ESPN today released their yearly column where anonymous coaches from around each league chime in on quarterbacks to give their honest opinions without fear of backlash. For the SEC, there was a lot of attention— just as you probably suspect— on Garrett Nussmeier, DJ Lagway, Arch Manning, John Mateer, and LaNorris Sellers.
However, there was a sixth player on that list: Texas A&M's Marcel Reed. The Aggie signal caller certainly has not gotten the same kind of publicity this offseason as the other players on the list, and that trend continued pretty predictably with this list.
Despite his inclusion, Reed drew few comments— at least, few comments that were included in the column— from the cadre of anonymous coaches sounding off on the QBs around the SEC. Even the comments that were made, though, showed Reed some respect, mentioning that he "threw the ball well" (contrary to the evaluation of some pessimistic Aggies and overbearing Longhorns), but most of the comments were about what Reed has around him.
Marcel Reed still slept on by media and coaches, but he's about to wake them up
This only further shows that Reed isn't being given the respect he deserves. After all, he's a top-10 returning quarterback in terms of ESPN's QBR metric, and the hype has been steady from his own teammates throughout the summer and fall.
The advanced stats also show that Reed was a completely different passer down the stretch than he was in the first part of the season. He's got all the tools there already to break out, and with the receiver room he'll be working with this year, it will show itself to even casual observers.
It may take a while for fans to get on the Reed hype train— it will most likely take a big performance against the Notre Dame Fighting Irish to get things rolling, which is a tall order. But don't get left behind here— Reed's arrow is pointed straight up righ