Texas Football: 3 reasons Sam Ehlinger is better than Spencer Rattler

2) Why Texas football QB Sam Ehlinger is better than Spencer Rattler: Turnover bug

It’s way too early to tell if Rattler is going to have turnover problems down the road, but the signs he showed down the stretch in Oklahoma’s loss to Kansas State over the weekend would point to that possible red flag. He tossed three picks in the loss to Kansas State, one of which wasn’t really Rattler’s fault.

Although compared to Ehlinger, Rattler could have a tough time keeping up in terms of touchdown-to-interception ratio. During his sophomore campaign, Ehlinger set the Big 12 record for most passing attempts without an interception. Over the course of about the last two and a half years, Ehlinger tossed just 16 picks. He did have one interception against Texas Tech, but that wasn’t the worst mistake ever.

And that is the lone interception for Ehlinger through six games this year.

This was the first time in more than four years that an Oklahoma starting quarterback had three interceptions thrown in a single game. While this is also the first time that Riley started a redshirt freshman at quarterback as Oklahoma’s head coach, it was the greatest of performances when it mattered the most.

Rattler did have more interceptions than most quarterbacks would have in high school from a prospect of his caliber. He tossed more than 30 picks in the last three years of his run with Pinnacle High School in Phoenix, AZ.

This is certainly a storyline to watch moving forward.

Up to this point in Ehlinger’s career, the only time where things really broke down in the turnover department to this degree was against the TCU Horned Frogs in a loss on the road last season. He had four picks in that game, but that is the lone outing for Ehlinger in his career with more than two picks.