Did Aaron Roderick Call Plays Last Year? Zach Wilson Seems to Insinuate So

BYU promoted Aaron Roderick to offensive coordinator in early January after former OC Jeff Grimes left to Baylor. Roderick was passing game game coordinator and QB coach for three seasons from 2018-2020.

Some have speculated that Roderick took over playing calling duties from Grimes at some point during their three years together. This has never been confirmed and the staff always said that offensive game planning was a collaborative effort. Zach Wilson, however, seemed to confirm that Roderick, at least in part, called plays last season.

During a press conference Saturday night after the Jets scrimmage, a reporter asked Wilson if he had ever received play calls from the booth. Below is Wilson’s answer. Keep in mind that Roderick was in the booth all of last season and Grimes was on the sideline.

“Yeah, my coordinator last year called plays upstairs. He would relay to the sideline in college and he (the sideline) would give hand signals in.”

Grimes was still undoubtedly a big part of BYU’s offense, especially in offensive line development. And play calling could have still been a collaborative effort. Grimes could have focused more on run and Roderick more on passing plays. But the fact that Roderick played a substantial role in play calling last year means that he was a huge part of the offensive planning and that that the play calling from BYU’s offense shouldn’t look all that different than it did last year. A year of play-calling experience for Roderick — in addition to his time as Utah OC — will smooth the transition this year as he is now full-time offensive coordinator.

We’ll get a chance to see Roderick and BYU’s offense 27 days from now when they take on Arizona.