
We need a portal intervention.
This is going to be a much more nuanced take than JUS’ PLAY SAM HORN, YA FREAKS, I hope you trust me on that much. Or at least I hope it will be. But I’m mildly annoyed by the hard searching for answers at the most important position in the transfer portal.
Mizzou needs a QB. This much we know.
Brady Cook is out of eligibility. Drew Pyne has eligibility and is competent enough, but not really the answer. Aidan Glover is now entering the transfer portal, understanding that his opportunity to play football at Missouri is likely gone. J.R. Blood got a few snaps this year but is out of eligibility. Brett Brown and Tommy Lock are also still listed on the roster, but it’s pretty rare for walk-ons to end up starting football games. That leaves Sam Horn on the roster.
Horn is coming off an injury and didn’t see any action during his redshirt sophomore campaign. He had Tommy John surgery back in February, and recovery from that procedure can take some time. He hasn’t played in a football game since the 2023 season,
Brady Cook was signed in the 2020 recruiting class. He was already committed to Barry Odom and stuck with Eli Drinkwitz, or I should probably say he stuck with Mizzou. Tyler Macon was signed in the 2021 class. Horn was part of the 2022 class. Gabarri Johnson was in the 2023 class. Glover last year, and then Matt Zollers is the new signee.
Macon, Johnson, and now Glover have transferred. None have developed.
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Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images
Which brings me to Mizzou and Eli Drinkwitz getting turned down by USC transfer quarterback Miller Moss in favor of Louisville. Moss is a fine quarterback. His PFF grade for the 2024 season was 79.2. He was really good against LSU to open the season, and then mostly fine the rest of the way. Then he got benched by Lincoln Riley. He flashed enough at USC to get everyone pretty excited, but he was the 45th ranked QB in power conference teams.
Brady Cook carried a 75.7 grade for the season and that’s playing hurt for more games than he should have. Cook ranked 60th in power conference teams.
Fernando Mendoza is another popular name around the Mizzou fandom, Mendoza played to a 77 grade on PFF this season. I’m going to look past the fact that Mendoza carries the same last name as Mario Mendoza who made famous the baseball jargon for being below average. Fernando Mendoza isn’t average, but he’s also a redshirt sophomore leaving him two years of eligibility. Mendoza finished 55th in power conference QBs.
I don’t mean to be dismissive, but this all seems like it’s completely okay but not all that exciting. Even if you cut off the number of drop backs to 100 or more you’re still talking about 34th, 40th, and 44th. All… fine.
We’ve appreciated Cook’s warrior-like mentality and his competitiveness and effort and will have helped Mizzou win a lot of games. At some point, though, he left a lot of us wondering if there was more?
Part of that wondering is coming from privilege. Mizzou fans are, by and large, spoiled when it comes to quarterbacking.
Brad Smith turned into Chase Daniel who turned into Blaine Gabbert who turned into James Franklin. The Tank handed things off to Maty Mauk, who gave way to Drew Lock. Connor Bazelak was next before Cook took over. So while things haven’t been perfect since Lock, the quarterback play has largely been really good to downright great. The interesting connection for all of those quarterbacks is they were recruited to the University of Missouri and signed as freshmen.
Portal shopping is all the rage these days, and I have to admit— it’s exciting. It’s fun! Free agency has always been one of my favorite parts of sports. But at some point Eli Drinkwitz needs to recruit, sign, and then develop a quarterback.
He gets half credit for Cook. But there’s more to be achieved and developed. I’m not sure if Horn is the right guy to invest in; after all he’s always had one foot on the gridiron and the other on the pitching mound. The talent is there but is the will? Is the health?
The problem now is that all the other QBs are gone. None were developed.
This isn’t even a Drinkwitz problem, this is a problem across college football. There are great quarterbacks but they’re fewer and farther between. As NIL and the transfer portal has provided quick solutions it’s removed the hard ones from the equation.
I don’t know what Drink will do to answer his quarterback conundrum, but I know if Sam Horn isn’t the answer at some point, Matt Zollers should be there soon enough. At some stage the head coach and his staff need to be responsible for identifying, recruiting, signing, and developing a star quarterback. Maybe they end up with Mendoza, maybe not. Maybe it’s Maalik Murphy, maybe not. Maybe it’s someone not in the portal right now, we’ll all wait and see. Whoever it is I’m sure I’ll work myself into getting excited about. But in the back of my head I’ll think signing a starter out of the portal will land you someone completely fine, developing one from your own roster could help you create a star.
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