Nebraska Football: Heinrich Haarberg position change on the horizon?

There may not be a bigger question for Nebraska football this spring than, “when is Heinrich Haarberg going to change position?” Ok, there might be a bigger question than that. What position the Kearney product will move to certainly has people on the edge of their seats. What doesn’t seem to be a real question at this point is if the move is going to be made at some point.

That the quarterback is eventually going to be lining up somewhere else on the field this fall and in the future seems to be a moot point. Even if no one associated with the Nebraska football program will actually admit, it’s a done deal. One need look no further than the fact Haarberg almost left the Huskers this winter, only to return after a discussion with the new coaching staff.

It’s hard to believe that discussion didn’t include Haarberg playing either tight end or wide receiver for the Nebraska football team. It’s also hard not to start dreaming on the kind of impact the player might be able to make, even if he’s buried on a depth chart that actually has more quarterbacks than people expected.

It seems as though head coach Matt Rhule would very much like to see what comes from a position switch for the quarterback. He talked just ahead of spring practice about how impressed he was with a few players. More specifically, he talked about the speed of Haarberg, calling him one of the fastest guys on the team.

For the player’s sake, it just makes sense to eye a position change. While he might see himself as a quarterback at this point, it’s clear he’s got an uphill battle to get on the field at that position. The Huskers not only have returning starter Casey Thompson but they have his heir apparent in Jeff Sims.

Chubba Purdy and Logan Smothers are also back. Both guys got playing time before the Kearney product did. He in fact, saw no action at all, despite the fact that neither Purdy nor Smothers were all that impressive. It certainly feels like if Heinrich Haarberg is going to be an impactful player for Nebraska football he needs to change where he plays. The player and the program seem to know that as well. So the only questions now are when and where?