Brandon Walker puts Arch Manning's slide on Sarkisian

Most people are blaming Arch for Arch. On Mostly Sports, Brandon Walker went after the head coach instead.

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“I believe there’s a good quarterback in Arch somewhere. It needs to be found by the coach… Sark, if he’s as good a coach as people think he is, he should have found it and fixed it” -Brandon Walker

That is a different take from the usual one. The popular line on Manning has been that the hype got ahead of the player. Walker's version is that the player is real and the problem is coaching. Sarkisian built his whole reputation on developing quarterbacks, so when the most famous one he has ever had goes backwards in Year 2 as a starter, Walker thinks the fix falls on him.

And he does look like he's going backwards. Texas lost 27-24 at home to an unranked Florida team on Saturday. That was its 2nd straight loss and leaves the Longhorns at 4-2, 1-2 in conference play. Manning went 14-of-20 for 173 yards and threw a late touchdown to Cam Coleman, but he was sacked 5 times and lost a fumble that basically ended the comeback. He is now 0-2 in his career against Florida. Through 6 games he has 1,295 yards, 11 touchdowns and 5 interceptions. He threw 7 picks in 13 games all of last season.

On Wake Up Barstool the next morning, T-Bob described the same thing from the film side: a quarterback who stopped playing loose and started playing scared.

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“Arch Manning is at his best when he's playing free, when he's willing to take shots and make mistakes. And right now he looks gun shy.” – T-Bob

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That lines up with Walker's take more than you'd expect. If the mistakes keep coming even after he stops taking risks, that isn't really a talent problem. It's a confidence problem, and keeping a quarterback's head right is part of a QB guru's job.

Now the program is hedging. ESPN's Pete Thamel reports that redshirt freshman KJ Lacey will get more first-team reps this week. Manning is still expected to start Saturday against No. 7 Ole Miss. Lacey has played in 2 games this season and is 7-of-8 for 63 yards, so nobody actually knows what he is yet. Still, when your backup starts getting real practice reps in mid-October, the starter has been put on notice.

T-Bob also pointed out that Texas has 4 ranked opponents in a row coming up, starting with Ole Miss. If Manning comes out loose and makes throws, Walker's point stands: the talent was always there, and it took a while to bring it back. If Lacey ends up taking the job by November, the question will be whether Sarkisian couldn't fix Manning or whether there wasn't as much to fix as everyone assumed.