If you’re a Purdue football fan, you should definitely avert your eyes from Lindy’s Sports Big Ten football annual this summer. Here’s where they slotted the Boilermakers in their Big Ten position group power rankings. Remember, there are 14 teams in the B1G.
QB- 11, RB- 13, WR- 11, OL- 14, DL- 13, LB- 13, DB-14, and special teams, wait for it……wait for it……5th. Reading those rankings reminds me of Rainier Wolfcastle in the Radioactive Man movie: “The goggles! They do nothing!!”
I’m not even going to bring up what Lindy’s said about Purdue football in the overall conference ratings. Well, the Boilers are much better than that; and Lindy’s is way off on this one. On the other hand, Purdue isn’t exactly bowl bound this year.
I will go out on a limb here and say that the the Boilermakers continue their upward win total trend in 2015.
Purdue football seems to be on the same train as the Illini, just one year behind. The horrifyingly bad 2-10 Illini of 2012 preceded the 1-11 Purdue team of 2013. The 4-8 Illini of ’13 were similar to last year’s 3-9 Boilers. And just like last year’s Illinois was quite probably the worst 6-6 team of all time, I could easily see this fall’s Purdue being among the worst 5-7 or 4-8 teams of all time.
Purdue football players attending Big Ten Media Day:
Danny Anthrop, Sr., WR
Robert Kugler, Sr., C
Frankie Williams, Sr., CB
QB: Austin Appleby, who started the final seven games last year, and redshirt freshman David Blough are the front-runners here. If the season started today, Appleby likely gets the call. His offenses produced 107 points in his first three starts, but then he went and…well, there’s a reason he could very easily lose the starting gig. If he is demoted; then trust me it’ll be earned.
RB: The running game improved significantly from ’13 to ’14, and you can thank the Illini game for much of that. Illinois’ lack of any attempt of run defense helped pad the Boilermakers rushing stats. Looking ahead to this fall, the running back position is so unsettled that it makes the QB situation look like the cradle of quarterbacks days.
Akeem Hunt and Raheem Mostert are both gone, meaning the ground game will have some serious question marks.
OL: Kugler is a 4-year starter and probably the top 2016 NFL Draft prospect on the Boilermakers roster. Centers don’t really get drafted very high these days, and quite often, not until the middle or later, rounds, but still. The best thing you can say about the offensive line is that every starter will be a returning starter.
WR: Anthrop was by far Purdue’s best receiver last year. He’s coming back from an ACL tear; so we’ll see if he can return to the solid form he showed last year: 38 passes, 616 yards. DeAngelo Yancey has potential as well.
Defense:
DL: It’s possible that Purdue could be better on both sides of the ball of this year, and yet still not legitimately contend for a bowl berth. This group will be make-or-break towards reaching that goal. It’s the most experienced group of defensive linemen Darrell Hazell has ever had. And they do say that a program usually makes it’s biggest strides in year three of a new regime.
LB: There’s a lot of reasons for optimism here too. It’s a group of all returning starters; with almost all of the team’s top tacklers coming back.
DB: Williams is the best DB on the team, and a borderline NFL prospect. However, the secondary is the weakest link of the defense. New safeties have to be broken in on a unit that wasn’t very good to begin with.
Bottom Line:
It’s amazing that Purdue football actually did go 1-11 a couple years ago. Or that the Illini went 2-10 in 2012 for that matter. In today’s day and age, high major programs never have records that bad. It’s very difficult to not win four or five games these days, the everybody in college football does their scheduling.
Purdue could indeed be last in the Big Ten, or close to it, across the board in all the major position groups this season. However, they’ll still win four games, and Lindy’s is wrong, shallow and superficial in their assessments of the Boilermakers. Yes, the college football team in West Lafayette will be bad this season, but they’re not going to be that bad.
Purdue will win at least four.
Never Too Early Season Preview Series:
Paul M. Banks owns, operates and writes The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with Fox Sports Digital. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, currently contributes to the Chicago Tribune RedEye edition. He also appears regularly on numerous sports talk radio stations all across the country.
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