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Every week, PowerMizzou.com publisher Gabe DeArmond answers questions from Tiger fans in the mailbag. This format allows for a more expansive answer than a message board post. Keep your eye out each week to submit your question for the mailbag or send them to powermizzou@gmail.com. On to this week's inquiries.
MlZ asks: Shapen just went down for the season at Mississippi state who was a pretty decent QB.So, as of this moment, how many of the remaining teams on Mizzou’s schedule would trade for Pavia as their starting QB?
GD: Texas A&M might not because Marcel Reed has played pretty well. Alabama certainly wouldn't give up Jalen Milroe. Taylen Green at Arkansas is a maybe and I haven't seen Michael Hawkins at Oklahoma yet, so I'm not sure there. South Carolina really likes LaNorris Sellers I think. The other three certainly would. So that's three yes, four potentially and one no.
And that's why I'm still pretty bullish on Mizzou's chances at a 10- or 11-win season. It's not just that a lot of the teams Missouri plays the rest of the way are mediocre or worse; it's that the weakness of those teams is on offense. We all acknowledge Missouri''s offense has sputtered. Nobody's arguing that. But who do you look at on the schedule and think "They're gonna have to score 35 to win that game?" Here are the national ranks in terms of total offense and scoring offense for the rest of the teams on the Tigers' schedule:
Texas A&M: 53/62
Auburn: 27/32
UMASS: 102/115
Alabama: 24/6
Oklahoma: 119/77
Mississippi State: 67/62
South Carolina: 87/41
Arkansas: 8/20
The only teams arguably better than Mizzou on offense so far (and it's pretty close) are Arkansas and Alabama. Even as poorly as it seems like Missouri's offense is playing, it's definitively been better than six of the eight teams left on the schedule. If Missouri can fix one thing--finishing a few more drives--there's no reason to lower your expectations for the season. Seven of the eight teams left are imminently beatable.
Stretch Four-20 asks: 1. Forgive me if it's a rookie question, but as someone who's a recent grad and not a well-versed historical fan, who do you have higher on your Mizzou QB hierarchy between Gabbert and Lock? Or do you view them as similar-caliber QBs (extremely talented, successful in college but never heisman contenders)? Also realizing they had very different sets of circumstances.2. What about the game in College Station will either tell you that the team can live up to the hype, or they may indeed be more of a top-20 team as opposed to top 10? Is it as easy as just "winning the game" or are there context clues within it you'll be looking for?
GD: 1) I had Lock just a little higher. Think I put him 23rd on my top 25 list and Gabbert in the first five out. They're very similar. Gabbert won more games. I'd also argue he had more talent around them. Both have rocket arms and were underrated athletes, but when their careers were over you ended up feeling like there was just a little something missing. Not that they weren't good; they were. But it just felt like there was a little bit more there we never saw.
2) Mostly it's just winning the game. That's the goal here. Go do that seven more times and absolutely nobody is going to care how you did it or by how much you did it. But obviously you'd like to see an offense that scores touchdowns instead of field goals a couple times and a passing game that looks a lot more crisp than it has. I don't even really know how to define what we've seen so far. A person who covers college football whose opinions I really respect texted me on Sunday morning after the Vandy game and said "I am having trouble figuring out exactly what is missing except they seem less confident on O and slower." And that's as well as I can put it. I don't know exactly what's off, but something has seemed off.
