Is Jack Miller the next Joe Burrow?

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The comparisons are inevitable.

When Dan Mullen came to Florida in 2018, the Gators QB situation was unstable. Feleipe Franks had been awful in 2017 and some guy named Trask was his backup. Gators fans had suffered through games quarterbacked by Treon Harris, Skyler Morhinweg, Luke Del Rio, Malik Zaire and Austin Appleby.

So it made sense that when Ohio State QB Joe Burrow decided to transfer, maybe he might be a good fit for Florida. Instead, Burrow went to LSU, played average in 2018 but then otherworldly in 2019 and won the Heisman while leading the Tigers to the National Championship.

Flash forward to 2021 and new head coach Billy Napier is coming into a similar situation. While the Gators QB situation is a little bit more stable, presumptive starter Anthony Richardson has been injury prone thus far. Neither Jalen Kitna nor Carlos Del-Rio Wilson have gotten any snaps.

And another Ohio State QB came available in the transfer portal.

This time, that player was Jack Miller. Miller was the 334th ranked player nationally in the 2020 recruiting cycle (89.51 247Sports player rating). That profiles very similarly to Burrow, who was the 280th ranked player in the 2015 recruiting cycle (90.03 247Sports player rating) and also hadn’t played much at Ohio State.

So when Miller committed to Florida earlier in the week, that’s the question I got. Is Miller just being added for depth and competition?

Or is it possible that he’s the next Joe Burrow?

High School Stats

Anybody who’s followed this site for any length of time knows that I put a ton of stock into the stats a QB accumulates in high school.

The reasoning is simple. Stats like completion percentage tell us something about decision-making and reading defenses. And at the collegiate level, you can almost always put the defense in a compromising situation. The question is usually not whether the QB has the arm strength or athleticism to make the play, but whether he can make a decision quickly enough to keep the defense on tilt.

We saw the ramifications of that this year, as Emory Jones has plenty of arm strength and athleticism, but really struggled to get the ball out on time and even sometimes to make a give/keep decision on read-option plays.

But you can’t just look at completion percentage alone. That’s because someone who completes 70 percent of his throws but only averages 7 yards per attempt is artificially increasing that completion percentage due to check downs.

I wrote about Burrow at the time he transferred and pretty much knew he was going to be special. How could I know? Well, look at his high school stats.

Burrow was excellent as a sophomore. He was elite as both a junior and senior. You don’t see stats like this very often at the high school level. Additionally, while Burrow had an extremely limited sample size at Ohio State (39 throws), he completed 74 percent of his throws, indicating that his accuracy might be able to translate.

So what about Miller?

If those stats were reversed, I might be really excited. While his completion percentage wasn’t great any of his four seasons, his freshman season was outstanding, with a good (10.8) yards per attempt average and a 53:15 touchdown to interception ratio. But the problem is that his accuracy didn’t get any better his sophomore, junior or senior seasons.

He and Burrow had almost the exact same number of attempts in their high school careers, but Burrow averaged more than 2 yards per attempt more and completed almost 12 percent more passes than Miller.

Again, the stats for Miller at Ohio State are limited, but in 14 throws, he only completed 7 of them, indicating that accuracy might still be a problem.

The thing that both Burrow and Miller seem to have is similar athleticism. Burrow terrorized defenses in 2019 by being able to slide in the pocket and either extend plays or take off for a first down. You knew that was a skill that he would have because he averaged 5.6 yards per rush in high school, indicating he wasn’t a statue back there.

Despite his size (6’4”, 210 lbs) and classification as a pro-style QB, Miller can move. He averaged 6.0 yards per rush for his high school career and averaged 9.0 yards per rush in his stellar freshman campaign.

Film Study

You never want to look at just stats to determine whether you think someone is a good player or not. Sometimes, guys play through injuries and end up struggling because of it. Other times, players show flashes but just aren’t consistent.

If the comparison we want to make for Miller is Burrow though, I have to say that I just don’t see it.

The thing that impressed me right away about Burrow was his decisiveness. He always knew exactly what he wanted to do based on the coverage and then executed quickly.

You can see that here, as Burrow knows the minute that the linebackers show zone and the defensive end rushes, the tight end will be open in the flat. He wastes zero time getting it out there and a second-and-8 is turned into a third-and-short.

The other thing you saw with Burrow was that the man he threw to was almost always in a one-on-one matchup, and that the ball was put in a position to allow the receiver to run after he caught the ball.

This is just a simple throw over the middle. But Burrow knows that the defense is in a cover-2 defense (by the alignment of the safeties) and he gets rid of the ball the minute he hits his drop. The ball is delivered right on-target, allowing the receiver to spin to the outside.

Now compare that to Miller in the Ohio State spring game last year.

The defense is in a single-high safety look. That means for the route combination Ohio State is running, the slot and outside and corners are in one-on-one coverage. I think this should be a high-low read where if the receiver running the curl is open, you deliver it there. If the slot corner drops too far, you deliver the ball in the flat.

The receiver in the flat is wide open. Instead, Miller checks the ball down across the middle to his tight end. This is an okay play. It might even get a first down. But you’re not going to get explosive plays by coming to this check down against this defense. This isn’t an isolated incident. On the same drive, Ohio State ran the same action and Miller did the exact same thing.

This isn’t a problem if you go through your progressions and come back to your check down. But it becomes a major issue if you stare down your receivers and allow defenders to get a head start.

That’s what happens here. Again, this is a completion to the slot receiver. It ends up being a 7-yard gain and most fans would clap and move on to the next play. But the thing I noticed is that Miller is staring down that slot receiver from the minute he receives the snap. He has his body tilted that way the entire play.

Watch how the middle linebacker starts creeping in that direction before he throws the ball. The ball is also delivered high, which makes the receiver jump and prevents him from turning to the outside. This isn’t all that different from the play I showed with Burrow above.

But had Miller been a tick late getting the ball out, it would have been going the other way for a pick-six. And a little bit more accuracy would have allowed the receiver to gain more yards after the catch.

Takeaway

On the surface, comparisons of Jack Miller to Joe Burrow are reasonable.

Both were Ohio State quarterbacks with similar recruiting profiles. Both couldn’t win the starting job at Ohio State in competitions where the guys they competed against put up huge seasons after winning the job. I mean, C.J. Stroud just was a Heisman finalist and Dwayne Haskins was the 15th pick in the NFL draft. And both have now transferred into the SEC to teams with championship aspirations.

But that’s where the commonalities end.

Burrow was a far more accomplished high school player no matter what stats you look at. And for the stats that I think are important and translate particularly well, Burrow is way ahead. He also had shown in game action at Ohio State a decisiveness on film that made it clear he had a chance to be special.

Miller hasn’t shown that yet, whether it’s looking at his high school statistics or the limited amount of film we have thus far. That doesn’t mean he can’t progress to be a very good quarterback, but the expectation that he can turn into anything resembling Burrow is unfair.

And that’s not just because Burrow produced perhaps the greatest season by a quarterback in college football history in 2019. It’s also that Miller’s job likely is to push current Florida quarterback Anthony Richardson to get better.

Richardson might actually be a better comparison to Burrow. His high school completion percentage prior to getting injured his senior year was 65 percent. He also averaged 11.3 yards per attempt that season. And we’ve all seen how electric he can be when he gets the ball out in open space.

The reality is that were Miller coming from any program other than Ohio State, we wouldn’t make those Burrow comparisons.

Instead, we’d make comparisons like Malik Zaire, who completed 57 percent of his throws in high school and proceeded to complete 58 percent in college. Or perhaps we’d compare him to Jeff Driskel, who completed 59 percent of his throws in high school and completed 61 percent of his throws in college. Or maybe we’d compare him to Deondre Francois, who completed 56 percent of his throws in high school and 59 percent in college.

Zaire, Driskel and Francois all had some level of success at the college level. Driskel almost quarterbacked the Gators to the BCS Championship Game in 2012. But none of those guys were Joe Burrow, or had the potential to be either based on their high school stats.

Neither is Jack Miller. He may end up being a very good quarterback. He may eventually evoke comparisons to somebody better than the three quarterbacks I’ve listed above. But to be honest, I hope he never plays a down at Florida other than mop-up duty.

Because that means Anthony Richardson is starting for the next two seasons.

Gasparilla Bowl

With Richardson out for this one – and Billy Napier not coaching the games yet – I’m not sure there’s a lot to glean from the Gasparilla Bowl against UCF.

Sure, losing to the Knights would increase the noise we hear from Orlando, but who really cares? That’d be similar to if Georgia fans started crowing about championships if the other three teams in the playoff ended up bowing out because of COVID (how stupid is that rule, by the way?).

Instead, I think this is a game where we can appreciate the commitment of some of these players to the program. Nobody deserves that more than Emory Jones.

Jones has had a rough season, no doubt. But through it all, he’s handled himself with class and taken the high road. He could have sulked after Anthony Richardson took over in the second half against LSU and got the start against Georgia. Instead, he rallied the troops to get the Gators bowl eligible.

He could have bailed on his teammates once he knew he was going into the transfer portal. But instead, he’s going to be fighting next to them to try and go out a winner. You can say the same thing about Dameon Pierce and Kaiir Elam, assuming both of those players head to the NFL next year.

As most games have this season, this one will rest on Jones ability to run the ball efficiently. In Florida’s six wins, Jones has averaged 10.6 carries and 8.0 yards per rush. In Florida’s six losses, Jones has averaged 11.4 carries and 3.4 yards per rush.

So I wouldn’t focus too much on total yardage. After all, Jones had 76 rushing yards against Alabama, but it took 19 carries to get there (4.0 yards per rush). Instead, focus on efficiency.

If Jones can average more than 6.0 yards per rush, Florida wins easily. I think that happens.

Florida (-7) wins, 34-17.

Picks this year: 7-4 straight up, 4-7 ATS.