Pitchin' with Pritch: Husker quarterback position thin

It is Saturday morning and the much anticipated Husker football season is about nine hours away from getting started. A lot of hype since Scott Frost was signed for a seven-year $35 million contract, and I would imagine that a lot is expected by some fans immediately if not sooner. 

I hope he is as successful or more successful as any coach in Husker history. If he is, the good times will be back and even better. Personally, I think he will be fine. 

He is young, he is energetic, he appears to be a coach that recruits and he is a proven outstanding offensive coach, so there are a lot of positive things being put into place. 

He has proven he can build a program for the work he did at his only head coaching job in Florida. 

All of that said, he is now in the Big 10 and playing probably the difficult Big 10 schedule that Nebraska has had since joining the conference. 

Add to that, the Huskers are dangerously thin at a very important position, and that is quarterback. 

Adrian Martinez, a true freshman, won the job over a pretty good red-shirt freshman, Tristan Gebbia, and as most Nebraska fans know, a couple of days after that announcement, Gebbia was missing from practice and had withdrawn from classes and was on his way to Oregon State. 

I know times have changed and kids want to play immediately. I have seen it in high school situations, college situations and even at the NFL level, but I really question Gebbia’s decision to leave.

 I am sure that Coach Frost understands changing as he started at Stanford under a pretty good coach in Bill Walsh and then transferred to Nebraska after a year. 

But Martinez missed all of his senior year in high school due to an injury to his throwing arm, so no one knows how that will go once the hitting begins. 

It would appear that in Frost’s offense, the quarterback will run a bit. 

That would seem to shout to me if I were the backup quarterback that I had better be ready because I am just an ankle, hand, arm or head injury from being the starter. 

It is possible to hurt all those parts of your body on one play! 

You think back and wonder where the Nebraska program would have been in the glory days of the 90s if Brook Berringer would have packed it in for some other school. 

It might have affected football history in Nebraska in a big way. He bailed the Huskers out of trouble a number of times when Tommy Frazier was hurt. 

So the Huskers are going into the season with Martinez as the starter and the backups are two walk-on kids. 

Nebraska has had a bunch of walk-on players who did great jobs but the quarterback spot is just a little different.

Perkins County

The PCS teams are a couple of games and meets into their seasons and the cross country team has picked up a first place spot. 

Congratulations go out to those athletes and their coaches. 

A special shout out to Jonathan Hunt and Monica Cole for picking up win No. 1 in their head coaching careers. 

That is always a big thrill as a head coach and I wish them many more in their careers.

Also have to throw in a line or two for the TeamMates mentoring program at PCS. 

The TeamMates program is having a raffle for two Husker football tickets and you can buy a ticket at most of the home athletic events. 

Good prize and a good program to help our students.