Re: TNET: Brandon Streeter recaps his sit-down with Kelly Bryant, decision to promote Lawrence

It’s a light news week folks. I personally appreciate this story. It’s not about Kelly Bryant, it’s about our staff and culture.

It provides useful insight as to how Dabo and staff go about making these critical decisions and how they approach the players when it happens.

The story reinforces what many of us already know. Dabo and staff continually evaluate players throughout the season insuring the best team is on the field.

They not only approached Kelly in an honest and forthright way, the decision was consciously made before the Cuse game, essentially giving Kelly the option of transfer without restriction. Is no one else impressed by this ultimate example of putting principle ahead of convenience?

Let me leave you with this hypothetical-

If your son were in Kelly Bryant’s shoes, would you rather he’d been informed per Dabo and Streeter, or would you prefer your son in this situation with some other program and roll the dice on how they would manage it?

No, I have no problem at all with this story. It’s a window into the sausage making part of the slogan “Best is the Standard.”

stanfordfanstl

Freshman [8]

TigerPulse: 100%

Posts: 12

Joined: 2019

Feb 11, 2019, 12:48 PM

I'm sorry if I as a Mizzou/Stanford fan am not supposed to be commenting on a Clemson forum, but I really want to share my thoughts. As a Mizzou fan, I'm obviously all over this, but again Kelly's decision to leave was the best one for both sides. I wouldn't say that Kelly was completely useless to Clemson if not playing, but definitely he would've held Clemson back even if he stayed as a backup. I know that both Streeter and Dabo have said he would play publicly, but if he was the backup, he should not have been playing except if Trevor went down. I actually said this back in September right before he transferred, and I believe that I was proved completely right. None of this matters as he did transfer, but this is what crossed my mind when he chose to leave.

1. People act as if Trevor would have only played the first few snaps and then Kelly would come in. That's a recipe for disaster, especially if you have a true freshman as the starter. If Trevor started red-hot, yanking him would have destroyed his rhythm and probably wouldn't have done much good for Kelly either. Even if Trevor started ice cold, you need to help him develop the ability to shrug off mistakes. Trevor was 18 years old, and he needed to play as much as possible so that he could fully mature. Trevor looked as good as a true freshman as Andrew Freaking Luck did his senior year (yeah I'm a Stanford fan too) and he has a limitless ceiling. If Kelly were to be rotated in, Trevor wouldn't develop as quickly.

2. Some people proposed using Kelly as a package option; for example on 3rd and short, or in the red zone, or if the game was too close. But again, that's a bad idea. The next two years, Trevor is going to constantly be in 3rd-and-short and red-zone situations. How is he supposed to get better at 3rd down and red zone if Kelly is playing those situations and not him? You could try using Kelly as a wide receiver, but with limited eligibility and the personnel to make Clemson known as WRU, why take targets away from Ross, Higgins, and Renfrow just to try to help Kelly's draft stock? You could try using some gimmicks with him, but . The only package I could see him actually being relevant in is on special teams, where he could run the Justin Fields specialty.

3. If Trevor comes out and the game is in the bag, it's time to play Chase Brice. Being up 28 or down 28 is the perfect time to play your freshman backup. Kelly might have been needed if Trevor went down THIS YEAR, but Chase was going to be needed in the next couple of years. So at that point, it's more worth it to play your freshman, develop him, and give him all the playing time possible. No matter how much you love your senior 12th man and appreciate his leadership and toughness, your freshman 12th man has a higher ceiling and so should be playing more than your senior 12th man. Kelly would not have been able to raise his draft stock anyway if he was conducting the mop-up work, even if it was 2nd quarter or 3rd quarter (like what Jalen Hurts did). It was better for Clemson and Kelly himself that he got out of Chase's way.

4. Even if Kelly stays, and saves the day against Syracuse, do you proceed forward with him as the starter or do you stick to Trevor? Hindsight is always 20/20, but Trevor should have remained the starter anyway because it would have forged Clemson's best offensive identity. Chase fits into that identity better than Kelly.

5. As a non-Clemson observer, I really took aim at Kelly when he first transferred: "Look at Brandon Wimbush! Like you he did his time behind Kizer and this year he got benched for a better guy, and guess what? He's in the new guy's ear, constantly mentoring him, and just being his #1 fan. Why can't you do that? Why can't you just enjoy this season like Brandon is doing?" I do believe that he left his brothers in a very precarious situation: for example, Trevor had to stay healthy, or if he got injured he had to play through it. It was also particularly frustrating for guys like Renfrow (who was one of Kelly's favorite targets last year) and the 4 guys who forewent the NFL to return to Clemson.

6. Then I spent more time looking at his situation and everything, as Wimbush had redshirted in Kizer's final year (something that Kelly SHOULD have done during Deshaun's final year). Also when Kelly played injured much of last year it's hard to call him soft. Chase said many times that Kelly DID mentor him even after leaving, and Kelly seems like enough of a high-character guy to also help Trevor out a bit too. We don't know about his relationship with #16, I'm just speculating. I cannot fault Kelly for wanting to preserve his eligibility, and since I follow Mizzou I'm very happy about it anyway.

7. It would've been better if he chose to activate his redshirt, stay with the team, mentor Trevor, push both Trevor and Chase in practice as all good backups are supposed to do, and just have some fun this year. I get it that hindsight is always 20/20, but with the recent sanctions on Mizzou, it's worth saying. Then, after enjoying the national championship, he could make a fully informed and levelheaded decision on where to transfer to. Maybe a school that didn't get sanctioned like Mizzou did.

8. Happy to have Kelly on Mizzou. Not happy with the way he left Clemson at the time. Still think he gets a lot of unfair criticism. And REALLY salty about the postseason ban. I promise this is the first and the last you'll see of me on a Clemson article!

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TNET: Brandon Streeter recaps his sit-down with Kelly Bryant, decision to promote Lawrence