Pete Don’t Fail Me Now: Answering questions on back-up QBs, bobbleheads and uniforms

We’re 24 hours away from real, meaningful Missouri football, so now is as good a time as any to kick-off a weekly mailbag feature on Rock M Nation.

Every week, send your best Mizzou football questions to me, Pete Scantlebury, on Twitter (@PeteScantlebury), and I’ll do my damnedest to give you a satisfying, fulfilling answer.

Onto the questions:

I wouldn’t say he’s fallen off the radar, but Michael’s question is still fair: Is Lindsey Scott, Jr.’s absence on the initial depth chart about his play, or about the play of the two guys ahead of him (Micah Wilson and Taylor Powell).

The answer is yes.

First off, I think fans see the “Former LSU quarterback” in front of Lindsey Scott’s name and assume he’s supposed to be a star. But, keep in mind that Rivals.com ranked Scott as a 5.5 3-star (the lowest 3-star possible) out of high school, and then moved him to a 5.7 3-star (highest 3-star possible) out of junior college.

Powell was a 5.6 3-star; Wilson was a 5.5. Basically, all three of those Missouri quarterbacks were ranked similarly.

The second part of this isn’t so much about how well Powell/Wilson are playing and how poorly Scott is playing; fact is, we don’t know how these guys have looked day in, day out this August. What I do believe is that all of Missouri quarterbacks not named Drew Lock are grouped pretty dang closely together. I think we’ll see all three of those guys at points on Saturday. And, I think the depth chart behind Lock will change throughout this season.

Just a hunch.

This is an easy one for me. It’s Missouri’s Stormtrooper look from the BYU game in 2015, and it’s not even close.

Just look at these.

I wish these were Missouri’s all-time away uniforms. So crisp. So modern. So chrome. This is the highlight of Missouri’s “modern” redesign, which has started to look stale in my opinion.

If anything, Missouri’s football uniforms need to find a way to mesh its tradition with a modern design. I can’t say enough good things about the new Mizzou basketball uniforms. I wish Missouri’s football uniforms would take a page out of that design book, bring back some of the old styles (the Block M, for instance), and incorporate them in an updated look.

Hey, Ken! How’s the ankle?

It’s a great bobblehead. The only thing that would have been better would be if it was Lock securing the bag instead of throwing a pass.

This is a great question, because you’re right. If Missouri is predicted to go 7-5, finish fourth in the East — by just about everyone — then how can it be overrated?

What I think is happening is this: The national media, guys like Barrett Sallee, are always asked about Drew Lock and Missouri together; the hype for Drew Lock, in my opinion, is confused as hype for Missouri. Lock’s hype should be largely independent of Missouri’s success this year, because whether Lock has a stellar year or a so-so year, he’s still going to get first-round hype before, during and after this season.

Lock could set more SEC records and Missouri may still not be much better than last year. But I think the hype for Lock’s potential, for Lock’s future, is what is being confused as hype for Missouri, and that’s why folks like Barrett believe Missouri is overrated.

I think the new redshirt rule is as fascinating as any rule change in recent history, but I don’t think it’s going to result in more early transfers. If anything, I think it might delay early transfers (not including quarterbacks, who will transfer if they don’t get enough hot water in the shower).

Because now many players who normally wouldn’t play will get a couple chances to “prove it” throughout the year. So that carrot can be dangled out to a player who isn’t atop the depth chart after the preseason, and that might have players hang on a little longer.

But it’s still a big unknown. I think after a few weeks of college football, we’ll have a better idea of what this rule change looks like on the field, and what we can expect from it down the road.

Jurassic Park. E.T. was one of the most traumatizing, upsetting films of my early childhood. E.T. was a creepy, co-dependent alien. I never want to see that movie again.