Inside The Huskies

Pac-12's Top 10 Football Players — Then and Now

We take a stab at singling out the league's elite without any magazine deadlines.

Dan Raley

In this story:

One of the challenges in publishing a college football preview magazine — and I know this personally from having been an Athlon Sports contributor for 17 years and still going — is the information has to be put together by early April in order to get the issue on the supermarket shelves by June. 

The danger in this is things can change. With the transfer portal, they can shift dramatically.

With that in mind, the new Lindy's magazine out for inspection offers a Pac-12 top 10 player list that caught our eye. It's fairly representable list with a few surprises. While admittedly no two people will ever agree on compiling something such as this, we've spotted a couple of unavoidable omissions right off. Also, we can agree to disagree on some of the other names. 

LINDY'S TOP 10

1) Noah Sewell, LB, Oregon

2) Clark Phillips, CB, Utah

3) Tanner McKee, QB, Stanford

4) Zach Charbonnet, RB, UCLA

5) Zion Tupuola-Fetui, ER, Washington

6) Dalton Kincaid, TE, Utah

7) Justin Flowe, LB, Oregon

8) Kyu Blue Kelley, CB, Stanford

 9) Merlin Robertson, LB, Arizona State

 10) Andrew Voorhees, OT, USC

The Lindy's list is curiously devoid of quarterbacks and linemen, offering just one of each. Maybe, the players at those positions simply aren't that good. Refreshingly, the mag didn't put down three or four USC players just for the sake of doing it.

That said, here's another stab at singling out the conference's elite players with time on our side and comments attached:

RALEY'S TOP 10

1) Jordan Addison, WR, USC — He was at Pittsburgh when the magazines were ready to go to press. He brings 100 receptions for 1,593 yards and 17 touchdowns to Los Angeles as a transfer and is widely regarded as the nation's top pass-catcher. 

2) Noah Sewell, LB, Oregon — He's the Pac-12's best defensive player and a returning first-team, all-conference selection. The Ducks have hit the motherlode with the Sewell family, rallying around Noah after lining up behind his brother Penai, an offensive lineman now in the NFL.

3) Zach Charbonnet, RB, UCLA — The former Michigan back and powerful runner comes off a season in which he posted 7 100-yard games, including 167 against USC, 131 against UW and 117 against LSU

4) Zion Tupuola-Fetui, ER, Washington — This pass rusher was the league's most dominant defensive player before he ruptured his Achilles and he's needed time to get it right again. He should be ready to return to the form that brought him 7 sacks in 4 games in 2020.

5) Clark Phillips, CB Utah — The Ute defender comes off a second-team All-Pac-12 season in which he provided lockdown coverage, intercepting a pair of passes and returning one for a score.

6) Jaxson Kirkland, OL, Washington — Seeking a sixth season and missing a deadline to make that happen, Kirkland didn't have his NCAA eligibility settled when the magazines called it a wrap. He's back now as the league's best offensive lineman, a two-time, first-team All-Pac-12 choice. 

7) Jayden de Laura, QB, Arizona — Lindy's tabbed Stanford's Tanner McKee as the league's top QB. We think it's de Laura, who won Pac-12 Freshman of the Year honors and used his arm and legs to lead Washington State to a historic romp over the Huskies. Arizona will build around him. McKee got handled by the Huskies. 

8) Kyu Blue Kelley, CB, Stanford — Another talented corner, he likewise was a second-unit all-conference selection after breaking up 10 passes and intercepting two, and running one back for a score against USC.  

9) Caleb Williams, QB, USC — You can never have too many quarterbacks on a top 10 list. A second-team All-Big 12 pick from Oklahoma, Williams threw for 1,912 yards and 21 touchdowns while starting just seven games.  

10) T.J. Bass, OL, Oregon — The tough-guy junior from Deming, Washington, which is located at the base of Mount Baker, has started the past 20 games for the Ducks. If Kirkland isn't the league's best up front, this guy is. 

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Dan Raley
DAN RALEY

Dan Raley has worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, as well as for MSN.com and Boeing, the latter as a global aerospace writer. His sportswriting career spans four decades and he's covered University of Washington football and basketball during much of that time. In a working capacity, he's been to the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the MLB playoffs, the Masters, the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship and countless Final Fours and bowl games.

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