Nebraska Football: Adrian Martinez’s rough day is slightly concerning

Nebraska Football made things interesting on Saturday.

As we all know by now, Saturday was not a banner day for Adrian Martinez and the Nebraska Football offense. They struggled throughout the course of the day, and this did not look like the offense many thought we would be seeing in the opener. Luckily, the defense saved the day but there were noticeable issues, particularly with Martinez.

Let me say this. He did not have good protection today. The offensive line needs to step up and do a better job. Yes, it is only the first game. We’ll have to see what they do against Colorado and then if they perform poorly next Saturday, I will be worried. Today however I can easily chalk it up to everybody getting their “feet wet” so to speak. However, there were some things I noticed that were a little bit concerning.

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For one, he looked indecisive . Last year, he would often make his first read and then throw the football. Today, it looked like he was focusing too much on every read that he had rather than the open man. Again, this was the first game of the season. We could chalk it up to a little bit of rust. However, his indecisiveness did not help himself either. The South Alabama defensive line played very well. They have many good players on that unit. They showed just how talented they were when they were able to close the pocket around Martinez.

While he was in the pocket, it often looked like looked like he wanted to throw initially, but was forced to run. The indecisiveness forced him to make throws often at the last second. They were not quality throws either. Some of them were dangerous high-percentage throws. One throw that should have been intercepted went into double coverage. He just didn’t look comfortable and he didn’t look like he knew what he wanted to do with the football. He acknowledged that in his postgame press conference following his team’s victory.

"“There were probably around four or five throws that I could’ve made that I think would have made a big difference offensively for us. I obviously threw an interception, kind of shorted the ball there. I just need to step up as a leader and football player out there on the field and do a better job,” Martinez said. “This falls on me. I think a lot of guys did their job well on offense today and I didn’t. It’s what it comes down to and we’ll get it fixed.”"

There is no doubt that he will right the ship, but the combination of the poor line play and the fact that he held onto the ball too long made for an interesting afternoon. It’s something that we will have to watch for when Nebraska Football takes on Colorado.

Nebraska Football can’t afford for Martinez to be tentative. He needs to come out firing, and continue to try and be the Heisman hopeful many think he can be.