UW Roster Review, No. 2-99: O'Brien's Concern Should Be Huard, not Morris
The suggestion was made that University of Washington quarterback job might be up for grabs between incumbent Dylan Morris and Colorado State transfer Patrick O'Brien as spring football practice came to a close.
People have been drawn to O'Brien's prototypical size at 6-foot-5 and 245 pounds and his big arm that in 2016 made him one of the nation's highest-rated QB recruits and originally took him to Nebraska.
Yet bottom line, O'Brien, who wears No. 10 for the Huskies, doesn't have a track record to indicate that he's a serious challenger to unseat Morris.
With him, it's been the other way around, a matter of being unseated.
For the Cornhuskers, he served as the backup quarterback to Tanner Lee for a Big Ten team that struggled to a 4-8 record and cost coach Mike Riley his job, and sent O'Brien looking for a new school.
At Colorado State in 2019, O'Brien got beat out by veteran Collin Hill to begin the season and became the starter for nine games only after Hill tore up his knee and was lost, again playing for a 4-8 team.
Last fall, O'Brien was relegated to the backup role behind Temple transfer Todd Centio for the season opener, a game that went badly against former Husky quarterback Jake Haener and Fresno State. This enabled O'Brien to reclaim the No. 1 job on a Rams team that finished 1-3.
This is not to slam this California native, but it all comes down to results. Morris has done it, winning three of four games last season, including engineering a huge last-minute comeback against Utah. The challenger has not.
O'Brien turned in a couple of 400-yard passing games for Colorado State, but he doesn't have a win-loss record that's all that inspiring so far — a cumulative 4-8 over two seasons as the Rams starter.
Going down the roster in numerical order, this is another of our post-spring assessments of all of the Husky talent at hand, gleaned from a month of observations, as a way to keep everyone engaged during the offseason.
In the recently completed spring workouts, O'Brien looked fairly sound while operating with a talented Husky roster filled with top-tier wide receivers and offensive linemen, the likes of which he probably hasn't shared the field with before.
Into his sixth college football season, O'Brien is a Husky insurance policy. However, he will enter fall camp constantly looking over his shoulder to see where highly acclaimed freshman Sam Huard is at all times.
Rather than worry about catching Morris, it's more likely the newcomer by way of Colorado State and Nebraska should be much more concerned with fending off Huard.
O'Brien's 2021 Outlook: Projected as a reserve quarterback
Service Time: Played in 19 games, started 12
Stats: Completed 254 for 418 passes for 3,394 yards and 16 TDs with 9 interceptions at Colorado State; 18 for 30 for 192 yards at Nebraska
Individual Honors: None
Pro prospects: NFL free-agent signee
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