{"id":420094,"date":"2026-07-31T23:05:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-31T23:05:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/420094\/"},"modified":"2026-07-31T23:05:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T23:05:17","slug":"sjsu-qb-battle-weaver-mcdaniel-rolovich-chase-job","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/420094\/","title":{"rendered":"SJSU QB battle: Weaver, McDaniel, Rolovich chase job"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chapter eight and the last of a summer series on the Spartans\u2019 position groups<\/a>. This week we examine San Jose State\u2019s quarterback race ahead of the 2026 season.<\/p>\n

San Jose State\u2019s offense enters year three under OC Craig Stutzmann with the pieces stacking up around whoever wins the job at quarterback. The receiver room keeps reloading and daring anyone to doubt it again. Running back coach Michael Smith is trying to turn the backfield into a spread and shred weapon<\/a>. And up front, the offensive line faces its own moment of truth in 2026<\/a> under first-year OL coach Ramsen Golpashin.<\/p>\n

All of it funnels through one position and on day two of fall camp, Stutzmann broke down how his quarterbacks are getting there.<\/p>\n

Hitting the ground running<\/p>\n

Stutzmann said this off-season gave him more access to his quarterbacks than in years past and the group used it. Player-run practices, roughly twice a week, built around 7-on-7 work against the defense gave Luke Weaver, Robert McDaniel and Daniel Rolovich a jump most first and second-year signal callers never get.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think those guys starting off in the first two days are further ahead in terms of understanding the plays, the intent of the plays and understanding how to manipulate the defense within those plays,\u201d said Stutzmann.<\/p>\n

Being careful not to oversell it, the football understanding is ahead of schedule. The chemistry with the skill players around them still has to catch up.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe chemistry building with the other players, with the receivers, with the O-line, with the tight ends, with the running backs still has to grow and the consistency has to get better,\u201d said Stutzmann. \u201cBut we\u2019re so much further ahead than where we were at the end of spring ball, which is definitely encouraging.\u201d<\/p>\n

What actually separates a starter<\/p>\n

Ask a quarterback room to describe what wins them a job and you will get stats, arm talent and highlight throws. Ask Stutzmann and the answer strips all of that away.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really simple,\u201d said Stutzmann. \u201cWhen it\u2019s all said and done, does the ball move forward and end up in scoring positions and in the end zone? And the second thing is just taking care of the football.\u201d<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t turn it over. Possess the football. That\u2019s the whole scorecard basically.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s so many stats you could have, right? How many touchdown passes, how many yards, etc. In the end, does a quarterback move the ball and end up scoring and does he take care of it? It\u2019s very simple when you look at it that way.\u201d<\/p>\n

What a close race actually tells you<\/p>\n

There\u2019s real value in naming a starter as early as possible. A locker room rallies around a QB1 faster than it rallies around a competition. But a race that stays tight cuts both ways. Sometimes it means every candidate is legitimately good enough to start. Sometimes, at least by the old conventional wisdom, it means nobody in the room has separated because nobody has fully proven he\u2019s a difference maker yet. That\u2019s just an outside impression built over years of watching quarterback battles drag on, not something Stutzmann said outright.<\/p>\n

Layer onto that the trigger question.<\/p>\n

Rolovich is a true freshman. At what point does upside outweigh experience? Coaches don\u2019t get credit for identifying the better long-term arm in October if the offense stalled out in September waiting on him to catch up. That tension and patience against readiness is baked into every close QB race and it\u2019s part of what makes Stutzmann\u2019s answers worth pulling apart.<\/p>\n

The harder question is how a young quarterback actually gets to that point mentally; fast enough to read a defense in real time without losing the speed of the game. Stutzmann framed it as removing clutter rather than adding knowledge.<\/p>\n

\u201cEarly on in a QBs\u2019 career, you\u2019re out there and you\u2019re like, gosh, the playbook is wide open,\u201d said Stutzmann. \u201cI think it\u2019s brain clutter, so it\u2019s a de-junking of the brain. The more experience you have, the more comfortable you feel because you\u2019ve seen it. You don\u2019t get tricked as much and you can de-clutter a lot of what could possibly happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stutzmann reached for a restaurant analogy to explain it. The first trip to a new spot, the menu feels endless. By the twentieth visit, even years apart, the order is automatic.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou go there, you try it once or twice, three times, you start knowing what you like from the place,\u201d said Stuzmann. \u201cIt\u2019s the same with football. In the beginning, it\u2019s like a new restaurant. You don\u2019t know what you really like or what\u2019s really good there. But the more times you get to that restaurant, the more you\u2019re like, \u2018Oh, I know what I want.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Stutzmann also has his own internal picture of what the offense is supposed to look like once it clicks, one he says has stayed remarkably consistent across his career even as personnel changes year to year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know what it\u2019s supposed to look like, efficient and explosive,\u201d said Stuzmann. \u201cI already visualize things, like playing USC, what it\u2019s gonna look like, how we\u2019re gonna score, how we\u2019re gonna win the football game. It\u2019s just a matter of getting it taught and having the players see the game the same way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Smooth, talented and a puppy with a high ceiling<\/p>\n

Asked to sum up each of his top three quarterbacks in a word or two, Stutzmann didn\u2019t hesitate.<\/p>\n

Weaver is smooth. \u201cLuke doesn\u2019t get rattled. He\u2019s smooth,\u201d said Stuzmann.<\/p>\n

\u201cRobby is talented,\u201c Stutzmann said succinctly.<\/p>\n

Rolovich received the most colorful read.<\/p>\n

\u201cPup. He\u2019s a puppy,\u201d Stutzmann said, laughing. \u201cBut a big dog puppy. His roof, his ceiling, is so high. But he\u2019s a puppy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Three different profiles chasing the same job with camp still deciding who closes the gap first.<\/p>\n

None of this happens in a vacuum.<\/p>\n

Whoever wins the quarterback job inherits a receiver room built to keep producing, a backfield Smith wants playing faster and looser than ever and an offensive line trying to answer its own questions up front.<\/p>\n

Stutzmann\u2019s job is to make all four parts move together and in year three with the pressure mounting, the margin for a slow start keeps shrinking.<\/p>\n

For now, the race stays close. Smooth, talented and a big dog puppy are all still in it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Chapter eight and the last of a summer series on the Spartans\u2019 position groups. This week we examine…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":420095,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[88,90,89,9393],"class_list":["post-420094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-jose","tag-san-jose","tag-san-jose-headlines","tag-san-jose-news","tag-san-jose-state-football"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=420094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/420095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=420094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=420094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=420094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}