Picture yourself being surrounded by five people who all agree on one accord about a sports topic. This recently happened to me when some of my coworkers attempted to convince me that the Pac-12 conference was the best conference in college football.
Because I am a fan of the most talented and competitive teams, I enjoy watching the SEC and ACC. My coworkers wailed about being over the hype and notoriety that surrounds the SEC and dared me to step outside of my comfort zone a bit and watch the Pac-12 this year.
I wasn’t too impressed with the teams overall (USC losing to BC) but what I did notice is that there are studs within the Pac-12 conference that could play in any major conference in college football (Marcus Mariota, Brett Hundley).
They told me to watch one of the best kept secrets in college football, Oregon State quarterback Sean Mannion.
So I decided to watch the game Mannion played against No. 18 USC and sad to say, I was really disappointed.
Originally, I had heard about Mannion last season when he was briefly listed on a Heisman watch. So when I watched the Beavers play against the Trojans I got excited to see someone with a lot of talent. Mannion stands 6-foot-5, 230 pounds and is currently listed as the sixth best quarterback prospect in the NFL Draft behind Marcus Mariota, Jameis Winston, Brett Hundley, Kevin Hogan and Connor Cook.
As I watched him play though, he didn’t do anything that was too impressive. I will say this — during the USC game there were some throws that he made that made me say “Ok, this man is legit.” But often times the decision making was so off I was surprised he had a ranking so high as a quarterback prospect.
One of the reasons why Mannion played so poorly against USC was because of the pass rush that they brought which is understandable. But even the coaching staff tried limiting their pressure and gave Mannion running back Storm Woods as a check down. However, even when Mannion threw the football to Woods, he was off and this was just a three yard pass.
Mannion normally throws for over 300 yards a game, but the Trojans had allowed none of it. He played terrible to say the least and finished the game 15-of-32 for 123 yards, two interceptions, a 46.9 completion percentage and no touchdowns. The final score of this contest was 35-10 with USC winning easily.
This shouldn’t come as a surprise since Mannion has never had success against the Trojans. Last season against USC he threw for 277 yards and three interceptions, and one touchdown. Again being slaughtered with the score ending up at 31-14.
The saving grace for Mannion is that he will have an opportunity to play against two quarterbacks inside of the Pac-12 that rank higher than him as prospects. These two are Oregon’s starting quarterback Mariotta and Stanford’s starting quarterback Hogan.
Though Mannion has to play well this season, he especially needs to have a sense of urgency and play like a man possessed against those two prospects if he wants a chance to move up the rankings board.
Though he had a terrible game against USC, Mannion has still gotten better. In an interview with Gary Klein of the LA Times, Mannion said this:
"“I really wanted to be accurate and play fast and improve my footwork — and I think I’ve made strides,” said Mannion, who has had two passes intercepted. “In the first three games, I completed passes on time, my footwork was quicker and there was not a lot of wasted movement in the pocket.”"
We should get excited to see the senior who is on pace to become the Pac-12 career holder for most yardage thrown. Currently Mannion is 357 yards away to pass the second place Carson Palmer and 866 to surpass Matt Barkley.
His next game is against the Colorado Buffaloes, which should give him a chance to get back to normal.
Now that his worst game of his career is over, we can look forward to watching his best games which are ahead of him and maybe he can eventually change his potential NFL fate.
More from FanSided.com
NFL Power Rankings Week 4: Cowboys rise
College Basketball: Preseason AAC power rankings
NBA Power Rankings: 2014-15 training camp edition
Derek Jeter and MLB’s 20 richest players
All 30 NHL franchises ranked by all-time greatness