I wanted to try to put Steven Threet’s performance thus far into perspective. Some people think he’s a stiff who lathers his hands in butter before taking a snap. Others see him as a competent young QB who can hold his own despite having the deck stacked against him with the depth chart on offense. He’s probably somewhere in between….so let’s find out. One of my motivations has been that I’ve sensed Brian at MGoBlog souring on him a lot in the past couple of weeks. Obviously he isn’t Pat White in this offense, but he isn’t Ryan Mallett either. Let me explain…..

I set out to compare his performance to other Michigan freshman quarterbacks. It is at this point, before even looking at a stat, where you can really understand Threet’s situation. Freshman aren’t supposed to play at that position. No matter how good you are in high school, you’re not ready to start at a big-time college program. Ask Jimmy Clausen. Ask Ryan Mallett. You can argue that Threet is a RED-shirt freshman and not a TRUE freshman, but since graduating college he’s spent a few months at Georgia Tech, a few months under Lloyd Carr, and a few months under Rodriguez. Not exactly a masters course in preparation for this season.

There are only two circumstances where a freshman QB is likely to succeed:

1. He’s a freakish athlete and can rely on his athleticism to make up for his mental and physical deficiencies. Pryor at OSU falls into this category. His passing stats are very modest and they’re keeping things really simple. He uses his legs to overcome his passing limitations.
2. He’s surrounded by a talented, veteran team. This is the Chad Henne category. We saw in Henne’s sophomore year that he wasn’t the second coming of John Elway that we saw his freshman year. Why? Braylon Edwards. Henne knew that if he threw it near Braylon, he was likely to have a chance to catch it – no matter how mediocre the throw was. To some extent this applies to Pryor as well since he is starting behind a veteran offensive line with a Heisman quality RB.

Steven Threet has neither luxury. But how does he compare to other freshman QB’s? If someone can dig up NCAA statistics from all schools it would be really interesting. I took on just Michigan QB’s. And it wasn’t difficult – they barely play as freshman. At this point through 7 games Threet has thrown the second most passes of any freshman QB that I could find in the recent history of the school. Let’s look at them:

I was surprised at Navarre’s stats. I remember him being horrible as a redshirt freshman and single-handedly giving away the UCLA game. But his stats aren’t horrible. Obviously Henne is on a plane all of his own, though his Y/A were lower than I expected considering the Braylon factor. Ryan Mallett sure was terrible, wasn’t he?

If I’m not mistaken, Threet is the first one of those players to be given the job out of necessity rather than due to an injury to a more experienced player, though I can’t remember Grbac’s situation. I also mentioned the lack of a surrounding cast. Here’s another chart comparing those QB’s.

Wow, nostalgia. I’m starting to wonder if Arrington’s departure hurt this offense more than anyone else.

I’m going to limit the amount of conclusions I draw from this information and leave it open to interpretation. Obviously missing from this data are the number of fumbles and any rushing statistics.

My opinion from this information and from watching the games is this – Threet is not a very good quarterback right now, but he’s not a bad one either. Unlike some areas of the team he is showing progress from week-to-week and compares favorably to other freshmen at his position. The quarterback position is a problem for the team, but the problem is mostly due to a lack of depth and experience – not directly because Steven Threet is incapable of leading the team to victory. Threet is raw and inconsistent, but he’s competent and should develop into a solid QB in time. There is little in my limited analysis that shows he’s worse than most of those other guys. What Michigan lacks is a capable experienced QB (Jason Forcier?) who could hold down the fort this season.

Let’s give Threet time and the benefit of the doubt…….and do whatever we can to keep Sheridan off the field.