Stumpy1
All-American
Welcome to the board.Hi there, Oregon State interloper here, wandered by to see what's shaking with your new coach and see a qb battle is brewing.
My thoughts on this thread based on many years of observation of Riley and Langsdorf, other OCs-
It is possible, but not likely that Riley may have the two contenders co-own the spot all the way through the season. He did this with Sean Canfield and Lyle Moevao in 2008 with mixed results. It was not fun. Nothing more frustrating as a fan to hear the coaches continually say that nobody has made themselves The Guy at the most important position. At some point you want to blame the coaches for not identifying which player to go with and make a choice.
More likely he and Langsdorf will have to make a choice because Riley doesnt have the mile long leash he had in Corvallis. But understand that he will take his time making a choice and it will be the guy who stays in the pocket either long enough to make a completion, throw an interception or take a sack. If there is one hallmark of Riley's offense it is finishing your shift as air traffic controller when the building is on fire, or falling down whatever. There are no designed scrambles and even moving the pocket around to let the quarterback roll out to one side of the field is, like a crazy idea. I can remember exactly two quarterback draws in 12 years and i dont think they were called plays.
Your offense may be a departure but i doubt it. Riley is as stubborn as he is nice. In fact i am going to say his friendly and down to earth way of being shields him from questions about his flexibility. Even the most vile dickweeds are defeated by the gee golly force field.
That said, i think he wins 9 or 10 games this year if he gets his coaching mojo back. He knows the fundamentals and can get kids to buy in. I would worry about late game decision making based on the last few years but maybe the change in surroundings will heal that nasty case of brain cloud he developed the last few seasons.
What you described could be said about our last coach(s). Hopefully Riley realized his errors from past and can adjust.