Phillip Nelson Expectations

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I have been reading numerous threads and I am surprised at how high some people's expectations are of Phillip Nelson for next year. Several claiming that he is the automatic replacement for Gray, some saying he has a chance to start as a freshman, etc. I think that ultimately he will be a very good quarterback for the Gophers (think Adam Weber running the same offense every year) but I think it is unrealistic to expect him to step in and contribute immediately. I'm hoping he is able to redshirt (meaning our Qb situation is stable enough) so that he has a year to mature both physically and mentally and adjust to the college game. The step up from high school is huge for most and when Phillip gets his chance you want him to be able to go in and have success. Sometimes I think people get overhyped by stars (remember our last 4* quarterback recruit with all the promise - Clint Brewster), or are so jacked at a local recruit with endless potential (think Moses Alipate) that they lose sight that they are freshman making a huge step up. Some transition well into the college game, others not so well. The quarterback position brings with it an extreme amount of pressure and it is tough enough without people placing extreme expectations on a freshman as well. I think Phillip will do just fine and will have a very successful Gopher career but give him some time so that when he makes that transition he is truly ready.
 

When things looked bleak earlier in the year people on here started looking at Nelson as some sort of savior. Now that people have had a chance to see him play, and also have watched Gray show some signs of developing into a solid QB it feels like most of the opinions on here echo what you laid out in your post.

Bottom line is none of us know how he will adjust to the college game and if he will pan out. He certainly looks like a very good prospect but that does not guarantee he will succeed. My theory goes right along with what you wrote in that I expect him to sit for at least one year and possibly even two, then if he is good enough he will be handed the reigns and we will see what he can do. That being said I think the coaches will go with the guy they feel gives them the best chance to win so after spring ball and fall camp if they feel Nelson is a better option then Gray he will be in there. I don't expect that to happen but my crystal ball is on the fritz so you never really know how it is going to play out.

The final note on Nelson is that he has not signed on the dotted lines yet. Granted he looks like a very solid verbal and I would expect him to sign in Feb but that is a few months away and you never know if something will happen to change is mind. Again seems unlikely but I tend to not get too caught up in the upside of any recruit until they sign that LOI.
 

So what about Shortell? Some of you were yelling for Max to start earlier in the season. Best bet is Gray starts next year with Max as a backup and redshirt Nelson to battle Shortell when Gray is gone. Shortell should have been redshirted but Kill could not due to depth. He will not do the same with Nelson.
 

The problem lies in placing too high of expectations on high school kids and projecting how they will play in college. Even the experts (college coaches) have a hard time with this, but I'd argue those that get it right more often than not are those that we end up calling "good coaches." Everyone is always looking for a program savior, but it usually just doesn't work that way. Hundreds of threads have been posted on players that were highly ranked in high school and didn't produce and those that were ranked low and became good players. The three best offensive players for the Gophers in the last 15 years (Decker, Barber, Eslinger) had no other D-1 offers.

It looks like Nelson will be a Gopher and he's a very good prospect, the kind of kid we need. Unfortunately, any one expecting magic from Day 1 and claiming that he's the guy that's going to "turn the program around" will probably end up being disappointed.
 

Parski1 said:
So what about Shortell? Some of you were yelling for Max to start earlier in the season. Best bet is Gray starts next year with Max as a backup and redshirt Nelson to battle Shortell when Gray is gone. Shortell should have been redshirted but Kill could not due to depth. He will not do the same with Nelson.
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I was not a fan of the way the coaching staff handled Shortell. They must not like Parrish or Moses at all to burn Shortell's redshirt in fairly meaningless action. Injuries forced their hand some but it would have been nice if one of the other guys could have shown enough to be the backup. Leads me to believe they got nothing out of those two which is why they had to turn to Max.
 


MNVCGUY said:
They must not like Parrish or Moses at all to burn Shortell's redshirt in fairly meaningless action.
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The first game of the season vs. a power program where we are in it until the very end is "meaningless action?"
 


I expect him to red-shirt and compete with Shortell for playing time when Shortell is a junior and Nelson is a red-shirt freshman.

Even with his weaknesses, I am a huge Marquise Gray fan and I hope he plays as many serious downs as he can in 2012.
 

There is a good amount of responsibility associated with redshirting athletes, and it's very popular on this board to manage your roster like a video game. However, you have to remember what you are asking of these student athletes- while it is great to redshirt freshmen so that they can further acclimate to your team, there is a flipside to this. You cannot turn around and pull (as most everyone tried to do with Weber last year) the "rebuilding card" when they're now a 5th year senior, if your team is not performing well. It is absolutely not fair to ask a student-athlete to put their life on hold and redshirt for a year, if you are also the type of coach who would bench that 5th year senior for the 2nd half of their final season, to give a less-prepared underclassman more experience. You need to reward those that have invested in your program, and that is a basic part of the team's culture.
 



Every college football game is important. For all those who were clamoring for Gray last year and wanted him to get playing time, not one person would have traded the Iowa win to watch Gray get "experience" and see the Gophers lose by 2 touchdowns.
 

I like to think I have a good perspective on what one player can do. I don't expect national championships out of Nelson. But from what I've heard about him, anything less than multiple Heismans (Heismen?) will be a disappointment.
 

I expect Nelson to challenge for the starting spot in 2013 with Shortell.

I don't know what happens next year, there could certainly be a scenario where Nelson shouldn't redshirt. If Nelson really is better than Shortell and Gray gets banged up, I think you go with the better of the two players. I understand the important of RSing players.

If everyone stays healthy, there should be no reason to play Nelson next season but that's a huge IF.
 

If this team will compete in the future, we need to keep more players in each incoming classes in school. How many guys do we loss every year? Red shirting only makes a difference if they are able to stay in school for five years.We do not get the same players like OSU, so we need to develop players. If we can keep them for five years we will see improvements. Along the same lines we can not keep turning over our coaching staffs every four-five years.
 



GopherJake said:
The first game of the season vs. a power program where we are in it until the very end is "meaningless action?"
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He must think starting and playing the entire game in the conference opener is meaningless action also.
 

Will Nelson be able to participate in Spring ball like Jones did last year. If he can they will know if he can compete this year or not. How many QB's can we have on the roster ? Gray, Shortell, Nelson, Parrish, Moses , Foreman, and Leidner. seems like lots of Schollarships tied up.
 


play hard said:
Will Nelson be able to participate in Spring ball like Jones did last year. If he can they will know if he can compete this year or not. How many QB's can we have on the roster ? Gray, Shortell, Nelson, Parrish, Moses , Foreman, and Leidner. seems like lots of Schollarships tied up.
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Come on people - he will NOT play next year! Nelson will for sure be red shirted. Kill has him for the near future. Gray and Shortell next year. It's a no brainier.
 

I realize that calling the action Shortell saw earlier in the season meaningless was a bad choice of words. What I meant was that it was a shame to burn his redshirt for the limited action he is going to see this season. It would have been nice if one of the other QB's on the roster could have served as the placeholder that Shortell basically became this year in the limited action he saw.

Obviously starting against Michigan and playing the second half vs. USC is not meaningless action but looking at how the Michigan game turned out things probably would not have been much worse with Parrish or Moses taking those snaps.

The point I was trying to make is that it is very clear the staff did not like what they saw from Parrish or Moses which lead them to playing Shortell as a true freshman.

As to the person that pointed out the number of QB's on the roster having 4 or 5 is not unheard of but I would expect a few of those guys to find other positions or transfer out. Parrish I would think would be a very likely transfer because I am sure he knows that if he didn't play this year his chances of leapfrogging Shortell and Nelson next year are pretty unlikely.
 

I've always been of the school that says you recruit at least one QB prospect each year (you probably end up recruiting more guys who play the position in high school and move once they get to college). We look a little overloaded at the position now, but that shouldn't be a mystery because Parrish and Alipate were recruited by a previous coach for the previous offensive system.

I can see both sides of the red-shirt/not red-shirt Shortell argument. I agree that having Parrish or Alipate taking the snaps at USC and Michigan wouldn't have made a difference in the outcome of the game, but Kill reminds me a bit of former Twins' manager Tom Kelly in that he refuses to compromise the on-field product and he must have felt that Shortell was the guy that gave the team the best chance to win and that win would have been important. We'll see if it was a good move or bad move. Have to remember that Gray was banged up as well.

PS--If Nelson enrolls in January, he should be able to participate in spring practice ala Marcus Jones. Further, under a provision passed last legislative session as part of the omnibus K-12 education bill, a portion of the per pupil aid attributed to Nelson as a high school student will follow him to the U and defray a portion of his education expenses.
 

I would think Parrish will look to transfer to another D-1 school if he can find a taker, some non-BCS school where he can sit a year and still have a couple years of eligibility. Moses will probably look to drop down to D2 where he can play right away since he only has 2 years left and sitting for one of them would not be an attractive option.

It has already been discussed that Leidner will probably never take a snap at QB so really that just leaves Gray, Shortell, Nelson, and Foreman on the list as QB's assuming those first 2 guys do in fact transfer.
 

St. Thomas' QB is a senior, so maybe Alipate goes there if he wants to transfer. Good school, great small college football program. He'd probably devour the competition in the MIAC.
 

I think hindsight regarding Shortell is pointless. What if Gray doesn't progress the way he has? Then maybe they would have moved Gray to wide receiver and started Shortell. It is hard to say what they would have done or were planning to do. Even if Shortell wasted a year, I do not think you should be worrying about that. He does not fit this offense at all.
 


I just don't know if Alipate has the gumption to transfer. He lost the job by being lazy - didn't follow the workout routine, didn't lose weight like they asked him to (instead he gained weight), shows up to practice and just goes through the motions (on a good day). I honestly won't be surprised if he graduates a Gopher. The guy has a great arm, and I thought he actually ran a lot better than he should have (all things considered), but I just don't see him putting out the effort to go somewhere else. Besides, wouldn't it be awkward if the heaviest person on the team was the QB??

Parrish, I'm not sure. I don't really know what the deal is there, unless he never really got over the injury. Maybe he is more of a fit issue than Alipate (not that Alipate fits real well, but there are other issues as noted above). Maybe he does go elsewhere, but I would also not be surprised if he stays. Do you really think he has a shot to be a starter at any D1 FBS school? My guess is he'd have to drop to D1 FCS at least to ever be a starter.
 

Lakeville Goldy said:
I just don't know if Alipate has the gumption to transfer. He lost the job by being lazy - didn't follow the workout routine, didn't lose weight like they asked him to (instead he gained weight), shows up to practice and just goes through the motions (on a good day). I honestly won't be surprised if he graduates a Gopher. The guy has a great arm, and I thought he actually ran a lot better than he should have (all things considered), but I just don't see him putting out the effort to go somewhere else. Besides, wouldn't it be awkward if the heaviest person on the team was the QB??

Parrish, I'm not sure. I don't really know what the deal is there, unless he never really got over the injury. Maybe he is more of a fit issue than Alipate (not that Alipate fits real well, but there are other issues as noted above). Maybe he does go elsewhere, but I would also not be surprised if he stays. Do you really think he has a shot to be a starter at any D1 FBS school? My guess is he'd have to drop to D1 FCS at least to ever be a starter.
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Dropping down would actually make sense in that they wouldn't have to sit out. I have no insight if any of them will transfer, but I wouldn't expect any of them to transfer to another BCS school.
 

If Parish tries to stay D1 I think the best he could hope for would be a mid major school. Alipate would certainly have to take a step down in class as no D1 school would bring him on to have him sit a year and then have only 1 year left to play.
 

If seeing the field at QB isn't going to happen, could they be switched to another position? I'd certainly understand if they transferred to be able to play, but if they want to play here, something is going to have to change.
 

Just for more speculation.......Gray now has 2 extra mouths to feed. Perhaps he goes Spreewell on us and decides he needs to "feed the family" and declares for the NFL draft.....
 

WHB Brewer said:
Just for more speculation.......Gray now has 2 extra mouths to feed. Perhaps he goes Spreewell on us and decides he needs to "feed the family" and declares for the NFL draft.....
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That's a really big gamble. I'm not sure where he's at in terms of getting his degree, but if you're going to bail on your free education, you'd better be 100% certain you're going to be earning an NFL paycheck.
 

There's no evidence that he's thinking about skipping his senior year. He'd do a lot better in the draft after his senior year than he would if he went pro this year.
 

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