FSU Football: Can James Blackman be a top 25 QB in 2019?

FSU football will need good to great QB play if the Noles want to win eight games or more in 2019. Can James Blackman become a top 25 QB?

FSU football redshirt sophomore quarterback James Blackman has been all you could ask for in his time in garnet and gold.

He played admirably as a true freshman against one of the toughest schedules in the nation and helped the Noles reach a bowl game in 2017.

The 2018 season saw him watching from the sidelines when he should have gotten more playing time as Deondre Francois struggled mightily at times.

Blackman shined in the one start he got although it was in a losing effort. Just how good is James Blackman seems to be the million dollar question right?

It’s hard to gauge his play as a true freshman under those circumstances(although I saw enough to believe he can be a above average college QB). Last season his lone start came against a suspect NC State defense.

However, he carved that bad passing defense up just as a good QB should right? Yahoo Sports released their list of top 50 college QB’s for 2019.

They broke the list up into tiers of 1, 2, 3 and 4 with Blackman coming in the fourth tier at No. 43 overall. Here’s the synopsis on that group from the writer:

"Tier 4 quarterbacks likely won’t be in Heisman contention, but they are bowl eligible-level talents or young guns waiting to break into Tier 2 or Tier 3. However, if a couple of these quarterbacks were benched due to mediocrity, I wouldn’t be too surprised."

I think the first part of that statement is accurate for Blackman. FSU won’t likely win enough games for him to be in Heisman contention, but they should definitely make a bowl game. His stats could be worthy of being mentioned because historically the Briles offense is crazy productive.

Can he break into Tier 2 (No. 3-`10) or Tier 3 (No. 11-34) though?

"Tier 2 quarterbacks are Heisman contenders, are good enough to lead their team to 10+ wins, and most have a higher floor than the Tier 3 quarterbacks.Tier 3 quarterbacks could play their way into Heisman contention and are good enough to lead their team to 8+ wins, but either aren’t established enough or haven’t shown enough of a ceiling to be in the tier above."

Thoughts

Well, my earlier statement basically ruled Blackman out of being in the Tier 2 group but I firmly believe he belongs in the Tier 3 group based solely on what his stats will likely look like.

Blackman has completed 59 percent of his passes at nearly eight yards per attempt for 24 touchdowns and 12 interceptions in his career.

If we look at his extremely small sample size from 2018 we did notice an uptick in his production. He completed 64 percent of his passes at 11 yards per attempt for five touchdowns and just one interception.

Yes, NC State’s secondary wasn’t very good and the Clemson game was a blowout when he played but he did look noticeably more comfortable even behind arguably the worst offensive line in the nation.

Florida’s Felipe Franks is listed at No. 20 on that list and I definitely think Blackman is in the same ball park if not better and 2019 should be the year to prove just how good he can be for FSU football.