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UCLA Football: Wilton Speight adds depth to Bruins’ quarterback situation

By Andrew Miller

ANN ARBOR, MI - SEPTEMBER 9: Wilton Speight #3 of the Michigan Wolverines drops back to pass during the first quarter of the game against the Cincinnati Bearcats at Michigan Stadium on September 9, 2017 in Ann Arbor, Michigan.(Photo by Leon Halip/Getty Images)
ANN ARBOR, MI - SEPTEMBER 9: Wilton Speight #3 of the Michigan Wolverines drops back to pass during the first quarter of the game against the Cincinnati Bearcats at Michigan Stadium on September 9, 2017 in Ann Arbor, Michigan.(Photo by Leon Halip/Getty Images) /
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Some of the biggest news coming out of the grad transfer market yet this off-season gave UCLA football a boost in the quarterback depth, in Wilton Speight.

UCLA football landed a huge pickup on the graduate transfer market on April 12, by hauling in the former Michigan Wolverines starting quarterback Wilton Speight. This all comes in the wake of a former UCLA grad transfer commit, former Washington Huskies signal caller K.J. Carta-Samuels, who flipped his decision from the Bruins.

Carta-Samuels decided to take his talents to join the Colorado State Rams, back in January of this year. However, first-year UCLA head coach Chip Kelly did not seem phased by the loss of Carta-Samuels in the quarterback competition for the 2018 campaign.

Yet, the focus here lies with how Speight fits into UCLA’s current offensive situation. The other options for the Bruins sit with rising sophomore Devon Modster and incoming freshman four-star dual-threat prospect Dorian Thompson-Robinson. The future of the program should be Thompson-Robinson, but Modster is a solid young option too, that has quite a few years left of eligibility at the college level.

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Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh had little to no room on the roster for Speight at this point, especially with former Ole Miss Rebels star Shea Patterson coming into Ann Arbor. If Patterson is eligible to play this fall, he could take the Michigan offense to a whole new level.

Speight does not seem like the prototypical quarterback for the offensive system that Kelly likes to run. Both Modster and Thompson-Robinson seem like better fits for what Kelly is trying to do. However, having an experienced option on the roster, at least to start the season, is never a bad thing.

The non-conference slate stacks up very tough for the Bruins. Of the three non-conference opponents, all of them are going to be tough outs. Things start off with the Cincinnati Bearcats, and then against the Oklahoma Sooners and Fresno State Bulldogs.

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Giving Speight the nod to just get all the skill position players surrounding the quarterback to start off the regular season slate is a great possible move for the Bruins. Modster and Thompson-Robinson don’t have anything close to the valuable experience that Speight has from Michigan.

This is a huge land to bolster the quarterback depth for UCLA. Speight is a fantastic bridge to whoever is the permanent solution for the Bruins under center.

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