CLEVELAND — Watching Josh Allen for the past three years at Wyoming, offensive assistant Mike Bath can’t help but think of his former college teammate Ben Roethlisberger.
“I was at Miami (Ohio) when Ben was a true freshman, my fifth year,” Bath, the Redhawks starting quarterback from 1998-2000, told cleveland.com in a phone interview. “I remember looking over when he was getting some reps in fall camp my fifth year, saying to one of the backup quarterbacks, ‘Crap, it’s a good thing I’m a fifth-year senior because I’d be playing safety next year.”’
Allen, whom the Browns are strongly considering taking No. 1 overall in the draft Thursday night, displayed many of the same characteristics as the young Roethlisberger at Wyoming the past two years.
“He’s got the same competitive nature that Ben has which has served Ben extremely well in his career,” said Bath, who coaches tight ends and fullbacks. “But he’s got some of those field characteristics and football characteristics as Ben like the ability to throw on the run, and make a play with his feet at an extremely high level.”
He noted that “Ben would probably punch me if he heard me say this, but Josh is probably more athletic than Ben.”
And at 6-5, 237, he has the edge there too at this stage of their careers.
“People probably look at just their stature but he’s bigger than Ben was coming out,” said Bath. “Ben was probably 220. But from a size perspective, from an arm perspective, athleticism there’s a lot of similarities.”
Bath recalls the first time Allen threw the ball at Wyoming. It exploded out of his hand.
“We just kind of looked at each other and were like ‘what?” said Bath. “It’s different. It’s unique, it really is.”
The Wyoming coaches, including offensive coordinator Brent Vigen who also recruited and developed Carson Wentz at North Dakota State have been proud of the way Allen has been upfront about his accuracy issues and how hard he’s worked to correct them.
It’s why Bath was so irked when he heard former NFL quarterback Dan Orlovsky rip Allen’s football IQ on Peter King’s Monday Morning Quarterback podcast.
Orlovsky cites a play during a loss to Iowa where the Will linebacker blitzed and Allen seemingly froze. Orlovsky said, ‘when the ball is snapped, it’s almost like I don’t know what’s going on. It’s like he doesn’t have a plan and a process.” He went to on to say “to not be able to react to adjust or react to a Will linebacker blitzing is alarming to me. Alarming.”
Bath said Orlovsky’s breakdown was “the furthest thing from the truth. That was a true freshman offensive tackle going the wrong way. There are some misconceptions by the analysts and they don’t ask ‘okay why did that happen on this play’ and they don’t investigate that more before they made a broad spectrum comment.”
Allen admittedly played poorly that game, but Bath cites other mistakes by the supporting cast that didn’t help, including a dropped pass in the end zone after Allen stepped up, avoided pressure and put the ball on the money on a post route.
“There was a sequence in that game where it was 7-3 and we’re on the 40-yard line going in in the last minute and half of the first half and he had to scramble because of an unblocked player,” said Bath. “Well, that was my running back that missed that protection. But he’s a high profile athlete, he’s going to be scrutinized by a lot of different outlets. It’s part of the business.”
Still, Allen readily admits he needs to improve his accuracy and has been working hard on that for the past few months with QB guru Jordan Palmer. The improvement has been marked, but will it be enough to make the Browns forget that they had a big-armed, inaccurate QB last year in DeShone Kizer?
“The thing I like about Josh is that he’s attacking those issues,” said Bath. “He’s attacking those flaws in the game to make himself better. I believe he can do it because I believe in the young man and his fabric and what he’s about.”
Bath, who grew up in Celina and remains a fan of all Cleveland sports, believes the Browns are the perfect landing spot for Allen in part because of quarterbacks coach Ken Zampese, who coached Bath at Miami.
“I know what type of coach he is,” said Bath. “Ken will grind on him and will work on that immensely in detail with him and Josh will work at it. He’ll work at it in the offseason. He’s someone that will continue to get better.”
He also thinks some time behind Tyrod Taylor, the 2018 starter, is ideal for Allen.
“Tyrod is a really good quarterback, and then Coach Hue jackson and coach Zampese have a great track record with QBs going back to Carson Palmer and Andy Dalton,” said Bath. “Josh grew up on a farm in California, and he’s the kind of person you want leading your football team. His ceiling is so high.”
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