Tommy- is grad transfer an option?

[TomCat88]

Mellott hasn’t played much NFL style quarterback so it’s hard to say that he simply can’t play quarterback in the NFL. He played in a lot of games but the sample size of his nfl-like plays probably wouldn’t amount to five games. He’s different. I don’t recall any quarterbacks that are built and move like he does. Some move faster, some built better, but I can’t think of anyone with his combination.

[grizzh8r]

Writing an in depth profile on Tommy that we hope to have out by the weekend (it might kill me first). But I interviewed Waded Cruzado. That interview will drop on Saturday.

Here's an excerpt with her thoughts on Tommy Mellott:

“Tommy Mellott is simply amazing,” Cruzado said. “To sustain all of that pressure when you are that young is absolutely incredible. Let me take it a step forward – to see this extraordinary athlete who is totally committed to his sport but also totally committed to his academic program, that’s so wonderful for our university.

“He just finished his degree in financial engineering with a 4.0 GPA and he is devoting well over 40 hours to his sport to practice and training, first one in, last one out, and you can see an intentionality in everything he does,” Cruzado said.

“When I have been in the locker room after those games, one thing that is so clear and so impressive is that yes, Tommy is happy, but he’s not braggadocious,” Cruzado said. “He’s humble. He’s focused. There’s a sense of sustaining his teammates making sure that they are fine, that they are doing ok. That’s amazing to see.”

“When he decided not to walk for commencement because he wanted to be so singularly focused on the game that night,” Cruzado said. “So we invited the entire team to have lunch together and I wanted to make sure I was feeding them correctly. So what I did is I brought Tommy’s diploma with me and I handed it to him. Because he is an inspiration to his teammates. He’s an inspiration to the student body. And he’s an inspiration to the state of Montana.”

“And perhaps the most important part of his legacy that for four years, he remained true to Montana State University and I’m sure that many schools approached him and I ‘m sure there were many offers along the way,” Cruzado said. “But he committed to the Bobcats on Day 1 and he graduated from this school. That’s rare.”

Chills - all the feels, man!

[Colter_Nuanez]

[Montanabob]

Mellott hasn’t played much NFL style quarterback so it’s hard to say that he simply can’t play quarterback in the NFL. He played in a lot of games but the sample size of his nfl-like plays probably wouldn’t amount to five games. He’s different. I don’t recall any quarterbacks that are built and move like he does. Some move faster, some built better, but I can’t think of anyone with his combination.

my concern at that level is durability.

[catatac]

Mellott hasn’t played much NFL style quarterback so it’s hard to say that he simply can’t play quarterback in the NFL. He played in a lot of games but the sample size of his nfl-like plays probably wouldn’t amount to five games. He’s different. I don’t recall any quarterbacks that are built and move like he does. Some move faster, some built better, but I can’t think of anyone with his combination.

my concern at that level is durability.

I'd say looking at this season Tommy has proven himself to be incredibly durable when he's not running the ball thirty times a game. Fifteen games in and I don't think he's had to take one play off due to injury. That's astounding.

[Travelingcat]

Mellott hasn’t played much NFL style quarterback so it’s hard to say that he simply can’t play quarterback in the NFL. He played in a lot of games but the sample size of his nfl-like plays probably wouldn’t amount to five games. He’s different. I don’t recall any quarterbacks that are built and move like he does. Some move faster, some built better, but I can’t think of anyone with his combination.

my concern at that level is durability.

I love Tommy and think he can find a role in the NFL, but I'm not sure that he'd play enough that durability would ever be a big issue.

[Joe Bobcat]

Mellott hasn’t played much NFL style quarterback so it’s hard to say that he simply can’t play quarterback in the NFL. He played in a lot of games but the sample size of his nfl-like plays probably wouldn’t amount to five games. He’s different. I don’t recall any quarterbacks that are built and move like he does. Some move faster, some built better, but I can’t think of anyone with his combination.

my concern at that level is durability.

I'd say looking at this season Tommy has proven himself to be incredibly durable when he's not running the ball thirty times a game. Fifteen games in and I don't think he's had to take one play off due to injury. That's astounding.

Seriously it's way past time to stop saying that Tommy was running 30 times a game. As an example last year he played in 9 games and ran the ball a total of 85 times for an average of less than 10 rushes per game. the most he ran in any one game was 18 times. Again last year he ran 7 times in the first game and 11 times in the second game. He got hurt enough in that second game that he missed the next 3 games. As you can see him getting injured had nothing to do with running the ball the mythical 30 times a game. With the way he ran it only took 11 rushes.

If you want to point to something that has helped him stay healthy this year look at how he has avoided the big hits by getting out of bounds and sometimes sliding down and in general doing something to avoid the big hit. In previous years he fought tooth and nail for 1 or 2 more yards, ran in beast mode and sometimes tried to initiate the hit. Those are the things that actually led to his injuries.

[coochorama42]

I find it unbelievable that players like Mellott and Cam Miller can’t make an NFL squad (or practice squad) as a QB. So many teams have backup QBs that they 1) overpay and 2) don’t play the same style as their starter. Given the insane cost of signing a QB to a long term contract, any team without a bona fide top 5 QB should be drafting QBs as often they can in the hopes of getting 3-4 years of a QB on a rookie contract. Brock Purdy is an average - at best - NFL starter, but the 49ers have been competitive during most of his tenure because his salary is so low…

[RKMCMT]

He's done. Hindsight being 20/20 maybe using him in special teams and as the gadget QB behind McKay in '21 wasn't a great decision. If they had let him only play in 4 games and the playoffs that year(the playoffs not counting towards redshirt happened last season) they could have requested another year but he appeared in most of the games that season.

Hard to fault that decision though. Coaches could see he was a special athlete the moment he stepped on the field and wanted to get him involved.

With how many lawsuits the NCAA loses nowadays I wonder if/when someone's going to sue over the timeframe of the new playoffs exception to try to get it applied in earlier years.

I'm in my 50's, but I am considering suing the NCAA. There's still gotta be some playing eligibility out there somewhere for me...

Check out the new ruling that says juco years don't count towards NCAA eligibility because it's a different sanctioning organization. Chain that together with NAIA or others and you could craft a decade long college career pretty routinely.