STARKVILLE — Mississippi State’s revolving door of quarterbacks persisted Saturday as freshman Will Rogers earned his first career start in a 24-17 win over Vanderbilt.
For weeks, fans and message board pundits have called for Rogers to start, and with good reason. After setting a Southeastern Conference record with 623 yards in MSU’s Week 1 win over then-No. 6 LSU, Stanford import K.J. Costello has seen his Pro Football Focus offensive grade dip from 76.6 against the Tigers to 46.2 against No. 1 Alabama before he was knocked out of the game with an undisclosed injury.
With Costello sidelined Saturday, Rogers completed 35 of 46 passes for 226 yards and a touchdown to give MSU its first win since September. But for those hoping the Brandon native is capable of resurrecting a season that has been all but lost, a deeper look at his numbers offer little optimism he’s the long term answer for a floundering Bulldog offense.
In a combined eight appearances between MSU’s two quarterbacks, Rogers has accounted for two of the three worst graded performances of the season by either player, including Saturday’s win over Vanderbilt, according to Pro Football Focus.
Further, his overall PFF passer grade of 45.6 on a scale of 100 sits nearly a point and a half below Costello’s average grade minus the LSU game at a tick under 47.
“There aren’t very many of them,” coach Mike Leach said of “freshman phenom” quarterbacks following Saturday’s win. “That’s why everyone remembers the very few that there are, because it almost never happens. You go from a guy that’s a true freshman, you try to play with him, then you go out on the road recruiting and as soon as you sign somebody that’s supposed to be a really good freshman and the media acts like that guy is going to shock the world. Well, that very seldom happens.”
While Rogers has undoubtedly been thrust into difficult situations — thrice relieving Costello while trailing by two possessions or more at the time — Saturday’s contest against a Vanderbilt team that reportedly had just 58 players due to COVID-19 diagnoses and contact tracing and that has won just one SEC game since November 2018 further proved the freshman is a far ways off from offering a logical fix under center.
Facing a defense that ranked last in the SEC in sacks and tackles for a loss heading into Saturday, Rogers was sacked three times, though that was in part due to MSU’s being short handed on the offensive line.
His 226 yards passing also marked just the fifth time since 2013 a Leach-coached quarterback threw for less than 250 yards. For context, Rogers and Costello’s combined 163 yards passing against Alabama was the single-worst performance by any team in Leach’s nearly 19 year career.
That Rogers was also only able to help MSU to 24 points, 14 of which were set up by Commodore turnovers deep in their own territory, against a team that had allowed at least 41 points in three of its four games this season offered little change from the Bulldog offense of weeks past, guided, in large part, by Costello.
“I look at Will as a young guy that has a lot of leadership in him,” senior linebacker Erroll Thompson said after MSU’s loss to Texas A&M on Oct. 17.
This isn’t to say Rogers isn’t capable of finding a groove through the rest of the season or that the MSU offense can’t progress heading into next fall.
During Leach’s first season at Washington State in 2012, the Cougars notched less than 300 yards passing five times and scored seven or less points in four contests. One year later, Washington State finished fourth in the nation in passing offense and 54th in total offense as the Cougars marched to a 6-7 record.
Looking toward 2021, the Bulldogs will hope to get a full spring sans a global pandemic as the quarterback position figures to be a battle between Rogers, four-star passer and top-150 recruit Sawyer Robertson and three-star prospect Daniel Greek assuming Costello moves on. But if one start and some change this fall is worth anything, it’s that Costello, not Rogers, has been the better quarterback this fall.
“My opinion on our team is going to be based on how well we play within what we’re capable of at this point,” Leach said following Saturday’s win. “I’m not going to be very tolerant of falling short of that. We have to play better. We have to coach better in order to make that happen because that’s where it starts.”
Ben Portnoy reports on Mississippi State sports for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter at @bportnoy15.
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