Notre Dame Football: Should Ian Book return next season?

The polarizing Notre Dame QB has had much said about him this season, a majority of it negative. Ian Book still has another year of eligibility — should he return?

After Ian Book led Notre Dame to the College Football Playoff last season, expectations for him this year were through the roof. Everyone, including Book himself, expected him to improve and become an even better QB than he was last season and lead Notre Dame back to the CFP.

None of that has happened. Book has regressed — for whatever reason — and Notre Dame is most definitely not returning to the CFP after dropping games to Georgia and Michigan and just barely scraping a win against Virginia Tech this past Saturday.

Everyone was ready for Ian Book to come into this season and become the next great Notre Dame QB — the next Joe Montana. It just hasn’t happened. Book does not have half of the composure in the pocket that he had last season, nor does he have the accuracy which made him so deadly.

The regression of Ian Book can’t be attributed to just one individual thing, but rather a combination of things. Many believe in the ‘2nd year QB regression’ theory of Notre Dame QBs under Brian Kelly. There is plenty of data to back that up as well.

Tommy Rees, Malik Zaire, Deshone Kizer, Brandon Wimbush and now Ian Book. The second season of a Notre Dame starting QB seems to never go well under Brian Kelly.

However, that may be much more of a matter of happenstance.

Some of this has to fall down on Ian Book himself. He constantly looks scared in the pocket. The Notre Dame offensive line, even after losing its starting right side of the line, is one of the best in the country. The line creates good pockets for Ian Book, but he still has ‘happy feet’ and puts his head down to try to run rather than keeping his head up, staying in the pocket and looking down field for a wide open Cole Kmet or Chase Claypool.

The shouts for backup QB Phil Jurkovec to start in place of Book have been loud and clear and that does not spell great things for Book if he continues to play the way he is. Before the commitment of 2021 QB Tyler Buchner, Phil Jurkovec was the highest rated QB Brian Kelly has pulled in quite a long time and fans want to see him play.

The facts are that this season, at best, Notre Dame can go 10-2. That is still a great feat, as it would be the third year in a row that the Irish have won 10+ games, however fans want more. The wanting of more may be unjust and fans may need to adjust their expectations, but the QB that can take Notre Dame to the promised land next year is not Ian Book.

Book is far too cautious in the pocket. He can’t make the deep throw. He is no longer as accurate as he was last season. He is missing reads. All of these spell bad things for the ND offense, as fans have seen this season.

I fully expect Brian Kelly to stick with Book for the remainder of the season unless things spiral. That said, Ian Book should not and can not be the Notre Dame starting QB next season if Notre Dame wants to continue to progress as a program.

There is too much talent coming in at QB in the coming years to halt it by letting Book lead the team again next season and having Phil ride the bench for a third straight year. Between the likes of Jurkovec, 2020 QB commit Drew Pyne, 2021 QB commit Tyler Buchner and even current freshman Brendan Clark, Notre Dame should be great at the QB position in coming years.

All in all, fans should be happy with what they have gotten from Book. A colleague and friend of mine here at Slap the Sign, Nathan Erbach, pointed this out to me the other day — Ian Book was never recruited to be the starter here at Notre Dame. Notre Dame fully bought into the Brandon Wimbush project and we all know how that turned out.

That being said, lay off the guy a little bit as the rest of this season plays out. I know you fans always want more and Book has been less than impressive this season, but he is doing his best and he did take the team to the CFP last season.

Everything is going to be okay.