Wake Forest Football Season Recap: Impressions of John Wolford

We continue our football season recap today by sharing our impressions of true freshman quarterback John Wolford.

Griffin: John Wolford was poised under center. Given a nightmarish situation for any quarterback, let alone a true freshman, he stayed tough under center. Generously listed at 6-1, he improved as the season wore on, showing ACC accuracy and decent arm strength. Once he is complemented with an ACC caliber offensive line and some legitimate offensive weapons, Wolford will be able to make plays.

Riley: John Wolford did about as well as I could have expected him to given the circumstances of the offense. There was no running game and until later in the year also no offensive line for most of his games. He threw some bad interceptions early on, but continued to grow and mature on the field. It will be interesting to see what transpires moving forward as Clawson has brought in a very talented high school player in Kendall Hinton.

Matt: I'm with Riley; I think Wolford performed pretty admirably given all the circumstances.  No running game, a struggling O-Line, dropped and tipped passes being a borderline epidemic, and yet I still feel like John could very well be the Wake QB of the immediate future.  My hat's off to John, honestly.

Chris: Wolford has some good points and some bad points, but he's the QB of the future for Wake Forest in my opinion until somebody takes it from him. Wolford seems to be a very good decision maker, which is perhaps the hardest thing to teach a young QB. He was given so little time in the pocket this year to make those decisions, but the vast majority of his turnovers this year were not from poor decisions, they were from tipped passes. With a complete and utter lack of a run game, so much pressure was put on the passing game, and with limited targets to throw to and such a short time in the pocket most plays, Wolford performed admirably this season. I was glad to see him form a good rapport with tight ends, and I think this will be a feature of playcalling in the future.

Robert: On the surface, John Wolford's numbers were not that impressive. He completed just 58% of his passes, and threw for only 2,037 yards with 12 touchdowns to 14 interceptions. That said, he was put in a very difficult position all season. He had very little protection from a young offensive line, he had no consistent running game, he had wide receivers with just average speed and a difficult time gaining separation. He was also a true freshman, who did not have the benefit of attending spring practice. All that said, he got noticeably better as the season progressed and had his best performance in the season finale against Duke, where he threw for 251 yards, 3 touchdowns and 0 interceptions. Also, of his 14 interceptions, 10 came over the first 5 games of the season. I liked him a lot coming out of high school, and I look for him to be much better next year as we develop our receiving corps and he gets to go through offseason workouts and spring practice.