If we made a radar chart (which I might at some point) on all of the skills that Watson possessed and what that allowed the Clemson offense to utilize, it’d be rather revealing.
The Clemson co-coordinators on offense were often labelled as “geniuses” but when your QB is a brilliant runner that can run the option, RPOs, and direct snap runs in addition to handling a spread passing attack…there’s a lot you can do.
Now he’s gone and they have to start over. I profiled how they might take a look at 5-star freshman Hunter Johnson for the job over at SB Nation. I’m often very hesitant with 5-star rated QBs…sometimes it seems like their hit rate is barely better than that of 2-stars who sign with particular coaches, but it’s easy to understand the excitement about Johnson. He’s accurate, he has a cannon arm, and he’s actually a dangerous athlete running the ball as well.
Watching a fuller HS game of his and studying his stats revealed he has yet to learn how to make good progressions rather than just trusting his ability to hit windows. How do we project how he’ll do in that regard? I don’t know. If something brings him down that’ll be it. If gets past that, Clemson may have another guy with a wide radar chart to allow all kinds of different conceptual variety on offense.