Spotlight on Landry Jones

As we build-up to the NCAA Football season, and our coverage of the Sooners, we have to begin with returning star QB Landry Jones.

The Sooners begin the season as favourites for the National Championship, but a lot depends on how Sophomore Jones continues to develop his game (and how the coaching staff choose to use him). The 22 year-old threw a 65% completion rate last season, peaking at 88% in the 52-0 destruction of Iowa State. Jones’ completed yardage and touchdown stats for the season however, combined with other key stats to give him a rating that didn’t trouble the top 20 performers.

But there is one stat which explains how Landry can lead an 11-2 offense, completing for 38 touchdowns (more than the top five rated quarterbacks), and not find himself in with the top rated players. That stat being that he threw at least 200 more passes than any of the top five rated QBs during the year.

With an out like Ryan Broyles (WR), Jones and the OU play callers can’t resist this tried and tested partnership to get the win. In winning the Fiesta Bowl, Jones completed to Broyles no fewer than 13 times. But Jones needs the support of his coaching staff to improve his rating in 2011. The Sooners’ reliance on his arm, contributed to Landry posting 12 interceptions last term, and taking 19 sacks (you could argue it both ways however, given how many passes he threw or attempted).

The debate about OU’s inabilty to run the ball is nothing new, and is back on the lips of the locals now that DeMarco Murray has gone. Head Coach Stoops says he likes to use several Running Backs to get the job done, rather than put his faith in a star man. The discussion around the wisdom of this approach is for another time, as we get closer to the season opener against Tulsa. But the lack of a figurehead ball carrier suggests that the same level of pressure is going to rest on young Landry’s shoulders again this season.