Logan

I have always been a big supporter of Logan. Even early in 2011 when he struggled and we had nothing else to judge him by, I thought he would come along and surprise people. By no means did I think he would do as good as he ended up doing, but I knew he was better than what we were seeing early in the season. I wouldn't criticize Logan for 2012. He had hardly any reliable weapons and way too much pressure on him in a stale program.

That being said, the regression we have seen in the last two games is inexcusable. Early in the year, I would put most of the fault on the receivers, but these last two games have been a lot on Logan. Against Duke, I don't know how he doesn't realize after not once, but twice that he needs to take a little off the ball when throwing it short to a receiver, THEN he does it again and it turns into his fourth interception. I blame the coaches or whoever is around him for this too because if I can notice it, then they should too. The second interception in the endzone from last week was, in my opinion, his worst decision of the year until today. NO FIFTH YEAR SENIOR QUARTERBACK WITH NFL POTENTIAL SHOULD EVER, EVER, EVER THROW A PASS LIKE HE DID TODAY THAT WAS RETURNED FOR A TOUCHDOWN AND ULTIMATELY LOST THE GAME. You can only justify throwing a pass like that on fourth down trailing with less than a minute left in the game. It is a tie game with plenty of time left and you have a great defense! So if anything, risk the intentional grounding penalty and live to fight another day. It was third down anyways so it is not a big loss if we lose a down, but to throw a lazy ball to where he did (I have no idea what he saw) is ridiculously poor.

Now, I know there are going to be a lot of responses to this defending Logan and blaming others. There is certainly plenty of blame to go around but everything has been the same except for Logan's performance. The play calling has still been well below average over the season, the receivers played terrible early but have come along for the most part, we haven't had a running game, Journell has been terribly inconsistent, and the defense has been outstanding. The key? Logan Thomas. Logan was forced to not play great early on because of the receivers (still had some bad moments, but not as costly), but now the receivers have come into their own a bit and he played extremely well until last week. So if you want to put it on the play calling or receivers or lack of a running game then fine, I understand. Yet, we won 6 straight with all of those problems when Logan was managing what he could and playing well. So the difference? Logan's performance. This isn't really an attack on Logan except for the two very costly picks he threw from the last two games, but more of we are only as good as he is. He certainly can not turn the ball over multiple times or turn it over in key times in the game. That is losing the game. He doesn't even really have to go out and truly win games with our defense. He just has to eliminate bad decisions while getting a little help from his receivers. You can still blame all the other things mentioned before, but the truth is we haven't seen those other aspects do well. We have seen Logan do well, which is why we were able to win (and an awesome D) despite all our other problems and why he is held to a higher standard. So that is why, as much as I hate to say it, he has been the major issue and cause for us losing these past two games.

I will tell you I am still going to support Logan and think we are probably better off with him than anyone else right now, but I will not be disappointed to see him graduate. I think he is a good quarterback but not a great one. I think he can be groomed into a great one because he has all the physical traits, but our coaching staff and system just couldn't get him there.