Casting Call For A Quarterback
In the first spring A.R. (After Riley), Wake Forest will have to find a quarterback. All Coach Jim Grobe knows about who will be playing quarterback in the Sept. 2 opener against Presbyterian is that it will be a player who has never taken a snap in college.
The candidates are sophomore Skylar Jones, redshirt freshman Ted Stachitas, freshman Brendan Cross and incoming freshman Tanner Price.
“We don’t know. We don’t know,’’ Grobe said last week on national signing date. “But now we’ll find out, because we’re just going to keep rolling those guys through all spring. We’ll have a pecking order just to say one goes in. But hopefully they’ll all stay healthy and by the end of spring ball everybody that lines up at quarterback this spring is going to have the same number of snaps, and we’ll see who the best is at the end of spring.
“And then when Tanner Price gets in here, we’ll start over again, and try to get through the first couple of weeks of August and see who the guy is and move on from there.
“We might feel better about a starter by the end of spring but right now I wouldn’t bet on any of those guys—I wouldn’t bet for them or against them. I think any one of them, including Sky Jones, could be the guy.’‘
My own sense coming out of last season was that Cross, the son of ex-NFL lineman Randy Cross, had the inside track. People around the program rave about his discipline, commitment and ability to learn and process information. But my opinion was obviously colored by the fact I really haven’t seen Stachitas do much in his two seasons with the program. He had shoulder surgery in high school, then went through another round after he arrived at Wake Forest. He also had an infected foot that set him back this season. I’m not the only person around to think that if he was the heir apparent, then he would have beaten out Ryan McManus for second team last season.
But Grobe indicated he’s anxious to wipe the slate clean on all of his candidates. He was asked last week if Stachitas had totally recovered.
“I think so but I’m not positive,’’ Grobe said. “It’s funny, we were in practice one day this past fall and it’s a pretty easy throw in the flat and (Stachitas) kind of underthrew it. It was a little helicopter ball that went in the dirt. I said `Ted, what the heck was that?’ He said `Yeah Coach, I used to be able to throw pretty good.’ But that was earlier in the season. I thought by the end of the year that he was definitely throwing the ball down the field better with his intermediate throws and deeper throws. To me it seemed like he had a little bit of a problem sometimes on touch passes. Of course, what happens is you watch Riley throw one and then Ted comes in. So that’s part of the problem, is you’re always comparing everybody to Riley Skinner.
“But I think he’s pretty healthy and we know he can run. He’s one of the faster kids on our football team. The nice thing about Ted Stachitas is he’s really fast with pads on. He’s a guy who I think has all the ability and I think he’s healthy. Of course you can be healthy after two shoulder surgeries and still not have the same ability to throw the football you did. So I think he’s in pretty good shape. We’re going to turn him loose in the spring and find out.’‘