Sunday Quickies: Quarterback Lynn Bowden Edition

Lynn Bowden could become Kentucky’s new QB with Sawyer Smith’s injuries

By Zac Oakes@ZacOakes Sep 29, 2019, 9:15am EDT

Last night was arguably the worst offensive performance for Kentucky in the Mark Stoops era.

There’s blame to go around. The offensive line struggled. The playcalling made you shake your head at times. Sawyer Smith struggled, but that was mostly due to shoulder and wrist injuries.

Overall, it was a performance we want to forget sooner rather than later.

But with Smith facing multiple injuries, Kentucky decided to move Lynn Bowden to full-time quarterback at the end of the game last night, which sparked a Kentucky touchdown ensuring that the Cats wouldn’t be shutout for the first time since the Vandy debacle that ended the Joker Phillips era.

After the game last night, Stoops admitted that they probably should have made Bowden the quarterback earlier in the game, and Stoops is right. Sawyer Smith has shown that when he’s healthy, he’s more than capable of being Kentucky’s quarterback. But with his wrist and shoulder injuries, he clearly can’t make the throws he needs to make.

With Bowden at QB, the playbook is more limited, but he presents a clear and dangerous threat as a runner and is able to make plays when everything breaks down. He obviously doesn’t have the arm that Smith has, but Smith’s arm is extremely limited with his current health.

All this said, Smith will have two weeks to try to get healed up but if he is still hurt in two weeks when the Arkansas game rolls around, Stoops and Co. will have to make a decision on who to line up at QB and it should be Lynn Bowden.

He’s the best option moving forward and Eddie Gran will simply have to retool the offense to play to his strengths, much like he did when Drew Barker was injured and Stephen Johnson had to take over. This obviously isn’t the same situation but the point stands.

Let the Lynn Bowden experiment begin!

Tweet of the Day

This finish tells me Kentucky’s staff needs to know if Lynn Bowden can be the guy at QB, a la Randall Cobb a few years ago. And ... maybe.
— Kyle Tucker (@KyleTucker_ATH) September 29, 2019