Confidence
This is the key to everything. A confident player will go out and usually play well. My grandfather used to tell me all the time if you go up to hit and don’t believe you can hit what the pitcher’s throwing, you won’t.
It’s a problem if a player is playing well enough for his team to win, but still too busy looking over his shoulder wondering, if he’s going to be pulled off the field.
No question players should feel pressure to perform well from competition. However, it’s a fine line to tow when a player wins a QB competition and still has to share time even when playing well.
That takes away his confidence and causes him to trust his coaches less. Why would he believe they’d put him in a situation to succeed when they don’t trust him when he’s playing well? If that was the case, they should have gone with the two-quarterback system straight out of fall camp.
Mike Norvell has an entire spring, summer, and fall to expose James Blackman to his offense. To see what he can handle, what he does well, and the best way to put him in positions to succeed.
This is when he can work on getting Blackman’s fundamentals back up to par, express belief in him, and ultimately gain his trust that he’s THE guy in 2020 provided Blackman puts in the requisite work.
Blackman’s already added 10 pounds, according to FSU offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham, who mentioned it in a recent interview with 247’s On The Bench Podcast.
He’s always been a hard worker, he just needs confidence and proper coaching to make him what he’s capable of. A quarterback that could help FSU football win eight or nine games in 2020.