Sure, but if you watched his interview, its Lester who has been gathering analytics on EVERY single snap of all the QB's in every drill since the spring. He says that's how he'll make his decision, and he called it a dead heat right now. He also talked about how much farther the QB's and the whole offense is on knowing how to run his offense. I really think he'll have the lions share of this decision.
QB Battle: Jeremy Hecklinski appears to have passed Hank Brown on the Depth Chart. QB was NOT a Transfer Portal Priority per KF on Dec 18
- Thread starter Franisdaman
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I’ll be glad to tell them you aren’t always right. But then, if any of them read this board they already know that.
The point is that Iowa is treating the QB position like a team trying to win 6-9 games. As usual.
The Outback Bowl has become the CFP for KF.
Just try and avoid losing more than 5 games anyway you can…rather than building an offense with consistent QB play that can raise the ceiling.
It’s maddening that so many fans accept it.
The ISU game is gonna be real interesting.
The Outback Bowl has become the CFP for KF.
Just try and avoid losing more than 5 games anyway you can…rather than building an offense with consistent QB play that can raise the ceiling.
It’s maddening that so many fans accept it.
The ISU game is gonna be real interesting.
Sure, maybe Hank is doing ok in practice.
But it really is hard to ignore Heck's Kids Day performance.
It just seems like when the lights are turned on, one QB REALLY shows up, and that's Heck.
This is starting to feel like it could be one of those frustrating seasons. If you have 2 QBs, it means you really don’t have one.
what else do you have to gauge it off of? At Kinnick in front of a few thousand people, I'd say that's when the lights are on.
So…Was Jimmy Sullivan another recruiting miss then?
It’s [at least] his second year and he doesn’t even appear to be in the discussion.
It’s [at least] his second year and he doesn’t even appear to be in the discussion.
It's really hard to ignore both performances from kids day. Heck looked great and Brown looked terrible. Now we're being told that might have been an anomaly. Given these circumstances it's hard to have any confidence in either guy to consistently lead the team this year.
So basically his trajectory so far looks like every other Iowa QB recruit from the last 10 years prior to Lester arriving.
That remains to be seen as Lester's only recruit is a true freshman who he extricated from a commitment to BSU.
Portal recruiting is just as important, and actually probably more important, than H.S. recruiting nowadays, especially at QB. Bessinger may be the only current QB that was recruited from day 1 out of H.S. by Lester (not sure about Fitz), but the two guys competing for playing time this season have to be considered "his guys." He hand picked both of them out of the transfer portal, and he has been developing them both for well over a year. Lester and KF decided to go with these two inexperienced QB's to lead the offense this season, deciding not to get another portal QB, making Iowa one of the very few P5 teams without a QB on the roster with much post-H.S. playing experience. I'm a big fan of Lester and what he's done so far, but as far as I'm concerned, this is the season in which he needs to prove his reputation as a QB development guru and that he is indeed the right guy for the job. If both of these guys underperform, it will look really, really bad, especially considering how much better the personnel is on offense everywhere else for a change.
In a world where Iowa had an extra 2-3 million laying around, I would agree. I'll precede this with saying that none of these numbers are concrete, but Colton Joseph ball park figures are 2 million, Colandrea is 2-2.5 million. I do tend to think the one they missed on was Marcus Stokes.
Iowa won't be bringing in many portal qb's to play right away.
Too expensive.
And too complicated of a system
This is actually the biggest problem with Iowa football as a program. You actually nailed it.
Wasn't referring to fan expectations.
The experts have expected 7.5 regular season wins in most seasons
A competitive P5 team not having an experienced QB on the roster is being in the vast, vast minority. This is not going to change.
We'll see how well that works out this season, but if Iowa plans on developing their own QBs year-in and year-out, (either H.S. kids or guys from the portal with 3+ years of eligibility), they'd better be really darn good at it, because they will literally be doing it differently from everyone else.
In this day and age of the portal, bringing in a seasoned QB is the new norm. If Iowa has such a complicated offense that they are not able to get an excellent transfer QB to perform right away, then they are doing it wrong.
While I agree that the portal is really important, I think Lester and Iowa were brand new to each other and still in "beggars can't be choosers" mode and he was stuck with the previous mistake.They obviously didn't have the confidence to have either one of them lead the team last year, so they went out and picked up Gronowski, hoping they could develop them over the course of the year. I'm not convinced they were/are sold on either one, but the overall team needs were much greater this year than last and a decision was made to stick it out with these guys to free up money for elsewhere. Neither one of these guys has a big price tag. Economics is a major factor in roster construction these days and Kirk has the last word in that regard.
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Perhaps that’s one reason why this type of offense is uncommon in college.
Obviously, we all hope that one of these 2 has a great season and Iowa has a solid starting QB for '27 and maybe even '28.
But what if we get "meh" QB performance this season, with a loaded OL/TE, as well as WR/RB for a change? Does Lester count on another year of development? Does he move on and go with "his guy" Bessinger, with Iowa again starting from scratch as far as QB experience? Do we go back to the portal to bring in a proven commodity? And then what if Bessinger never pans out or ends up transferring? Those are tough questions that may need to be answered.
The point is that Iowa may have to count on the portal whether they like it or not. Very few QB's stay in a program and "develop" as backups for more than a few years anymore. I'll bet you could count on one hand how many P5 QB's are 3 years out of H.S., still with the same college they committed to out of H.S. but still aren't looking at getting any significant playing time this season (That is what Jimmy Sullivan could potentially be NEXT season, which is why I expect he'll be transferring (as well as Brown or Heck) unless there's an unexpected change in the QB pecking order over the next few months).
No crystal balls here. The future is completely unknown, but as I said, I'm not holding Lester accountable if neither Heck nor Brown pans out given the situation he found himself in when he first arrived. I'm frankly surprised that he's been able to improve things as much as he has given the dumpster fire that he inherited talent wise and even more difficult to overcome, reputationally. "Come join the worst offense in the nation where qb and receiver careers come to die" isn't exactly an easy sell for anyone.
Right, Mark Gronowski came to Iowa so that his career would die. 9-3 ending the season beating the #14 team in the nation and only a handfull of plays away from much much more.
well considering most books had the Hawkeye's at 7.5 wins I'd say it was a successful season
He came because Lester and Kirk were able to sell him on the idea that things would be different and he could be successful. Well, that and the $1 million plus didn't hurt either.
How did every single QB recruited to Iowa from 2016 forward fare prior to last year?
To be 100% fair BOTH Brown and Heck have playing experience in college and Brown has started at least 3 games.
To be fair, I think people would rather forget Brown's few snaps at Iowa. I know I would.
Not that there aren't good ones, but if all these "seasoned guys" are so good, then why are they in the portal. I know there are various reasons, but some of them weren't able to win the starters job where they were, and then your asking them to go in and learn an entirely new offense AGAIN, and be the best guy in the QB room. One of the things Lester was really excited about was this is his first year (in year three) where he has three QB's who he had all of last season and all spring and summer to work with the same guys. He seems to think that's a big deal. I guess we'll find out.
We were within a handful of plays (and him not getting hurt in the Indiana game) of things being REALLY different last season.
Just making the point that BOTH played in college BEFORE they came to Iowa. Brown started at least three games. So refuting MTF comment that we didn't have a QB on the roster who had any college playing experience.To be fair, I think people would rather forget Brown's few snaps at Iowa. I know I would.
There’s no guarantee Iowa could have gotten a better QB in the portal within budget. I think a lot more analysis goes into the roster and what positions they pursue in the portal than most fans realize
Brown had two starts at Auburn. His first start against New Mexico was OK. The second start against Arkansas was a disaster, and he only saw game action one more time in his Auburn career after that. 52 pass attempts total at Auburn, and was benched on a team that went 5-7.
Hecklinski played one game with zero pass attempts at Wake.
Only one other P5 team has as inexperienced a QB room as Iowa (Alabama), so we are indeed an outlier, doing things differently from everyone else.
Cade, BSully, and Gronowski were experienced college quarterbacks when they got to Iowa. These two guys really are not, and the little we’ve seen from Brown (at Auburn AND Iowa) has not exactly been reassuring.
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Zach Wilson was probably going to commit to Iowa but our pal Petras beat him to the punch. Wonder if things would have been any different if he was the guy.
I hope this is Bessinger in Lesters office all Year
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Behind that OL and with the special needs OC Joe Montana could have been the QB and made no difference
Who would you have liked to see them go after? I’m not saying there’s not better QBs out there, but with the stupid money some of these schools are throwing around, I don’t know that most of them are worth it/in the right price range
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