Garrett Nussmeier's Master Class, Plus 10 Other Week 1 Winners

We’re witnessing something special in Garrett Nussmeier. The stats were great (he completed 73.7 percent of his passes for 230 yards and a touchdown) in LSU’s 17-10 win over Clemson on Saturday night, but the coach’s tape revealed a master class in college quarterbacking and showed me just how advanced his game is compared to some of the other QB play I watched over the weekend. I came away from the performance bullish on his future as a high-level NFL starter and I’ll detail why in my tape breakdown below. 

In the second half of this newsletter, I’ve included some quick-hitters on a handful of guys who impressed me in Week 1. It’s not an exhaustive list—I’m sure dozens of other prospects played well—but these are players who jumped out to me watching games in real time or flashed during all-22 tape study. A few of the names are actually guys that scouts reached out to me about that I still need to watch more tape on, but I wanted to mention them to give you an idea of who the league is paying attention to early in the season.

This won’t be a weekly piece and I’m sure I’ll rebut aspects of it over the next few months, but it’s a way to start the season on a positive note. With that, let’s dive into what I saw on Nussmeier’s tape.