Texas A&M Football: Firing Kevin Sumlin wasn’t the right move
By Robert Ford
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5. Roster is young
Finally, the last reason why I thought a change at the top was wrong was that the 2017 team played so many true and redshirt freshman.
Here’s the list by position. Nick Starkel (Redshirt Freshman) and Kellen Mond (True Freshman) at quarterback.
Quartney Davis, Kendrick Rogers and Clyde Chriss were redshirt freshman. True freshman in 2017 were Jhamon Ausbon, Roshauud Paul, Hezekiah Jones and Cameron Buckley. This group made big plays throughout the year.
On defense and especially in the secondary, Derrick Tucker, Myles Jones, Travon Fuller, Debione Renfro and Keldrick Carper saw major time.
Other freshman that played major minutes include Anthony Hines, Buddy Johnson, Jayden Peevy and Justin Madubuike.
This group tells you this team is about to take a major step forward. Starting so many freshman should’ve given him one more year especially playing the entire season with quarterbacks with zero career starts heading into the year.
The future is bright
Yes being so young is an indictment on the upper classman, but what can you do when so many players from the 201 and 2015 seasons did not pan out. The 2017 team had 37 freshman and 17 sophomores on scholarship compared to 13 juniors and 14 seniors.
Of the 14 seniors, six of them did not play and one was your punter. All 13 juniors played and should be around for their senior seasons except Kirk.
To conclude, yes I agree Sumlin and the staff did not win enough. Yes, the offense and defense frustrated me and the rest of Aggieland. Too much talent has arrived on campus that for whatever reason did not live up to their end of the bargain. Yes, the stadium has been empty.
All of these reasons are painful, but Sumlin has the fourth best record of all SEC schools since arriving. Would Aggieland have taking that knowing how bad the last 10 years were? I would have, but I can understand why the change was wanted only going 27-14 at home.
Next: Did Kevin Sumlin have a quarterback problem?
I wish my friend the best of luck and hope he realizes what he did to improve the environment around Aggieland. I do not believe the change was warranted. Maybe you agree, maybe you disagree but hopefully when the dust settles the A&M brass realize this was a mistake.