Hawkins hasn't really looked that good all year.
Remember pre-season when we were predicting a blowout against CSU? Offense didn't really look all that good against CSU, we only beat them by a TD despite having superior talent at most positions.
EWU - We all remember what happened here. The offense looked bad for the majority of the game
WVU - Scored two touchdowns super early in the game then the offense did exactly nothing for the rest of the entire game.
FSU and Texas - We don't need to get into details.
It's not just the last two games. Nor is it all Hawkins' fault. But the writing is on the wall from an objective perspective, in my opinion - CH does simply not have the physical talent to compete in a conference like the Big 12. And it's not just Texas and WVU. Teams like OSU, Missouri, even KSU are going to score a lot of points and if you can't score with them, you are going to lose.
A lot of you reference the fact that Cody has "earned" the right to start for the remainder of the season. Why? What, specifically, has he done this year that signals that he has earned or is entitled to any playing time? Given the starting job, by all appearances, by default? Better performance in practice and in camp than the other options? A solid but far from great freshman year in which the team went 6-7 and lost to ISU? Needed last minute defensive touchdowns to beat a D2 team and beaten two horrible CSU teams in overly close games?
To say that the only talent advantages Ballenger has over Hawkins is scrambling ability is pretty much akin to deliberately sticking your head in the sand. He clearly has a much, much stronger arm and has somewhere in the realm of 6 inches of height on him and probably 40 pounds. CH accuracy has also not looked quite "stellar" this year.
Does Hawkins know the playbook better? I would imagine. All this talk about a "RS FR" taking the starting job as some sort of catastrophic measure rings of a certain irony when you consider that CH was a "RS FR" last year. He has 1.5 years in the system, CH has 2.5 years. How much difference is really there?
Should Matt come in and start next week against Kansas? Probably not. Should he get significant playing time and take the starting job barring a dramatic improvement in Cody's play that seems, at this point, relatively unlikely? Absolutely.
To suggest that playing a bigger, faster, stronger, larger-armed QB over a struggling starter who has had a pretty disappointing five games is some sort of blasphemy reeks of bias.
Anyone who is watching can readily acknowledge that there are issues with the offensive line, if not dramatic issues. That does not mean that o-line play is the only problem.
