Texas Tech football: 5 best offensive players Red Raiders face in 2019

Here are the five best offensive players the Texas Tech football team is set to face this year.

There’s no conference in the nation more offensively-minded than the Big 12, which annually boasts the most elite grouping of offensive teams in the sport.  And the roots of the conference’s offensive obsession can be traced back to the Texas Tech football program.

When Mike Leach sprung his “Air Raid” offense on the conference in the 2000s, Tech’s rivals began to take note of how the spread offense was helping the Red Raiders balance out their talent deficit with a decided strategic advantage.  Now, every team in the conference runs some form of the spread attack forcing defensive coordinators to have recurring nightmares of flying footballs and scoreboards being lit up like pinball machines.

Thus, it is not surprising that 16 of the 26 Big 12 players taken in this year’s NFL Draft were offensive players.  What’s more, ten of those 16 were skill position players.

As far as the Red Raiders are concerned, eight of the eleven draft picks the program has produced since 2011 have been offensive players.  When LB Dakota Allen was taken in the seventh round of this year’s draft, he was the first Red Raider defensive player selected since 2014 when another LB, Will Smith, was also taken in the fifth round.

Of course, the Big 12 has also produced the top pick in the last two NFL Drafts in OU quarterbacks Baker Mayfield and Kyler Murray.  What’s more, the NFL seems to be willing to even pounce on Big 12 offensive figures that have not proven to be successful.  When the Arizona Cardinals scooped up Kliff Kingsbury to be their head coach despite his 19-35 conference record, it was a tremendous statement about how offense has become the driving force in football across all levels.

Last fall, half the teams in the conference (OU, OSU, West Virginia, Tech, and Baylor) finished in the top 25 nationally in total offense while OU and West Virginia were also in the top 10 in scoring. 2019 looks to be no different.

Consider the fact that the only two head coaches in the conference, TCU’s Gary Patterson and Kansas State’s Chris Klieman, have defensive backgrounds and it is easy to see what side of the football is prioritized in this conference.   Even Les Miles at Kansas was an offensive coordinator at Oklahoma State and the tight end’s coach with the Dallas Cowboys prior to getting his first Power 5 head coaching job in 2001, which might surprise some given how his teams at LSU struggled to move the ball.

Likewise, Iowa State’s Matt Campbell, who has built a team with the best defense in the conference in his three years in Ames, was an offensive coordinator and o-line coach at all three of his college stops before taking over the Cyclone’s program.  That is despite the fact that he played along the defensive line as a collegiate at Pittsburgh and Mt. Union.

Certainly, it will be another track meet in the Big 12 this fall.  The conference is loaded with elite playmakers ready to once again put on the type of show that Big 12 football fans have come to love.

That means Texas Tech will see its share of elite offensive talent this year.  Let’s take a look at the best offensive players the Red Raiders will be tasked with stopping in 2019.