Utes not interested in Dayne Crist
by JazzyUte on Dec 6, 2011 5:32 PM MST
in Football
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PrintLya Wodraska is reporting Utah isn't interested in former Notre Dame quarterback Dayne Crist.
It's rumored Crist had shown interest in transferring to Utah and, originally, the marriage looked good for both, as the Utes have a great deal of questions at the quarterback spot. However, for whatever reason, Utah doesn't appear to be interested in him.
Maybe this suggests they're confident in Jordan Wynn, who played three and a half games this season before going down with a season-ending injury, or they're comfortable with Jon Hays leading the offense.
Either way, even with the addition of Travis Wilson and Chase Hansen, there will be a lot of uncertainty at this spot heading into spring ball.
We'll see how it plays out.
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Surprised...
It seems as though he would be a perfect marriage…
by BetterasIgetolder on Dec 6, 2011 6:08 PM MST reply actions
Cody Stevenson
A QB transfer from Dixie State is coming to Utah next year. My buddy who plays WR down there described him as another Jon Hays. Pretty bummed.
Keep those Jon Hayses coming!!!!!
Why go after a QB like Crist when we can keep the Jon Hays pipeline alive?
by Ute_in_Austin on Dec 7, 2011 4:33 PM MST up reply actions
I hope this isn't true!
Obviously we need better QB play; even if Wynn is healthy and they have confidence in him, what harm would there be in having Crist? It would be a 1 year scholarship. What’s the problem? I don’t get it.
Saul wasn't interested in Crist either
I’m crossing my fingers there is a similar change.
For the love of Crist
I hope Lya is wrong. Ugh
by mykneegrows on Dec 6, 2011 7:03 PM MST via mobile reply actions
Hopefully this means Wynn is coming back?
Best case scenario: Wynn comes back, and is 100% healthy heading into next year. This guy can play when healthy (which unfortunately is almost never the case) and understands the offense. Let Hansen go on a mission and develop Wilson as a backup.
Worst case scenario: Wynn doesn’t come back (or isn’t healthy), and Utah is forced to either A; start a true freshman at QB (which is rarely a good thing), B; stay with Hayes (kill me now), or C; try and land a Jucco QB to save the offense (risky at best).
With the likes of Devonte Christopher, Dres Anderson, Reggie Dunn, Dalin Rogers, John White, Kenneth Scott, and the Baylor WR transfer Gordon Utah has a chance to be a dynamic offense next year. A healthy Wynn would be best suited to utilize those weapons.
If you're going to post a picture that big you should at least put in a subject line so we can minimize it.
"The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance."-Socrates
NOOOOOO!!!!
I will not kill myself I will not kill myself I will not kill myself I will not kill myself I will not kill myself I will not…… WHAT IN THE F ARE YOU DOING CHOW?!?! WHY ME?! Crist is the perfect fit for a stop gap EVERYTHING WAS PERFECT! Lya better be wrong or I’m gonna… I’m gonna… Well I dont know what I’ll do but she better be wrong!
I live and die on Saturday's
There's no way in hell...
the Utes staff is comfortable with Hays leading this offense for another year. None.
As another poster said above, I hope this means that they are confident that Wynn is healthy. I really have my doubts, but that’s the best case scenario if what Wodraska is saying is true.
Otherwise, this doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.
"The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance."-Socrates
The guy has been in the system since August
You can already see improvement in Hays from his first four games to the last four. With a month of bowl practices, spring camp, the entire summer and then fall camp, he’ll be much better. He doesn’t have a bad arm. The initial problems were his decision making skills and reading defenses. That can be developed to a large extent.
by UteinBrooklyn on Dec 6, 2011 9:08 PM MST up reply actions
It's more than that.
Sorry – Typo.
Hays is just not good. Just look at the routes the receivers have to run. There is nothing complicated, no loops, even very few cutbacks. It’s either (1) Run, (2) screen pass, or (3) long side-line route. Hays is incapable of timing the ball to where it needs to be on a well-ran pass route.
Hays was getting better, but he really only had a couple of plays to work with. We need much much more if our offense is going to pose a legitimate threat.
He doesn't have a bad arm......
but he lacks accuracy……did you watch the Colorado game?
Maybe
They were concerned about decommits from the freshmen?
by Joseph Silverzweig on Dec 6, 2011 8:44 PM MST reply actions
It shouldn't worry them.
Crist is a senior with one year of eligibility.
Sure
But if Wilson’s dad calls up and says "Don’t you bring that Crist kid in, or my son is going to BYU’, and you weren’t sure about him anyway… obviously, that’s a far flung scenario.
by Joseph Silverzweig on Dec 6, 2011 9:43 PM MST up reply actions
He is probably
tired of playing high school teams.
by Joseph Silverzweig on Dec 6, 2011 10:33 PM MST up reply actions 1 recs
Sounded good, but didn't make a lot of sense.
Crist would only come here if he is the starter. I think Wynn gives the Utes a better chance when he is healthy. He has three years in this system already. So I’m not too disappointed. The coaches simply have a master plan that we don’t know about.
Even so, I don't like just dismissing him right away.
At the very least I’d hope they’d entertain the idea of him coming here and just let him know there is no promises. If he turns out to be better than Wynn then he starts, if not, yet another year as a back-up. Thats the chance you take, but like I said I think it’s just a bad Idea to say not interested right away. At the very least he is more QB depth.
No offense to Dayne
….but if you can’t start here, you won’t be starting anywhere.
If you’re interested in this school, you’d might as well just come out. It’s a good school, and quite frankly, we give you the best chance to start out of the schools you’re looking it.
If not? There’s always UNLV
How does he have 3 years in this system........?
When Norm has been here for less than one, during which time, he missed the majority of summer camp and hasn’t played since September?
May not have 3 years in the Offensive System...
… But he has three years in the Utah System. They Way Whit runs his program is different than how other schools run their program.
Wynn has also built relationships, and trust here.
But yes, Wynn has a year in the Norm chow System.
Meh
I halfway agree with you, halfway don’t… I’ll go ahead and assume that you feel the same way.
Let me just put it out there: I love Wynn, I really do. He used to be my favorite player (probably Christopher now)… but I want to win games. After the shoulder surgeries, I don’t want to risk having him go in and blow his shoulder out in week 2…. for everyone’s sake, including his.
It looks like this program has made its decision (to stick with Jordan), so I can only keep my fingers crossed that he can come back and improve this team.
But here's the thing
I understand not wanting to go out their and risk having Wynn blow out his shoulder two weeks into the season. Very valid decision.
But if it’s a question of Risking it with an injury prone QB who’s been around for three years, or risking it with an equally injury prone QB who hasn’t been around, which would you rather have?
If based on solely injuries
…it’s a toss-up
But I do think that Crist would’ve offered higher upside.
If we could just cut the two of them in half and sew Crists’ upper body to Wynn’s lower body, we might have something.
Like this?
Everyone hates a pink-shirt-wearing communist.
by displacedute on Dec 9, 2011 11:01 AM MST up reply actions
Something going on...
If this is the case then they better have a damn good JC quarterback coming in because this just doesn’t make sense not to pursue Crist.
Watching a quarterback like Foles at Arizona, I could only dream of having someone like that play for Utah this year. We could have beat Oregon in the championship!
Yup...
QB play is the big reason we didn’t win the south. Coaches need to know this. Hays is not going to do anything special here. He might (key word is might) keep us around .500, but we’re not going to be a big threat next year with him as QB. The offense is so vanilla and basic that that you can tell the coaches realize his limitations.
So it perplexes me that they’re not interested in bringing in a potentially solid, vastly better QB, than Hays. Unless they really trust Wynn or feel either Wilson/Hansen can step in and lead this team.
I realize this may be a dumb question...
but aside from the interceptions, what was the problem with Hays?
Att Com Yd Comp% YPA TD Int QBRating
Jon Hays 105 183 1266 57.4 6.92 9 7 124.1
Jordan Wynn 66 116 727 56.9 6.27 6 2 123.2
It's not a dumb question...
Statistics alone fails to give the entire story.
As someone said in this thread already, the offense was very basic under Hays. The routes weren’t diverse, Hays often overthrew, or just badly threw, to the receivers (we were aided by some great talent at that position) and it seemed the offense was not nearly as fluid as it seemed to be under Wynn.
In fact, the first half of the Washington game was the most impressive offensive outing of the season for Utah. They were hitting on almost all cylinders, and outside mistakes in the RZ, looked damn good, and far more improved than they were in the first game.
In fact, I felt Wynn and the offense improved each week until he went down. With Hays, the offense was so bad at times, and so reliant on the run game, that it definitely handicapped the Utes in the second half of the season.
There was also the trust factor.
As in the coaches had none in him. And when they did ask him to throw it was a 3 step drop, with only 1 read, and the receivers were running either flat passes, screens, slants, or fly routes. These are routes you run when your QB Can’t be trusted to make a good throw, or physically can’t make a good throw. You also limit the number of reads when your QB can’t handle the pressure.
The sad thing is that Hays seemed to have a lot of Heart, and I’m sure under different circumstances would be a decent leader. He just doesn’t have the talent, or capabilities to be a Div 1 QB.
This is my concern with Hays.
You really can only run about 1/3 of the plays with Hays that you could with Wynn. We were able to make it work… somewhat… but not at a level that would win us the PAC-12 South.
It really just narrows the possible plays we can run, as Hays is not capable of making game-time decisions or throw a complicated route. Not to mention all the sacks, which could have been avoided with throwing the ball away, which is out of Hay’s playbook.
It also really, really, really, really, really, really, really narrows our margin of victory.
We have almost no room for error with Hays as the QB, simply because we can’t really do much to overcome said error.
Yup...we found that out the hard way against Colorado...
As much as people want to lay the loss at Coleman Petersen’s feet, the fact is, the offense had opportunities to score, in either the red zone or with good field position, and couldn’t get it done.
The errors aren’t necessarily turnovers, either. They’re getting SACKED on a potential game-winning drive…that killed us.
by JazzyUte on Dec 7, 2011 3:15 PM MST up reply actions 1 recs
Stat comparisons aren't helpful here. Watch the games instead.
Hays might finish a game completing 10/15 passes for 175 yards and no picks and people say, “Hey, that’s not bad! That’s efficient quarterback play!” The problem is, 8 of those ten completions happen during 2 drives in the 3rd quarter, which result in one field goal and the rest of the game consists of 3-and-outs, punts, fumbles, and John White running his guts out trying to break a long one.
Our best chance of winning next year would be with a healthy Wynn but we don’t know if he even exists anymore (2011 Wynn was not a healthy Wynn, btw). Our next best chance would be with a stud Freshman (I’m thinking of a more physically-gifted version of Wynn when he was Freshman). There’s a chance we could have both of those next year and a chance we could have neither. The ‘neither’ option scares me.
It's the same way Terrance Cain's Stats/Win Record didnt' tell his story.
In his career I believe Terrance Cain was something like 9-1, with that lone loss coming to a Rose Bowl Bound Oregon.
His Stats weren’t too bad, Around 200 yards per game. Better than 2 to 1 TD to Int ratio.
You’d think well he was controlling the offense, why did he ever get pulled for Wynn.
It’s because when you watch him play, you could tell he had no control over the offense. It’s why the biggest joke of last year, were people actually wanting to see him over Wynn. Wynn may have struggled, but he at least had control of the Offense. Cain never did.
It’s similar with Hays, the numbers don’t do justice to just how bad he really is.
but aside from the interceptions, what was the problem with Hays?
The problem with the statistical comparison is that you’re comparing him to Wynn. Get your ignore buttons ready folks, because I’m going to say it. Post-injury Wynn is not a good QB. We routinely made other QB’s look bad this year, so if you only watched Ute games, he didn’t look that much better/worse than the QBs we were facing. If you watched many other games, however, the deficiencies were glaring. The new “healthy Wynn” has a bum shoulder, reasonably avoids stepping into throws for fear of being hit, and has a better chance of connecting with the back of the left guard’s helmet than a receiver on a 20+ yard route. Wynn may be a great decision maker but he doesn’t have the physical tools of a guy like Katz at OSU- and Katz is a backup QB on a poor PAC12 team. Wynn would make a great backup in this conference and would do a great job of helping guide Wilson in his development. He may have a future in the coaching booth, but we need to explore other options for someone to take the field.
The problem with judging Posty Injury Wynn....
… Is that you are judging during injury Wynn. Wynn was not 100% at any point this season. However as you watched the games, you could see that Wynn was getting better, and trusting his shoulder more and more.
Wynn was also improving greatly.
The new “healthy Wynn” didn’t exist because he wasn’t completely healthy, so you can’t say for certain how he stacks up, but I wills say the first half of the Washington game, were some of the best throws of the season, and it was clear that Wynn was healing and improving.
by UnHoly Ram on Dec 7, 2011 7:57 AM MST up reply actions 1 recs
That's valid, and actually more in line with truth than what I posted
The caveat though is that if we accept that this was NOT a healthy Wynn, then we have to accept that the coaches were doing some PR spin by saying over and over that his shoulder was healthy. We then have to consider that all the reports coming this fall of Wynn’s rapid recovery and readiness to play in spring ball could also be bullshit. So the options are:
1) Wynn was healthy last year and had a pretty mediocre season (UW had a terrible pass defense and he threw a red zone INT that game so I don’t give him that much credit for that one half)
2) Wynn was not healthy and the coaches covered it up for the entire preseason. That means that all reassurances of his return to previous form are sort of worthless.
The conclusion from either of these points is that we need to be in the hunt for a guy like Crist.
Oh Absolutely the coaches "spun" Wynn's return to health.
Doesn’t really surprise me, because Coaches Spin crap all the time. While I agree that the coaches need to be in the hunt for another guy, I don’t think that guy is necessarily Crist. As I say below we honestly aren’t sure that Crist is a good QB yet. His numbers in the only year he saw extended play time were pretty average. Add in that Crist is also injury prone, and The Utes not being all that interested in him isn’t too much of a stretch.
That being said, if Crist isn’t the one, and unless they are 100% sure that at least 2 of Wilson, Shreve, and/or Hansen are going to be really good, there is no way they can go into this season with Just Wynn and Hays.
There is no way that they can go into this season with Hays as the #2 QB.
Yup.
The only thing that makes me hopeful (probably overly so) is that Crist is coming from ND. If there’s any school that as a whole seems to achieve far below talent level, it’s ND. Also, Kelly switched them to a spread offense that doesn’t suit Crist’s skill set. The risk is somewhat small
1) One scholarship position for one year: easy
2) Commit to bench Wynn for the first 4 games and let Crist start: harder, but the extra rehab won’t hurt Wynn, and in the event Crist sucks, Wynn still gets 8 starts which is probably the most that we’ll get out of him anyway.
PS
The one thing that I keep thinking about for next year is will JWIV stay healthy with 25+ carries per game? If JWIV went down (god forbid), does anyone want to bet the entire outcome of the season on Wynn’s shoulder? That thought terrifies me and is absolute justification for bringing in Crist.
Also, if we have closed practices all spring and Wynn sits out the scrimmage (as expected), then I will assume the worst.
Seems to me many might be making Crist too much of a savior
Is he better than the current healthy QB’s on the roster? Absolutely, but there’s not really a guarantee he improves us all that much.
Crist wasn’t exactly tearing it up and Notre Dame, and also was injury prone in his own right. Nobody knows yet, after three years, if Crist really is any good.
But it was a spot of hope.
Don't worry guys
I heard Alex Smith is coming back to Utah to finally play his senior year in 2012. We will be set at QB.
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Sort-of-daily sort-of-funny sort-of-thoughts at danoftheday.com
Lya didn't even cite a source....
so that tells me that Dayne is probably in town to work out the final details, given Lya’s track record.
Love the Jazz, Utes, and BoSox.
bigbenstechnicalfoul.blogspot.com
by BigBenSportsGuy on Dec 7, 2011 10:10 AM MST reply actions
Lya's source was probably Utezone.
She does very little actual reporting. It’s embarassing for her. I hope Jazzy’s new job gets him enough “legitimate” news cred so that he can become the Tribune sports reporter.
Everyone hates a pink-shirt-wearing communist.
Jazzy has a new job?
Love the Jazz, Utes, and BoSox.
bigbenstechnicalfoul.blogspot.com
by BigBenSportsGuy on Dec 7, 2011 1:58 PM MST up reply actions
Yeah, he posted on his facebook about it. Something sporting-news related.
I don’t remember what it is exactly, but it’s the start of him becoming Utah’s beat-writer (hopefully).
Everyone hates a pink-shirt-wearing communist.
interesting.
any specific organization? thats exciting! Jazzy, details please!
Love the Jazz, Utes, and BoSox.
bigbenstechnicalfoul.blogspot.com
by BigBenSportsGuy on Dec 7, 2011 3:15 PM MST up reply actions
If you're Crist, why do you go to a place you won't play?
He’s leaving ND because he’s not playing. Why would he go somewhere else not to play?
If Wynn is indeed coming back, I don’t see how Crist takes the starter job from him. Why would he come to Utah to be the #2? If Wynn is not coming back, then I have NO IDEA why Utah would proactively tell him they’re not interested. My guess is they like their chances with Wynn.
I agree
This tells me the Coaches feel secure with their QB situation.
Of course, past history (Basically since 2005) tells us you can’t exactly trust these coaches when it comes to the QB Situation
I don't know what our scholly situation is (it's too complicated to keep track of unless you do it for years, you can't just count up players)
But I imagine we can come up with 1 scholarship if Crist wants to come here. I think the bigger issue is that he doesn’t want to come here. Wynn (even if still slightly injured) is our starter unless he goes down. And as fans we think he’s definitely going down, since it’s happened twice already, but it’s not a guarantee for a guy like Crist, who has 1 year to show the NFL that he’s worth taking a chance on. If I’m Crist, Utah is not a situation I’m interested in. I want a school that doesn’t have any experienced QB talent coming back. A place like USC (if Barkley transfers) or Baylor or Florida State or Wisconsin or someplace like that.
Everyone hates a pink-shirt-wearing communist.
I agree, just for different reasons.
I too don’t think getting a scholarship is the issue. If he comes, he’ll get one. I think Crist will go where he can get as close to a 100% guarantee that he will be “the guy.” He has one year left to, as you said, show what he can do. If I’m him, and my best offer is an 75% chance of starting with a middling FBS team, or a 100% chance of getting the job at a decent FCS team, I’d think long and hard about the 100% chance given that I have one year left. His singular goal is to get on the field as much as possible in his one year left.
Now, this is totally hypothetical, but maybe the Utah coaches are saying “We have Wynn who is not 100%. He wants to come back, and we want him to come back, but there is room for that not to work out, and he has a track record of being hurt. You can come in and try to get the job from him, if not you’re virtually guaranteed to be our #2.”
If you’re Crist, with one year to play, do you take that? Probably not.
by fountainofute on Dec 7, 2011 2:16 PM MST up reply actions
Right, exactly.
I think he’d be smart to do the FCS thing too. I mean, Elliot took a Div III QB job and turned it into a brief NFL career and now he’s playing in the AFL.
Everyone hates a pink-shirt-wearing communist.
Rumors
Until I see something in quotes from Whit or Chow, I’m striking everything about Crist from the record. It was a rumor that he was considering Utah and it is a rumor that the coaches are not interested.
Frankly, I think we would be retarded not to be interested in the 2nd best QB recruit coming out of high school, and we would be double retarded not to take a Pro Style QB of that caliber, especially with Chow as a coach. Then we would be triple retarded not to be interested because he provides a very good “Bandaid” while we get Hansen and/or Wilson familiar with the offense next year. I heard Kyle Gunther on the Red and Blue show say that when he talked to Utah coaches they said “they didn’t even know who Crist is,” in a sarcastic manner. I’m hoping Woodraska didn’t take that out of context because we all know the coaches know who he is. Maybe they were saying something by not saying anything and that implies that they are at least aware of the situation.
Now that I really think about it and after talking with some other people
I’ve come to the conclusion that not taking Crist has to do with Chase Hansen. Remember, he talked with Chow and his family and decided to forego his mission to have a chance to compete for the starting job. How do you think that would make Hansen feel? maybe he changes his mind again and goes on his mission before he enrolls and the Riley Nelson rules take effect. At this point we can’t afford to lose an athlete of his caliber.
Nor can we lose an athlete of Crist's caliber...
I think the Utes are a little more concerned with winning than the feelings of an incoming freshman. They should, and probably are trying to get the best QB on the field and that isn’t going to change just because a kid decided to forego his mission. He probably wont get any special treatment.
lets be honest here
no one really knows how great Crist is and with only 1 year of eligibility losing out on him has nowhere near the impact on losing out an amazing recruit.
and i’m not saying Hansen will get special treatment, what I’m saying is we need him to enroll so that he’s off limits to BYU, when it comes to recruiting, if he takes off on his mission after his first year.
by khaostheory117 on Dec 8, 2011 4:11 PM MST up reply actions
That's the key thing that seems to be missed.
Everyone is talking about Crist like it’s the second coming. Like it’s guaranteed he’s going to be the savior.
Truth is through three years, his play on the field, when he’s been on the field, has really given us little to believe that.
completely agree
I wanted Crist for depth and nothing more, the more people between Wynn and Hays on the depth chart the better. If he played well enough in the spring and fall to become the starter then so be it.
by khaostheory117 on Dec 8, 2011 7:31 PM MST up reply actions
Why would they just say they're not interested?
Even if there’s a few talented guys coming and the possibility of Wynn being healthy (knock on wood), have we not learned that you can never have too many talented QBs on the roster. Even with Wilson and Hansen joining the team, we still have nothing close to a sure thing at QB for next year. I totally get that they can’t promise a guy like Crist the starting role, but why wouldn’t they just say “we’re interested, but no guarantees”. Instead, they just say not interested. How can they not be interested? Did they not notice that we went most of the season WITHOUT A FREAKING QB? Why not say they’re interested, but just be honest with Crist that there’ll be competition for the QB role?
This.
Reading this headline came as a shock to me. Not interested? Like we’ve got the next Peyton Manning coming in next season. Why come out and say you aren’t interested otherwise.
Unfortunate to hear that we feel set atvthat position
Seems like the UTE’S are ofcthe thinking that mediocrity incthe QB position is something they can make up elsewhere!
Seems like the Jazz sundrome of getting “project” centers to try and work around!
by UTErabidfan on Dec 7, 2011 8:42 PM MST via mobile reply actions
Agreed
I think feeling “set” at the QB position is what got us into this mess in the first place. Can’t have too many QBs.
by Ute_in_Austin on Dec 7, 2011 8:45 PM MST up reply actions
There's a difference between feeling "set" at a position, and not being interested in someone.
There are many reasons the Utes might not be interested in Crist. Many have been mentioned before. Injury issues. Don’t really know if he’s that good. The kid may not want to come in and compete, and instead wants a guarantee he’ll be the starter. Those are all valid reasons to stop being interested.
Just because they aren’t interested, doesn’t mean the coaches feel “set” at the position. But that we’ll only learn by what they do over the next few months.
Mybe . . .
There is something about Crist that the coaches know that we don’t? Some guys do not fit into certain teams, yannowhatimean?
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"I'm not upset about the U allegations," tweeted Cleveland Indians closer Chris Perez, who pitched at Miami. "I'm mad we didn't win anything while we were cheating."
yeah come on Aardvark
don’t you know the internet is no place for logic or facts
by khaostheory117 on Dec 9, 2011 11:21 PM MST up reply actions
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