5 Reasons Why Zach Calzada is a Good Fit for Kentucky

Zach Calzada is the fourth starting quarterback in five years to join the Kentucky football program from the transfer portal. When you tally up the traditional transfers, Mark Stoops has had eight players start games who started their college careers at another program.

The courtship of Calzada and his commitment to Kentucky was criticized by some around the BBN. Some folks remember him from his time at Texas A&M. They aren’t buying this guy as the right quarterback to help fix this anemic offense.

The initial hesitation makes sense. After all, remember our initial reaction to the Mark Pope hire? That turned out alright for BBN. Allow me to share why I think Zach Calzada is the ideal quarterback to lead the Kentucky offense.

Calzada is Elusive in the Pocket

We’re all friends, right? Let me ask you an honest question: Do you trust the Kentucky offensive line to give its quarterback time to throw the football? I don’t care who the Cats sign on the offensive line out of the portal; I’m skeptical.

Kentucky doesn’t necessarily need a running QB to be able to move the chains and score points, but I don’t think they can be successful with a statue in the pocket. When you turn on his 2023 highlights, in one of the first clips he is nearly sacked in the back of the end zone multiple times before he finds an open receiver for a 26-yard gain.

Statistics back up this anecdotal evidence. Last year, Kentucky quarterbacks were sacked 26.1% of the time they were pressured. Will Levis took about that many sacks during his 2022 season. Devin Leary was great at avoiding sacks and he still was taken down 18% of the time. Zach Calzada has a career 14.5% pressure-to-sack rate. He finds a way to find a way.

Success Despite Adversity

Calzada was an unheralded recruit from the state of Georgia. He wasn’t going to get a chance to play over a Texas quarterback at Texas A&M until that guy got hurt. It was a rocky start, but he finished his first game with a game-winning touchdown throw.

Aggie fans still refused to fall in love with the backup QB. They wanted his ass on the sideline but there was no other option. Then he took a shot and injured his leg while throwing a game-tying touchdown against Alabama, his third of the night. He gritted through that injury and led his team down the field for the win.

An injury prevented him from playing at Auburn. Instead of hanging his head, he went and put up big numbers at Incarnate Word. In his senior season, he led the school to its first-ever undefeated season in conference play and threw for just shy of 4,000 yards and 35 touchdowns. He found a way to find a way back to the SEC.

Calzada has Invaluable SEC Experience

You can knock him for being at his best in the FCS ranks, but that’s lazy. When he played in a dozen games for A&M as a redshirt freshman, he was as good as most of the quarterbacks we’ve seen in a Kentucky uniform. He had 17 touchdowns and nine picks. The last Kentucky quarterback to play a full season and throw fewer interceptions was Terry Wilson in 2018.

Unlike a first-time starter or a former ACC quarterback, he has seen what defenses will try to to do confuse a quarterback and he knows what it takes to win big games in the Southeastern Conference. You can’t measure that on the stat sheet.

He’s Got Some Shit to Him

The phrase I use in the subheading is one that Cole Cubelic likes to use to describe nasty offensive linemen. It applies to this quarterback in both his play on the field and how he acts off of it.

Calzada’s ability to ad-lib is entertaining and maddening. Similar to a Brandon Garrison three-pointer that hits the bottom of the net, there will be many, “No, no, no, no — YES!” plays with Calzada. He’s not afraid to throw a football into a tight window across the middle of the field. He won’t hesitate to find a seam in the run game, gain 15 yards, then lower his shoulder into a linebacker.

This guy also has a personality that will endear himself to Big Blue Nation. He may not be at Kerr Kriisa levels of trash-talk, but he will tell it like it is. After all, he used the Vince Carter “I got one more in me” meme to announce he’s back for one more year. If you don’t like it, he’s not afraid to chirp back online. Calzada is bringing infectious confidence to the Kentucky football team.

Yea u got another year to hate on me Robert🤣💪🏼

— Zach Calzada (@zach_calzada) December 17, 2024

Calzada is Different than his Predecessors

Zach Calzada is unlike any of the previous quarterbacks Kentucky recruited from the transfer portal. Trying the same thing over and over and expecting different results ain’t gonna cut it for this offense. He didn’t have the recruiting rating. He played in the SEC, had some success, but was humbled down to the FCS level where he did everything that was asked of him.

A big body with a big arm and quality production, he could’ve tried to test his salt in the NFL where he could have heard his name late on the third day of the draft. Instead, he’s returning to the SEC with something to prove. Calzada plays a brand of football that can inspire his teammates, similar to what we saw Stephen Johnson do during his stint in Lexington. The Kentucky offense needs a shot in the arm and this gunslinger might have the right stuff to give us an offense worth watching in 2025.