Cal Football 2024 Season Preview Part 2: The Offense

Cal has added nearly an entire starting lineup of portal talent, but this side of the ball still begins and ends with one man: Jaydn Ott

Part 1: Back from the Dead?

For the first time ever in the Justin Wilcox era, there’s good reason to believe entering the season that the offense will be the best unit on the team. Will the conventional wisdom hold? Let’s dive in:

2023 Offense, revisited

2023 season in review

Rather than repeat myself, I’ll mostly just refer back to what I wrote back in mid-January when I looked back at the 2023 offense (as well as my own pre-season predictions) so that I can focus on trying to catch up on this year’s roster following another offseason of portal madness. Just click on the link above if you need a refresher on what went down last year.

Unit Summaries

Quarterback

Projected starter: sophomore Fernando Mendoza

Depth: senior Chandler Rogers, sophomore CJ Harris

This is the deepest QB depth chart in the Wilcox era - having three guys with actual on-field D1 experience is quite a rarity for many programs. Of course, two of those guys (Mendoza and Harris) only have roughly a half season’s worth of experience, so I don’t want to oversell things. The larger point: Cal is in good position to weather injuries to the most important position with minimal drop-off in play.

But I’m burying the lede here: who’s actually going to win the starting job out of camp, and who is going to earn the bulk of the playing time once the season gets serious?

I don’t know. I put Fernando up top because he’s the guy that won the job last year, he’s the guy who catalyzed Cal’s season turnaround, and he’s the guy who comes into the season with experience in Cal’s system and chemistry with Cal’s receivers. He’s the sentimental favorite.

But there are arguments in favor of Chandler Rogers - scroll down for more below.

Offensive Line

Projected starters:

LT: freshman Nick Morrow
LG: senior Rush Reimer
C: junior Matthew Wycoff
RG: junior Sioape Vatikani
RT: senior T.J. Session

Depth: senior Will McDonald, sophomore Trent Ramsey, junior Bastian Swinney, sophomore Braden Miller, senior Victor Stoffel

The right side of the line is a (barring injury) stone cold lock with Vatikani and Session both well entrenched. The left side of the line is much more fluid and there are multiple camp battles in progress. I’ve made my best guess from practice reports and recruiting rankings but offensive line is always among the hardest to project.

By the way, if you haven’t been closely tracking portal comings and goings, Cal’s additions are Reimer (30 starts with FCS Montana State), Miller (0 starts with Michigan State), Stoffel (20 starts with Temple) and McDonald (26 starts with Coastal Carolina). All three are involved in positional battles and I’d expect to see all of them on the field at some point, whether starting or not.

Running Back

Projected starter: junior Jaydn Ott

Depth: sophomore Byron Cardwell, senior Kadarius Calloway, sophomore Justin Williams-Thomas

It’s the Jaydn Ott show in what he has already stated will be his final year in Berkeley before heading to the NFL, and he’s the unquestioned star of the team. But Cal made more solid portal additions, highlighted by Byron Cardwell, who was talented enough to get playing time as a true freshman at Oregon. Kadarius Calloway comes from Old Dominion and will battle it out with returner Justin Williams-Thomas for 3rd string carries.

Tight End

Projected starters: sophomore Jack Endries, senior Corey Dyches

Depth: junior J.T. Byrne, junior Jeffrey Johnson

I don’t actually think that Cal will regularly start two tight ends, but they probably will run plenty of two tight end formations, and I don’t think there’s much doubt that Endries and Dyches will get the bulk of the snaps. Endries established himself as a reliable receiver with 35 catches in his freshman campaign, and he’s now joined by Maryland transfer Dyches, who totaled 107 catches, including 49 last year. Considering that last year’s all-ACC tight ends managed 41 and 39 catches respectively, I think there’s an argument that Cal might have the best tight end duo in the conference.

Wide Receiver

Projected starters: junior Tobias Merriweather, junior Trond Grizzell, junior Mikey Matthews

Depth: sophomore Kyion Grayes, junior Jonathan Brady, senior Mason Starling, junior Mavin Anderson

Thanks to both graduations and portal departures, Cal had to largely rebuild this position group, and three portal additions are expected to be major contributors. Merriweather (former 4 star recruit from Notre Dame) Grayes (former 4 star recruit from Ohio State) and Matthews (former 4 star recruit from Utah) are all going to be in the rotation. None of them are sure things, but all of them are young enough and talented enough that there’s reason for optimism even with a relative lack of on-field chemistry or time in Berkeley. Jonathan Brady (transfer from New Mexico State) should add solid veteran experience after getting lots of playing time for the Aggies.

Defining Questions

Can Cal make the right choice at starting quarterback from the jump?

Last year, Cal screwed up their starting quarterback evaluation, and it cost them a win over Auburn and gave them an almighty scare against Idaho and Arizona State. But they finally settled on Fernando Mendoza in time to save the season and earn bowl eligibility.

This year, however, Cal isn’t choosing between three virtually unknown options. Instead, Cal will be choosing between two very well known options in Mendoza and Chandler Roger, plus Ohio transfer CJ Harris.

While camp rumblings indicate that Harris (who, to be fair, is coming from one of the better MAC programs) has acquitted himself well, I’m going to assume that the top two spots are between Mendoza and Rogers. So let’s look at the objective facts, such as they are:

Experience:

Advantage Rogers - he has 36 games played and 921 passing attempts compared to Mendoza’s eight games and 243 attempts. Though Mendoza does have more time working with Mike Bloesch and Cal’s current offensive system.

Opponent quality:

Advantage Mendoza - his eight starts all came against power 5 opposition. Meanwhile, Rogers has very limited experience against higher end competition, with games in 2022 against Texas and Alabama (and brief back-up cameo against Cal last year with North Texas) making up the bulk of his experience. Having to go against Texas and Alabama level talent probably isn’t a very fair measure, and those games didn’t go particularly well, so it’s a question mark.

Passing stats:

Advantage Rogers. Mendoza and Rogers both have similar completion percentages, but Rogers had more yards/attempt last year (8.0 vs. 7.0) and a better touchdown-to-interception ratio both last year and across his entire career.

Rushing stats:

A wash? Both QBs are around 2 yards/carry on their career and neither would run the ball as anything other than a change of pace or to keep a defense honest.

Of course, the battle is going to come down to who looks better in camp, and also probably who looks better in live action against UC Davis. It would not surprise me at all if they get similar amounts of playing time in week 1, but Cal absolutely needs to figure this out quickly, because week two brings Auburn on the road and it would be a real bummer if an inability to pick the right QB cost Cal an SEC win two years in a row.

Can the Cal offensive line take another step forward?

Last year, against my own prediction, the Cal line went from probably the worst line in power conference football to roughly power conference average. And I trust Mike Bloesch as a coach enough to assume that average line play is something of a baseline expectation for 2024, even with a decent amount of turnover.

But is there room for another step forward? It’s possible! Cal portaled in twice as many offensive lineman (4) as they did the year prior (2) and three of those linemen have significant on-field experience. Combine that with a few returning rotation players and a couple of guys potentially ready to contribute after redshirt seasons and there’s reason to believe that the floor is higher than last year, and that the ceiling might be higher as well.

How far can Jaydn Ott carry this team?

Look, let’s be real: this is Jaydn Ott’s team. He’s a generational back that will win you a handful of games with his abilities. Cal got increasingly creative getting the ball into his hands last year and there’s no reason to think that 2024 will be any different. He’s a complete back, one of the most balanced running backs in Cal history, and there is every reason to believe that he’ll put his stamp on the season from start to finish.

Final Outlook

For maybe the first time under Justin Wilcox, I feel like there’s a high degree of variance for the Cal offense.

A significant amount of that variance is due to roster turnover that is all but inherent to the modern structure of college football. After all, Cal is basically one lineman away from being able to roll out a credible starting lineup made up entirely of transfer portal players.

But there are likely bets in the portal, and then there are high variance guys in the portal. Cal’s WRs are pretty high variance because of the high recruiting rankings mixed with inconsistent playing time/production. Cal’s portal lineman are high variance because they’re all either stepping up in level of competition and/or haven’t seen enough of the field to be a sure thing.

Throw in a QB battle as the high variance cherry on top and you can see how there are many different directions things could go this year.

It’s entirely possible that Cal has, by far, the best offense of the Justin Wilcox era. Wait, no, that might make it sound like I’m damning the ceiling this year with faint praise. This is an offense that could push into a top 25 level, it could perhaps be something like the 3rd best offense in the ACC. If Cal finds the right starting offensive line, if they make the right choice at QB, if their transfer WRs are ready to deliver on their recruiting rankings, and all of those pieces cohesively revolve around the kind of rare talent they have at starting running back, then there’s no real weakness and a couple of obvious strengths.

On the other hand, when you are turning over somewhere between five to ten out of eleven starting spots, you start to worry about how quickly the team can find chemistry and cohesion. Is there a center that can call out a protection? Have the WRs learned their routes? Does the QB know where they like the ball? Is everybody ready to execute a run/pass option? There’s downside risk here.

But ultimately, what I come back to, is that about 20 times a game, Cal will be handling the ball off to Jaydn Ott, the best running back in at least 13 years. When you have that kind of player making up that much of your offense, it’s really hard not to move the ball.

Even better, Cal will probably only face a couple of high end defenses. Florida State should be very good, and NC State and Auburn are projected to be borderline top 25, but this team has enough talent that if things are working well they should be putting up points in nearly every game this season.

I’m ultimately optimistic. Optimistic because I think there’s enough playable talent across the roster, because I think this offensive staff is sharp enough to make the right choices, and because you’d be dumb not to bet on Jaydn Ott.

Prediction: Cal ends the season as the 5th best offense in the ACC, and the gap between Cal and the best offense in the conference isn’t as big as you’d think.