Inside The Huskies

Bodpegn Miller Will Catch Passes For UW, But He Can Throw, Too

The Ohio State transfer was a high-powered high school quarterback in Ohio.
Dan Raley|
Bodpegn Miller is a former QB turned UW wide receiver.
Bodpegn Miller is a former QB turned UW wide receiver. | Miller

Somebody had to ask.

Jedd Fisch, any consideration to using Ohio State transfer Bodpegn Miller, your new 6-foot-4, 205-pound wide receiver, at quarterback someday?

After all, he threw for 4,544 yards and rushed for 2,991 yards and accounted for 77 touchdowns in his career as an Ohio schoolboy signal-caller, earning him all kinds of accolades.

"We'll let BP focus in on being a wide receiver," Fisch said with a smile. "That's still a position that he's kind of learning."

Ah, but then the third-year Husky coach, who clearly prefers to use dual-threat quarterbacks, made sort of an allowance in a teasing manner.

"The good thing is we're not pro football and we can dress as may quarterbacks as we want," Fisch said, referring to having Miller handy.

For now, Fisch envisions his taller and more athletic receivers such as sophomore Chris Lawson, incoming freshman Jordan Clay and Miller providing yet another receiving threat similar to what the departed Denzel Boston supplied.

"I like the height." Fisch said. "We want to make sure, like Denzel, we want to find guys who hit certain measurables. Chris, who's 6-3, and BP is close to 6-4, and Jordan Clay, who's close to 6-4, all being in that X wide receiver position will really help us continue to be able to do what we did at that spot."

Still, the newly arrived Miller runs the 40-yard dash in 4.43 seconds, a tick or two slower than current UW quarterback Demond Williams Jr., and he has a 35-inch vertical leap.

He redshirted for Ohio State last season after coming off a senior season at Ontario High School in Mansfield, Ohio, in which he completed 149 of 253 passes for 2,214 yards and 20 touchdowns, and ran 211 times for 1,988 yards and 21 scores.

He also played defensive back and finished with 41 tackles and 3 interceptions.

For good measure, he punted and kicked off, too.

Did we forget to mention he was adopted from Ethiopia by an Ohio couple?

If the Buckeyes wouldn't consider Miller as a quarterback, there's a chance his arm strength or accuracy weren't off the charts, which is what would be required by that Big Ten team. Still, he appears to have huge hands.

And word is Miller casually launched a 50-yard-plus pass in Husky Stadium the other day that didn't go unnoticed.

"I saw that," Fisch said of word circulating around about the new guy's arm.

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Dan Raley
DAN RALEY

Dan Raley has worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, as well as for MSN.com and Boeing, the latter as a global aerospace writer. His sportswriting career spans four decades and he's covered University of Washington football and basketball during much of that time. In a working capacity, he's been to the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the MLB playoffs, the Masters, the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship and countless Final Fours and bowl games.

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