WR performance hasn't been very good at all in these last two years for various reasons.
Other than Chase Claypool in 2019, we haven't had a big time season from our WR1's. Kevin Austin had a decent season in 2021, Miles Boykin had one in 2018, but other than that, the numbers put up by our WR1's looked more like other teams' WR2's.
In 2022, we didn't have a quarterback who could get the ball to them for most of the year. Drew Pyne almost never looked over the middle, and rarely, if ever, threw to the left, unless Mike Mayer were lined up on that side. The supposed spread offense that Tommy Rees ran became more of a "constrict" offense, where the short and short to medium range of 1/3rd of the field would be used.
There were many times that Lorenzo Styles was wide open, streaking across the middle, and Pyne never even looked his way. When he wanted to switch to defensive back, and then transferred out,
In 2023, three of our receivers, Deion Colzie, Jayden Thomas and Jaden Greathouse, were gimped with nagging injuries for much of the year.
The WR corps as a group (not including Chris Tyree) didn't show much developmental improvement, especially since Chansi Stuckey was a terrible WR coach with just *one* year of experience as a WR coach. Once we started playing the better competition, the lack of separation among the receivers versus the oppositions' defensive backs wasn't very good at all, and that's being generous.
While Rico Flores showed some signs of promise, putting in good numbers for a true freshman, his transferring out along with Merriweather and Edwards for their locker room puffs with Stuckey didn't exactly inspire confidence.
I'm very grateful to Jordan Faison coming on board halfway through the season, since he finally gave us a reliable receiver in the 2nd half of the season. Still, it shouldn't have come down to bringing in a true freshman walkon and his becoming our best receiver.
While Sam Hartman turned in a good set of numbers, he should have had Brady Quinn-type numbers last year with better developed receivers.