Texas Tech football: Pros of a Big-12-only schedule

Fewer games mean fewer injuries

For a team as thin as Texas Tech appears to be again in 2020, a nine-game schedule might be ideal.  That’s because it would decrease the number of injuries a team has to deal with and that’s long been a problem for the Red Raiders.

Teams like Oklahoma, Alabama, Texas, LSU, Ohio State, Clemson, and other so-called “blue bloods” can absorb an injury by simply pulling another 4 or 5-star player off of the bench.  That was the case in 2018 when OU lost starting RB Rodney Anderson for the year and simply plugged in Trey Sermon without missing a beat.

Texas Tech doesn’t have that type of margin for error.  Most especially at RB.

Ask yourself how you would feel if Tech has to enter any game this fall without starting RB SaRodorick Thompson.  Yeah.  It’s not a fun hypothetical to ponder.

But with only nine games on the schedule, the likelihood that Thompson, or any other player, will be lost to injury decreases by 25%.  That’s significant for a team like Texas Tech which has a decent enough starting 22 to compete with most teams in the league but which often falls into dismay when starters start to go down as is the case every season for every team.

Also, with fewer games to play, Tech could ask more of Thompson every week.  Last year, he averaged just 13.3 carries per game.

This year, could Tech ask him to carry the ball 20 times a game?  If so, that would only be 180 carries, 20 more than he had a year ago.  That might make OC David Yost feel much more at ease about his game plan each week.

Injuries are inevitable in football.  That’s why the teams with the most depth are able to separate themselves from the pack.  Tech isn’t one of those teams so a shorter schedule could make the Red Raiders more competitive by helping to lessen the number of injuries Wells and Co. have to navigate around.