101 Days of BC Football: Josh Bordner, #8

In the 2011 spring game, Maryland native Josh Bordner appeared to be Boston College’s fourth-string quarterback behind Chase Rettig, Dave Shinskie, and Mike Marscovetra. By the time his redshirt freshman season ended in November, he had climbed up to second on the depth chart, with Frank Spaziani saying that BC needed someone “different” who could give the offense a spark. Whether or not he actually did was one thing, but one thing we know in the summer of 2012 is that we’ve now narrowly avoided a quarterback controversy twice since November.

Bordner made his Boston College debut in the 38-7 meltdown against Florida State, running for 45 yards and throwing the ball twice against the Seminoles. Right away, BC fans began to wonder if the coaching staff was preparing to pull the plug on Rettig, who himself took over the starting role in the middle of a season. The answer then was no, but we kept seeing Bordner coming into football games as somewhat of a change-up by BC. When all was said and done, he appeared in five games and netted 73 rushing yards, 37 passing yards, and two rushing touchdowns. Unfortunately, towards the end of the year, the situations in which Bordner would enter for Rettig became much more obvious to opposing teams, so his impact was still limited.

Chase Rettig appeared to catch on a little at the conclusion of the season, but on March 31, 2012, Bordner’s status was again the topic of much conversation. Few will deny that Rettig had a bad spring game and that Bordner was better by default, though he himself only went 8-of-18 against an utterly decimated Eagle secondary. Once more, however, Spaziani kept Bordner as the backup and Rettig as the starter, which at this stage is the correct call.

What will Bordner’s role be in 2012: doing what he was doing last year, eventually rising to the starting role if Rettig trails off, or holding a clipboard? With Doug Martin taking charge of the offense now, I don’t know. Quarterback-by-committee has never been a favorite thing of mine, and we’re not mid-2000s Florida (see: Leak, Chris and Tebow, Tim), either. Still, one can’t help but wonder if we will see Bordner serving a more significant function on Boston College by the time the season is over.

Until he starts a real game, we still don’t know what we have in him. Will we find out in his sophomore year? Anything’s possible.