 1,569 yards and 15 TDs for a 126.8 QBR. That's a 19.4 jump in QBR. I don't expect another big jump like that, but even if he gets it into the mid-130s it'll be adequate. Case Cookus was only 131.3 last year and I'm pretty sure we'd all be happy if Murray could equal Cookus.

+1
The reasons I think Chris Murray will continue to improve are (in no particular order);
• This will be his Junior year and 3rd year with Coach Choate & staff
• Bob Cole (nothing against Denarius)
• A ‘deeper’ offensive line
• Tyler Natee
• Travis Jonsen pushing him
• A better defense which will mean there will be less of a need to score lots of points in order to win, which in turn let’s Brian Armstrong & Co. call plays that Chris Murray and the offense can have more success executing.. It’s been proven to work……last season WSU lead the BSC in Scoring Defense only allowing 15.8 PPG, but were 2nd to last with only 395 YPG of Total Offense.
GO CATS!

Cantwell didn’t put up a lot of pass attempts, but he was the best QB in the BSC. He attempted just the fifth most, but was only one TD away from the league high. Second in pass efficiency to Maier.

[Hi-Line Bobcat]

I'm not into the whole winning record by QBs when they didn't play on the same team during the same year. This isn't baseball.

Time to let the Prukop vs Murray thing go. Pointless.

I think we can all be encouraged by the trends under Murray. He was a project when he came to MSU with very little passing experience. He was never intended to play as a true freshman due to that.

He was 2-5 in his first seven starts with losses of 18, 24, 17, 31 and 4. Since then he's 5-4 with losses of 8, 12, 2 and 1. He was 0-3 in his first five conference starts. Since then he's 7-3 in conference starts.

He was 37-for-81 with 8 interceptions 550 yards and 6 TDs in his first six starts for a 107.4 QBR; in his last 10 starts he's 115-for-221 with 8 interceptions 1,569 yards and 15 TDs for a 126.8 QBR. That's a 19.4 jump in QBR. I don't expect another big jump like that, but even if he gets it into the mid-130s it'll be adequate. Case Cookus was only 131.3 last year and I'm pretty sure we'd all be happy if Murray could equal Cookus.

So these aren't "meaningless stats" as you stated in the other thread? I just want to be sure I understand what are meaningful stats vs. meaningless stats and "due to offensive style system" stats.

[Cataholic]

Not about to argue for any reason. I'll simply state the majority of those 5600 yards came from garbage and pad the stats times of the game. Chris Murray, as a sophomore, equaled the one stat that mattered by a senior: a 5-6 won-loss record. He has two more years of eligibility ahead of him and his senior year, he'll be one year younger than the kid who left for Oregon, right? I think Chris Murray has a tremendous upside ahead of him and with an experienced OL and dependable receivers his passing will obviously be better.

Go back and look at how many dropped passes the Cats had the last two years.

What was Prukop's record as a starter? Thanks in advance.

Q: Did Prukop play within an air-it-out offensive scheme conducive to putting up big statistics?
A: Yes

Q: How many big games that actually mattered did Prukop win as a Bobcat?
A: 0

Q: How many times did Prukop get his ass whooped by the griz?
A: Every time he faced them

Come on man. Do you really believe that's a fair assessment? Prukop was a very good quarterback and did the best he could with the tools he had. Very few FCS quarterbacks could have done better in that situation. End of story. Time to let go and move on.

Yes, I believe it's a very fair assessment. I'm not saying Prukop was a bad QB. In fact, I think he had a lot of physical potential and could've been one of the great Bobcat QBs of all time. He even managed to become an FCS All-American in 2015, despite amassing most of his statistics in "garbage time" against sub-par Big Sky defenses. But it's still a shame he didn't finish his career as a Bobcat.

My point in that post raises the question of how do we best assess QBs? We live in a sports world obsessed with player statistics. I'd argue these statistics are severely overemphasized in evaluating players, especially QBs. I believe Choate is a believer in this concept as well, which is one of the reasons he's becoming a great head coach.

Gawdy offensive statistics was the great hoax of the Ash era, in my opinion. Big numbers, but never any big wins. NEVER BIG WINS!!

My main point is that Prukop never won a single big game as a starting Bobcat QB (or any college team's starting QB I don't believe), despite his superior ability & potential. This is a very important fact that can't be ignored. This manifested itself against the Griz both times he played them. Big time QBs play their best in big games. If not, you're not a big time QB.

Fortunately, Murray is 2-0 against the Griz & will likely be an FCS All-American this season (at the ATHLETE position, if they allow it).

But in the end, what matters are Bobcat wins & losses. Not individual player fantasy football statistics.

Blaming Prukop for never winning the big games is dumb. He played when MSU had two of the worst defenses in the history of MSU football. Defenses lost those games, not the quarterback.