2011’s 10 Most Important Purdue Football Players: #1

The Boiling Point: Purdue’s Rob Henry checks in at No. 1 of TheBoilingPoint.com’s list of most important football players for the upcoming season.

No. 1 ROB HENRY
Year: Sophomore
Position: Quarterback
Number: 15
Key stat: 7 – started seven games under center as a redshirt freshman last season.
Analysis: It would be difficult to find many people who don’t agree with Purdue’s starting QB being the most important player on the team. Now, there has been talks of Miami transfer Robert Marve getting time there, too, but that looks unlikely right now. Marve is still missing some practice as he continues to deal with recovery from his second ACL tear to the same knee.

Back to Henry … there’s no question the team trusts and respects him. Despite playing part of just one season he was voted one of the team captains this spring, which tells you a lot about what his teammates think of him. Where Henry has to continue to progress is as a passer. Fans saw his running ability, especially in a win at Northwestern last year, but Henry struggled to give the Boilers much of a vertical threat. Now, to be fair, the receiving corps had a number of injuries last year, too, so it was hard to get any consistency going. Not to mention Henry had a vicious finger injury on his THROWING hand that slowed him down. If Henry can stay healthy and Purdue can have a couple wide outs really step up, then the sophomore QB should be able to make the needed strides in the passing game. It’s also important that he’s not looking over his shoulder wondering when he will leave the game.

If all of that can come together, Henry can help make this team bowl-eligible. If he doesn’t progress quite like he’s needed to then it’s going to be a long season.

This is part of a daily series that concludes today. Again, these are the most IMPORTANT players for this upcoming season, not necessarily best. The complete list is detailed below.. Also, do you agree or disagree? Let us hear your thoughts.

Complete list
No. 10 Carson Wiggs
No. 9 Akeem Shavers
No. 8 Dwayne Beckford
No. 7 Ricardo Allen
No. 6 Ken Plue
No. 5 Kwann Short 
No. 4 Justin Siller 
No. 3 Ralph Bolden 
No. 2 Gerald Gooden