The SEC season for Mizzou starts in earnest this weekend. While that means the quality of competition exponentially increases over all, including the talent on defense and the skill positions, what it really means is that the Tigers are now set to begin the gauntlet that is SEC quarterbacks.
Mizzou did get their feet wet a bit already, passing an early quiz by controlling kansas’s experienced quarterback Jalon Daniels. That said, Daniels, while talented, might be the eighth or ninth best quarterback the Tigers
play this season. The line of those top eight starts this week with perhaps the best of the bunch.
Now we’ll get to LaNorris Sellers’ status a bit later, but take a look at this list of forthcoming quarterbacks the Tigers have on the docket:
- LaNorris Sellers (projected first round draft pick)
- Ty Simpson (fourth year four-star junior at Alabama)
- Jackson Arnold (Five-star transfer)
- Diego Pavia (no introductions needed)
- Marcel Reed (four-star stud who put up 360 yards at Notre Dame last week)
- Blake Shapen (experienced passer who puts up big numbers in Jeff Lebby’s system)
- John Mateer (projected first round draft pick taking the SEC by storm this year)
- Taylen Green (leading the SEC in TD passes in 2025)
That’s a hell of a list and it doesn’t even include projected first round draft pick Garrett Nussmeier at LSU, Arch Manning at Texas, Austin Simmons at Ole Miss, Gunner Stockton at Georgia (and so on and so forth).
Regardless of who the Tigers don’t have to play, they DO have to play a bevy of talented signal callers who can make even the best defenses in the country sweat. Corey Batoon’s perspiration could very well start Saturday night when the best of the bunch, the Gamecocks’ LaNorris Sellers, comes to town.
At the time of publication, Sellers’ health status for Saturday’s game is completely up in the air. He went down in a heap in the second quarter of South Carolina’s blowout loss to Vanderbilt last week after taking a glancing blow to the face mask from a Commodore defensive lineman. The hit was later ruled targeting, but that meant little to Sellers, who spent the rest of the game looking woozy on the sidelines.
While coach Shane Beamer declined to give specifics on Sellers’ injury, On3 Sports’ Pete Nakos reported that Sellers suffered a concussion. Beamer did tell reporters Sunday that he was “optimistic” Sellers will be able to play this week against the Tigers, but that really doesn’t mean anything until Sellers is suited up and throwing warm up passes Saturday.
For the purposes of this argument, we’re going to assume that Sellers will be able to play Saturday. I mainly make that assumption because I’m a Mizzou fan:
Though we do have unfortunate history with South Carolina back-up quarterbacks too.
So assuming it is Sellers who suits up Saturday, he will be the biggest test the Tigers will face all season in terms of excellent quarterback play. I probably don’t need to remind Tiger fans of what Sellers did to Corey Batoon’s offense last year, but I will because I’m a glutton for punishment. In the 2024 matchup, Sellers went 21-30 for 353 yards and five touchdowns. He also time and again escaped Tigers’ pressure to make big plays downfield:
Coming into the season, the NFL draft pundits agreed with me as Sellers was slated to go early in the first round as high as second overall in 2026 NFL mock drafts.
Sellers hasn’t necessarily lit it up statistically so far this year, but he started slowly last year as well. Through his first three games in 2024 he threw for 393 total yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions. He quickly turned it around though, throwing for 2,100 yards and 18 touchdowns in his final nine games and adding an additional 500+ yards and four touchdowns on the ground.
While off to a slow start, Sellers’ numbers through three games are better this year. Despite missing more than half of the Vanderbilt game last week, Sellers has 431 yards, two touchdowns and one interception. What’s missing so far to elevate Sellers is his rushing production, as he only has 45 rushing yards and one touchdown this season. He also has been sacked seven times which has hurt those numbers, but once he unlocks his ground attack his game will elevate back to where it was when he torched the Tigers last year.
That dual-threat nature to Sellers’ game is what makes him one of the most dangerous players in the country and why he tops the list of biggest challenges the Tigers will (or should) face this year. The only other player who comes close at this point is Oklahoma’s John Mateer.
The Washington State transfer leads the SEC in passing yards thus far in 2025, throwing for 944 yards and five touchdowns as well as rushing for 161 yards and four more scores. While perhaps more explosive than Sellers, Mateer is a much less efficient passer, as he’s thrown an interception in all three of the Sooners’ games and currently stands 11th in SEC QBR. Taylen Green has also taken a step forward this season, leading the SEC in touchdown passes, but he has that hog stink on him which makes it hard to put him higher up on the list than perhaps fourth or fifth.
Regardless of how the rest of the quarterbacks rank out two through eight, Sellers remains at the top of Corey Batoon’s “oh s*t” list and will remain so until South Carolina back up Luke Doty runs out on the field or the Tigers are able to exact revenge on their last second lost in Columbia East last year. Either way, the season of ceiling raising starts Saturday for the Mizzou defense. Let’s hope they are up for the task.
