Martinez cannot read medium and deep coverages, he is only reliable throwing the ball to the outside or dump passes, that won't cut it in league play, he needs to learn to not force the ball into coverage!
This should not be a shock to people.
Everyone who called for Martinez to start and wanted him to start, should know that was what they were getting. It is only a question of does it matter, that he can't do those things, given hat he can do running the ball.
Not the coaching here, when you are talking about a redshirt freshman that spent most of last year as a scout team WR. He may be electric, but he has a long way to go as a quarterback. Of course Nebraska doesn't need that, we just need someone who's not slow...
Here is the problem...shouldn't one of the older guys be "developing" their talent? At this point, with the players we have gotten, shouldn't we be developing talent so we don't have to use the freshman?
That is coaching my friend.
We don't
have to use the freshman, we
want to, because that's the kind of offense that we want to run and Bo made the call that the killer running ability of Martinez is worth it.
This is why in the offseason I said: we should start Lee, because we should be starting a talented quarterback. And many, many other responded: Lee isn't a good runner. Taylor is a good runner. Having that is more important. Bo agreed with them. It was his call, and that's what he went with. I still don't agree with the call, but I don't think it will be disastrous either - as stated, if we show up to play, I think we'll steamroll many teams this year, Texas included, whether or not the QB has his footwork down. I'm not stoked that this is the story Bo has chosen for this season, but we're down that road now and I'm hoping for the best.
On another note, with the 3-headed QB race this year, we forget how dangerously thin we really are at the quarterback position. We have Taylor and Cody who from the start were projects, that were completely raw about being a QB (footwork, mechanics, etc), from the moment they stepped on the field. Cody was a dedicated QB from the beginning, and he has made strides in all those departments. Taylor wasn't, so it's understandable that he is less far along. Then we have Lee, who, footwork or not, is clearly out of favor; Witt, who left; Spano, who no longer has healthy knees; Carnes, who is redshirting...
So some guys we get are projects and some aren't. The direction that Bo wants to turn this offense to involves getting a larger number of quarterbacks who
are projects, which is how we end up with two project, athletic QBs at the top of the depth chart, and Jamal Turner as our next QB commit. They will take longer to coach up, doesn't matter how good the QB coach is, but in the meantime will rely on their athleticism. That's not my cup of tea, personally, but it's Bo's.
Well, we need a qb that can lead us to more than five 1st downs a game and a 99th ranked total offense (even with a marginal sos).
I'll take the hit on Tmart's growing pains for his obvious upside.....
Good. That's fine. But if you really are willing to take the hit on the growing pains, drop the bagging on SW, because when we struggle this year, we are going to be seeing Tmart's growing pains and not a "lack of offensive identity" as you suggest.