West Virginia head coach Rich Rodriguez has coached long enough to develop his own rules of the trade.
Every coach is different in that regard, but they are things that Rodriguez puts a firm belief in when it comes to areas such as quarterback and how he makes up his special teams units for example.
When it comes to the quarterback spot, Rodriguez has never been a believer that having two or three options at the position at a time or even playing multiple signal callers is a bad thing.
Over his career, Rodriguez hasn’t backed away from playing two quarterbacks at a time such as when he used both Adam Bednarik and Pat White in 2005 in Morgantown or during his time at Mississippi when he played Matt Corral and John Rhys Plumlee.
“They were both good enough to start. John Rhys was a true freshman. I hope I can have three quarterbacks or four quarterbacks that are good enough to win with,” he said.
The reasoning is simple. Rodriguez has a philosophy that if you’re good enough to win games with then he’ll find a way to get you on the field even if it’s at the quarterback spot.
That way if there is an injury to a quarterback, his team can adjust and will be prepared to have another signal caller lead the team like what unfolded with White from the Louisville game on after Bednarik was hurt.
“A comfortable feeling that we can do anything we want and not worry about, ‘oh gosh, we can’t run that because he might get hurt and there goes the season’,” he said.
Rodriguez has seen that mentality out of the quarterbacks on the current roster with how competitive they have been in the early portion of spring practice and how each seem motivated to showcase what they can do. Now, in practice there is some balance with that in allowing that to occur but being smart with the players at the quarterback spot when the Mountaineers do elect to go live.
“You got to figure out how to evaluate your quarterbacks from a run standpoint, but also not put them in too much harm’s way. That’s kind of a balance we’re trying to do,” Rodriguez said.
In terms of special teams, Rodriguez takes a different approach than some as he doesn’t place his best players on the units outside of instances of punt returner or kick returner. That is very different than what his predecessor Neal Brown did when it comes to the special teams units.
“I’ve always thought I like having backups as starters on special teams because one, they’re fresher, but also two, they take maybe a little more pride in that,” he said.
Essentially Rodriguez will take those players that are in the rotation but now starting at certain spots and give them the opportunity to play major roles on the various special teams units.
“They may be a backup at a position, but they’re going to be great special teams players,” he said.
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