It seems to me something is going a little haywire down in Eugene, where quarterbacks are suddenly jumping ship. Normally, that’s probably not cause for a major alarm, because Oregon has starter Jeremiah Masoli coming back and he’s going to be pretty good.

But what makes it a little scary is that Coach Chip Kelly’s offense  burns through quarterbacks the way an Indy car goes through tires on a hot day. Do you actually think Masoli, as much as he likes to run the ball, will get through next season unscathed? If so, he’ll be the first of Kelly’s QBs to pull off such a feat.

Justin Roper was the real loss here. He was a proven quarterback with a big arm who might someday play on Sundays. He was a quality backup who could have started at some other Pac-10 schools. And the dropoff from Roper to whoever assumes the backup role now is enormous.

And what bothers me the most is what Kelly has said about it:

“I’ve met with everybody – we’ll see,” Kelly said Tuesday. “I think everybody knows where they stand. I didn’t want any of them to transfer, but if they’re not happy not being the No. 1 guy at that position, then I can’t predict how that’s going to happen.”

Kelly said Harper, who reportedly became interested in Kansas State when the Wildcats brought back coach Bill Snyder, said he wants to be closer to his hometown of Wichita, Kan. He requested his release be forwarded to three schools: Kansas State, Kansas and Oklahoma State.

“The one thing we can’t do is we can’t move Eugene, Oregon, closer to Kansas,” Kelly said.

So, in other words, you want the guys who aren’t No. 1 to be happy about it? Obviously, they never will. Your job as a coach is to keep them around, anyway — either through a realization that they’ll probably eventually get a chance to play due to injury, graduation or whatever reason. That’s what coaches do, you know — they keep the 40 kids who aren’t starters around somehow, so that they have depth.

And as far as moving Eugene closer to Kansas, come on, pal,  if distance from home is going to start becoming a problem — as is being said about both departing signal callers, Chris Harper and Roper — then you better stop recruiting players from outside the Pacific Northwest, which you’re obviously not going to do.

Look, I’m never happy to see someone with NO previous head coaching experience be handed a head coaching job at this level. The head guy has responsibilities that coordinators don’t even know exist. One of them is keeping kids from transferring. Another is media relations, which I hear Kelly has flubbed grandly with a policy of making reporters request interviews with players 24 hours in advance.

Don’t get me wrong, if he wins games the guy can get away with whatever policies he wants. That’s the American way these days. But if he doesn’t win down there — and win big — he’s going to look like the dumbest hire in the school’s history.

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Tags: Chip Kelly, Chris Harper, Dwight Jaynes, Jeremiah Masoli, Justin Roper, Oregon Ducks

A while back I wrote about cause and effect and what it has to do with Oregon’s quarterback situation. But still, I’d always thought the Ducks did a decent job of getting their signal callers ready to play.

Until Saturday afternoon. Wow — did the coaching staff really think Oregon was so much better than Boise State that it could slide through the game by just lining up and shoving the ball down the Broncos’ throats? Forget about injuries to the quarterback, what in the world was Oregon’s game plan? If you really want to play smash-mouth football, get out of that spread offense, put a couple of tight ends on the field and hand it to a fullback 30 times. Otherwise, use the spread to get your receivers isolated in space and throw the ball up the field! Don’t bring a baseball bat to a tennis match.

That was an expensive mistake for the Ducks, who couldn’t afford a nonconference home loss. But neither starter Jeremiah Masoli nor backup Chris Harper seemed capable of making anything but the most elemental of throws and while they were in the game, the capable Oregon receiving corps was totally wasted. Sure the fourth-quarter comeback behind Darron Thomas (finally, a quarterback who can throw!) was nice but for most of the day, that was a very ugly Duck effort.

And speaking of ugly efforts, my goodness — wasn’t Portland State-Washington State one of the worst games ever played? I realize the Vikings need every penny but $225,000 wasn’t enough to justify that whipping against the worst team in one of the worst major conferences in the country. Honestly, I think there are Big Sky teams that could give the Cougars a go — but not PSU. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen Mouse Davis quarterbacks look so inept.

By the way, this just in — the Pac-10 stinks. And after a full season of playing in the Pac-10, USC will be hard-pressed to keep its edge for the BCS playoff to come.

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Tags: Big Sky Conference, Boise State Broncos, Chris Harper, Dwight Jaynes, Jeremiah Masoli, Mouse Davis, Oregon Ducks, Pac-10 Conference, Portland State Vikings, USC Trojans, Washington State Cougars