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Boston College has looked significantly better since Bill O’Brien made the decision to bench Thomas Castellanos in favor of Grayson James. The quarterback opted to quit the team in the wake of that demotion, and while his former head coach was initially pretty diplomatic about that development, that is firmly no longer the case.
The Boston College Eagles have been mired in mediocrity since the end of the Matt Ryan Era, and the team suffered what seemed like it could be a debilitating setback when head coach Jeff Hafley abruptly left the program well after the start of last year’s hiring cycle to join the Packers as their new defensive coordinator.
However, the situation panned out about as well as it could when Bill O’Brien agreed to leave Ohio State just a few weeks after agreeing to become their offensive coordinator to head to Chestnut Hill.
The Eagles still headed into the season with pretty low expectations, but they briefly appeared in the Top 25 with the help of a win over what was supposed to be a talented Florida State squad and seemed to be trending in the right direction with the help of the veteran skipper and a promising dual-threat QB in the form of Thomas Castellanos.
Castellanos transferred from UCF prior to the start of the 2023 campaign and was far and away the most electric player on the Boston College roster last year. Fans had pretty high hopes for the QB heading into the 2024 season, but it became increasingly clear he was holding the team back as the year progressed thanks to his inability to throw deep and a tendency to make plenty of questionable decisions in the pocket that came back to bite the team.
Those struggles were on full display when Boston College faced off against Syracuse on November 9th, and O’Brien ultimately opted to bench Castellanos in favor of Grayson James.
The backup helped the Eagles secure the victory and was subsequently named the starter, which led to the man he replaced deciding to quit the team in the middle of the season with plans to enter the transfer portal.
James helped BC give SMU a run for its money in his first start after the promotion and looked pretty good in their decisive win over UNC on Saturday, and it certainly looks like he’s an upgrade from Castellanos based on how he’s fared so far.
It certainly sounds like O’Brien agrees with that sentiment based on what he had to say during a conversation Andrea Kremer recapped on We Need to Talk.
— Newton Woods Jedi (@NewtonJedi) November 24, 2024
Castellano’s former coach did not mince words while assessing the situation, saying:
“We brought in Castellanos, and told him we were making him second-team and for him to view it as an opportunity to sit back, learn, improve, work hard, and be ready. He didn’t like it and he left the team
Ninety-nine percent of our guys are tough and smart. He was an outlier at BC.”
Dang, Bill. Tell us how you really feel.