From making Heisman buzz and being an early draft pick to becoming a complete disappointment, Garrett Nussmeier’s fate turned fast. This season has been throwing curveballs at him since the start, as he’s dealing with an abdominal strain, which has impacted his performance. Then, a lousy offensive line and rushing attack just made it worse. The final nail in the coffin, you may ask? He made a critical error against Alabama that didn’t just bench him but also drew visible disappointment from his interim head coach.

After getting benched against Texas A&M in their home loss, Garrett Nussmeier’s inconsistency once again pulled him out of the game. With 9:41 minutes remaining in the third quarter, Nussmeier made a rookie mistake on 3rd and goal. To avoid the three-man rush, he moved the wrong way and went straight to Bama’s Edge Yhonzae Pierre, who sacked him for a 14-yard loss. That rushing decision didn’t just end the drive for them but also showed his lack of decision-making.

That’s when Frank Wilson had to take the tough call of benching him for Michael Van Buren. Talking about his move after the game, he said, “Yeah, so as we discussed as a staff, we knew they there could be opportunities in the quarterback run game, and then at the back end, as they tried to bring closure to it, they would make it difficult to just sit in the pocket. And so we wanted to move them around and do some things. We thought that he gave us a chance to do those things.”

It’s not like Nussmeier was bad from the start; he started with 9 for 9, but then LSU’s sloppy offensive line made things worse for them. Then, Bama frequently added 7 or 8 men in coverage against the Tigers, who have struggled throughout this season in the run game. Even with a minimal pass rush, Garrett could feel the pressure. Despite that, he ended the game by completing 18 of 21 passes for 121 yards with no touchdowns.

Even Wilson praised Nussmeier’s efforts, saying, “I thought [Garrett Nussmeier] did some good things early on. We moved him out of the pocket, and I thought he started the game off extremely well. As we went into the depths of the game, we just thought it was an opportunity for us to change up, to throw their defense off. And so we went with the change.” But despite the change, Buren couldn’t do much, as Alabama held him to 3 for 9 passes with 36 yards and just one rush for 6 yards.

With Garrett Nussmeier, even LSU’s interim coach, Frank Wilson’s debut turned disappointing as he took over after Brian Kelly’s departure. The Tigers got penalized 10 times and were limited to just nine points in four red-zone visits against the Crimson Tide. With this, LSU lost for the second time against Kalen DeBoer’s team.

But with this QB change, an interesting factor comes to light with Buren’s redshirt status.

Is Michael Van Buren LSU’s best shot?

After playing in 8 games last season as QB1 for Mississippi State, Michael Van Buren signed with LSU in December. His dominance was evident in those games as he completed 140 of 256 passes for 1,886 yards with 11 touchdowns and 7 interceptions. He even added 5 rushing touchdowns. He was named SEC freshman of the season after passing for 306 yards and a career-best 3 TDs against Georgia in Week 5.

But coming into LSU, he served as a backup QB for Garrett Nussmeier. Now that he will go pro next season, there’s a high chance that Buren will take up the reins. He showed flashes of excellence against the Aggies and Alabama. Now, if he’s planning on staying longer at LSU, he can play in up to four games before he loses his chance to use 2025 as his redshirt year. And his game against Alabama was his third appearance.

Now, it will be interesting to see who Frank Wilson goes with. Who do you think it will be? Let us know in the comments.

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