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In battle of rotating quarterbacks, Wilton Speight provides Feleipe Franks valuable lesson
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Wilton Speight needed to regroup.
He did something he had never done in his Michigan career, and probably something he had never done in his entire life. He threw back-to-back interceptions that were returned for touchdowns.
It was an implosion that one would’ve expected from a guy making his first career start like Feleipe Franks. To that point, Franks hadn’t make any mistake of that magnitude. It was Speight who forked over the lead. He was the one who didn’t take what the defense gave him. Not Franks.
As a result, Speight was pulled for the rest of the first half. When the second half started, he got a chance to come back in an redeem himself. That opportunity wasn’t wasted. Speight promptly came out and led Michigan on a go-ahead drive and gave it a lead that it wouldn’t relinquish.
In the midst of Speight’s revival of the Michigan offense, Franks made his first costly mistake as a college quarterback. On a quarterback scramble, he made a wrong cut that cost him a first down, and even worse, he fumbled in the process.
That was Franks’ last play of the day.
He didn’t get a chance to bounce back like Speight. From the sideline, Franks watched Florida struggle to muster anything against a stout Michigan defense. Malik Zaire was tasked with Florida’s comeback attempt, which ultimately failed.
That won’t always be the case. Sometime in the future, Jim McElwain is going to ask Franks to recover from his own mistake. As for how to execute a proper regroup, all Franks had to do was watch what Speight did.
By no means was Michigan’s comeback entirely the product of Speight. The Michigan defense and ground game were the real MVPs. Let’s not fool ourselves into thinking anything other than that.
But what Speight did was what Florida was missing. The Gators didn’t have a guy who could step into the pocket and make a big-time throw to keep the chains moving when they fell behind.
Speight, after those disastrous pick-sixes, came out blazing in the second half. He came out and completed 5 of 6 passes for 52 yards on that opening drive, which was concluded with a Karan Higdon touchdown run.
It was Speight who had every reason to sulk. He was the incumbent starter who had to battle all summer to win the starting quarterback job, at least according to Jim Harbaugh. Speight’s first pick-six probably wouldn’t have happened if Grant Perry (his leading receiver) made a play he should’ve made. So after two ugly plays, Michigan’s QB1 was on the pine?
Look at what Harbaugh said about that (via Angelique Chengelis):
Harbaugh on Speight pic.twitter.com/W1vPVQEKd3
— angelique (@chengelis) September 2, 2017
That exact situation could happen to Franks this year. There could be times when he starts a game and gets yanked after a dumb interception, only to find himself back under center a few series later.
By all accounts, it looked like Franks handled his “benching” well. He knew the odds of him playing an entire game were slim, at least if you believed what Jim McElwain said in the pregame press conferences. Franks stayed loose on the sidelines and had all the right body language one should see from a redshirt freshman.
RELATED: Watch: Speight picked off again, returned for a touchdown
Those circumstances were not ideal for Franks. He was without his top two skill players, and he didn’t get much help from the offensive line. Speight, who played with mostly new receivers, could relate to that.
But that one game won’t define Franks’ time in Florida. The fact that he only made one big mistake in his first career start was impressive in itself. Remember when Speight threw an interception on his first pass of 2016? It was uglier than anything Franks did on Saturday.
Franks will have more help in the future. He won’t deal with 10 suspensions every week (we think). He won’t see Don Brown’s defense every week. Franks also won’t have any first-game jitters anymore.
Sooner or later, McElwain is going to give Franks a chance to work through his mistakes like Harbaugh did with Speight.
Franks will need to make the best of in-game adversity like Speight did. Now, Franks will have to bounce back from a loss for the first time in his career.
It might not have been the start he hoped for, but Franks would be wise to follow Speight’s lead.
Connor O'Gara is the senior national columnist for Saturday Tradition. He's a member of the Football Writers Association of America. After spending his entire life living in B1G country, he moved to the South in 2015.