Ducks Attack Message Board Forum

Another good article from Dale Newton.

Been touting this kid since the first time I saw him on Video. Some of you are probably getting sick of my mancrush on this kid but I really think of all the great, great, recruits we got in the class DAT, Lyerla, Blackmon, etc. I think Mariota will be the best player in this class and think he could end up as Oregon's first Heisman winner. I know this is kinda crazy talk but from what I saw he was by far the best QB I've seen on a HS video. Great Mechanics, great footwork, great speed. I remember his coach saying they timed him in the 40 at about 4.3 a couple of times and thought no one would believe it so they adjusted it to 4.5. Maybe even faster than DD ?

Brian Bennett and Rodriquez also look like their going to be very, very good but I just think Mariota is a notch above them. Very excited about these QB's who could definitely be the best group in Oregon history.

Just wish all this other stuff can be dealt with soon so we can just concentrate on football.


" "He has the accuracy of Jason Gesser. Has the coolness of Timmy Chang. Has the competitive spirit of Darnell Arceneaux," said Passas, who coached these passers. "So he's all of those guys built into one guy, and that's Marcus. He's faster than all of them. He's smarter than all of them. So if we're choosing sides and I have the first pick, Marcus would be the first pick.

Mariota's high school head coach Arceneaux told Lindsay Schnell of oregonlive.com, "I can tell you right now, Marcus will be THE best passer of anyone (at Oregon). His throwing motion looks a lot like Andrew Luck's. He's a thrower first, a natural thrower with running ability. He is probably one of the best quarterbacks to ever come out of Hawaii with all the intangibles. He's a phenomenal athlete and he's got unbelievable speed. Him on the zone read, it's just not fair."


http://www.duckstopshere.com/2011-artic ... riota.html

Great stuff Bigducker, thanks for the link.

I was surprised a little that we offered him in June after a camp (prior to his senior year). Considering that he was a first-year starter as a senior.

Oregon took a little chance there, but he clearly didn't disappoint.

This kid has everything it takes to really blow it up when he gets his chance.

I think he looks great. While he had those hand timed 4.3s he also had a SPARQ electronic timed 4.7. At that same combine the fastest of the wide receivers and running backs were in that same 4.7 range so he truly has great speed for a QB. I am guessing next year he will time around 4.7 at Oregon which would give him the fastest Oregon timed 40 for a QB since Chris Harper.

His highlight video is strikingly like the kid from Nevada Koper#$%#%#niczki, but with a smoother throwing motion.

His ceiling is sky (Heismann) high but you never know how these things will turn out. I think he was definitely a steal and the coaches were brilliant in being onto both Mariota and Manziel before there big Senior years.

GrandpaDuck wrote:I think he looks great. While he had those hand timed 4.3s he also had a SPARQ electronic timed 4.7. At that same combine the fastest of the wide receivers and running backs were in that same 4.7 range so he truly has great speed for a QB. I am guessing next year he will time around 4.7 at Oregon which would give him the fastest Oregon timed 40 for a QB since Chris Harper.

His highlight video is strikingly like the kid from Nevada Koper#$%#%#niczki, but with a smoother throwing motion.

His ceiling is sky (Heismann) high but you never know how these things will turn out. I think he was definitely a steal and the coaches were brilliant in being onto both Mariota and Manziel before there big Senior years.

Thats actually really funny, i watched a highlight vid of his sr. year, and all i kept thinkin was Colin Kapernick. Similar rocket arm, incredible speed and quicks. It also impresses me that he runs nearly the exact same offense that we run here at UO. Its going to be fun watching this guy grow in to his potential.

Just wondering, what kept him from being higher than a 2/3 star prospect (Rivals and scout were 3, ESPN was 2) rather than the 247 4* rating. I dont know much about the grading system or whatever, and i'm kind of new to the recruiting world, though i know a lot about college football because of how i follow the draft so closely.

Duffman57 wrote:

GrandpaDuck wrote:I think he looks great. While he had those hand timed 4.3s he also had a SPARQ electronic timed 4.7. At that same combine the fastest of the wide receivers and running backs were in that same 4.7 range so he truly has great speed for a QB. I am guessing next year he will time around 4.7 at Oregon which would give him the fastest Oregon timed 40 for a QB since Chris Harper.

His highlight video is strikingly like the kid from Nevada Koper#$%#%#niczki, but with a smoother throwing motion.

His ceiling is sky (Heismann) high but you never know how these things will turn out. I think he was definitely a steal and the coaches were brilliant in being onto both Mariota and Manziel before there big Senior years.

Thats actually really funny, i watched a highlight vid of his sr. year, and all i kept thinkin was Colin Kapernick. Similar rocket arm, incredible speed and quicks. It also impresses me that he runs nearly the exact same offense that we run here at UO. Its going to be fun watching this guy grow in to his potential.

Just wondering, what kept him from being higher than a 2/3 star prospect (Rivals and scout were 3, ESPN was 2) rather than the 247 4* rating. I dont know much about the grading system or whatever, and i'm kind of new to the recruiting world, though i know a lot about college football because of how i follow the draft so closely.

All the rating systems are biased towards kids an evaluator can see in person as opposed towards just watching film. The closer a kid is to recruiting system employees the better the chances of being highly rated, and obviously Hawaii doesn't qualify as "close".

GrandpaDuck wrote:I think he looks great. While he had those hand timed 4.3s he also had a SPARQ electronic timed 4.7. At that same combine the fastest of the wide receivers and running backs were in that same 4.7 range so he truly has great speed for a QB. I am guessing next year he will time around 4.7 at Oregon which would give him the fastest Oregon timed 40 for a QB since Chris Harper.

His highlight video is strikingly like the kid from Nevada Koper#$%#%#niczki, but with a smoother throwing motion.

His ceiling is sky (Heismann) high but you never know how these things will turn out. I think he was definitely a steal and the coaches were brilliant in being onto both Mariota and Manziel before there big Senior years.

And when you consider he's not 5'9" or 5"10" he's 6"4" makes it even more amazing.
Once he gets into the open field there's not going to be too many DB's that are going to run him down .

GrandpaDuck wrote:I think he looks great. While he had those hand timed 4.3s he also had a SPARQ electronic timed 4.7. At that same combine the fastest of the wide receivers and running backs were in that same 4.7 range so he truly has great speed for a QB. I am guessing next year he will time around 4.7 at Oregon which would give him the fastest Oregon timed 40 for a QB since Chris Harper.

He had a hand timed 4.58 right before his senior season at the Rise Nike Combine...

http://rise.espn.go.com/football/articl ... mbine.aspx

Duffman57 wrote:

GrandpaDuck wrote:I think he looks great. While he had those hand timed 4.3s he also had a SPARQ electronic timed 4.7. At that same combine the fastest of the wide receivers and running backs were in that same 4.7 range so he truly has great speed for a QB. I am guessing next year he will time around 4.7 at Oregon which would give him the fastest Oregon timed 40 for a QB since Chris Harper.

He had a hand timed 4.58 right before his senior season at the Rise Nike Combine...

http://rise.espn.go.com/football/articl ... mbine.aspx

Ya this kids 40 times are all over the map but I trust the times when he was at those camps and he was always one of the fastest players there...and at 6'4" that's just crazy, wait until coach Rad gets a hold of him!

I can't wait for our future QB battle between BB, MM and JR.

maxduck wrote:

Duffman57 wrote:

GrandpaDuck wrote:I think he looks great. While he had those hand timed 4.3s he also had a SPARQ electronic timed 4.7. At that same combine the fastest of the wide receivers and running backs were in that same 4.7 range so he truly has great speed for a QB. I am guessing next year he will time around 4.7 at Oregon which would give him the fastest Oregon timed 40 for a QB since Chris Harper.

His highlight video is strikingly like the kid from Nevada Koper#$%#%#niczki, but with a smoother throwing motion.

His ceiling is sky (Heismann) high but you never know how these things will turn out. I think he was definitely a steal and the coaches were brilliant in being onto both Mariota and Manziel before there big Senior years.

Thats actually really funny, i watched a highlight vid of his sr. year, and all i kept thinkin was Colin Kapernick. Similar rocket arm, incredible speed and quicks. It also impresses me that he runs nearly the exact same offense that we run here at UO. Its going to be fun watching this guy grow in to his potential.

Just wondering, what kept him from being higher than a 2/3 star prospect (Rivals and scout were 3, ESPN was 2) rather than the 247 4* rating. I dont know much about the grading system or whatever, and i'm kind of new to the recruiting world, though i know a lot about college football because of how i follow the draft so closely.

All the rating systems are biased towards kids an evaluator can see in person as opposed towards just watching film. The closer a kid is to recruiting system employees the better the chances of being highly rated, and obviously Hawaii doesn't qualify as "close".

Probably another reason is that he didn't start until his senior season, so he wouldn't have had the exposure for that reason, also.

"Marcus was a 3.6 student in high school, and his eye-popping senior stats are even more amazing when you consider that he had to wait until his senior year to become the starter for the Crusaders--he had two quarterbacks who got scholarships in the classes ahead of him."

if you're the qb in this system and run from a 4.7 to 5.0, you'll be fine. anything under that is fantastic. D. Thomas runs a 5.0 fwiw so if Mariota can/does run a 4.7, that's more than adequate. Masoli ran in the 4.8's. Plenty fast. Dixon was a high 4.6ish qb btw.

The big difference between other QB's and DD and MM is most can make a 20 yd gain. Dixon and Mariota can turn 20 yd gain into a into a 65 yd TD. Which make's good QB's, Great QB's in Chip's system.

Bigducker wrote:The big difference between other QB's and DD and MM is most can make a 20 yd gain. Dixon and Mariota can turn 20 yd gain into a into a 65 yd TD. Which make's good QB's, Great QB's in Chip's system.

Masoli and his 4.8 did that just as well. Really, what I care about in Chip's system is not a QB's 40 time but, "can you make the right read?" The ability to correctly read your keys will make and break QBs in this system. DT is a perfect example; it's clear in film when DT is hesitant or flat out wrong on his read versus when he gets in a groove and gets rolling. Is it nice to have a guy w/ elite speed back there? Of course, but it isnt what takes QBs from good to great in this system. Judging by Mariotta's GPA and commentary from his past coaches and evaluators I have a high degree of confidence he'll be able to pick things up quickly--but it will be a challenge and would be for anybody.

I agree ElDude that making the right reads is whats most important in this offense but I would take it one step further and say that the mesh/fake are important as well. When you are playing defense the faster you can read and react the better you are going to be and in the game of college/nfl football 1/10th of a second can mean the difference between a TFL and a 1st down, which is why ball fakes/mesh are extremely important to us IMO.

ducklydoright wrote:I agree ElDude that making the right reads is whats most important in this offense but I would take it one step further and say that the mesh/fake are important as well. When you are playing defense the faster you can read and react the better you are going to be and in the game of college/nfl football 1/10th of a second can mean the difference between a TFL and a 1st down, which is why ball fakes/mesh are extremely important to us IMO.

Agreed 100%

I did this research a couple of years ago and I am going by memory so I might be off by 1 but, I once tracked the 10 longest runs by DD and Masoli. 8 of the 10 were by Masoli though the longest was Dixon's. Dixon's superior speed did not translate to longer runs as he has a slew of 10 to 15 yard runs where he would run out of bounds. Like LMJ, a lot of Masoli's long runs started relatively inside. Dixon (Thomas too) seldom ran other than to the edge.