Among the well-wishing Twitter followers of injured Washington State quarterback Connor Halliday was one who managed to evoke a response of raw emotion from the Cougars' fifth-year senior. The nation's leading passer broke his right leg when he was brought down by Southern Cal star defensive lineman Leonard Williams, ending his college career.
Halliday (6-foot-4, 201 pounds) expressed just how daunting he sees the task of recovering well enough, or quickly enough, to get a fair look from NFL scouts.
Of course, there is miles of game film on Halliday, so it's not as though scouts necessarily needed to see him play three more times. He's attempted more passes by far than any quarterback in the nation this season, 526 in only nine games. That's 106 more than the next most frequent passer, Colorado's Sefo Liufau. Where the injury could damage Halliday's hopes for an NFL career is in his availability to compete in the controlled environments of postseason scouting: the Reese's Senior Bowl, the NFL Scouting Combine, Washington State's pro day, and the like. Coming from a shotgun system in which the running game is at best an afterthought, those opportunities are significant for a quarterback like Halliday.
And he's obviously cognizant of it.
It's unclear when Halliday might be recovered well enough to show scouts what they will want to see.
*Follow Chase Goodbread on Twitter **@ChaseGoodbread*.
