Is it the hair?

Yes. Yes, it is. Well, except for not really. A few days after the thrilling ending of the game, I've come to this conclusion: BYU can't beat good teams with Riley Nelson as starter. That pains me to say because Riley played so well and has so much heart, grit and leadership. But, Bronco essentially admitted it himself when after the game he essentially said Utah St. had a hard time adjusting to Riley. I think if you give a good team a week to prepare for him, though, Riley is pretty limited. Even his completions were pretty awful looking (that pass he threw to a wide open DiLuigi who was maybe five yards downfield that didn't even make it to his foot was just bad). If you go back to last year, BYU got trounced by FSU and AFA when Riley was in the game. They knew they didn't have to respect the downfield pass, at all.

So, the only solution, I feel is that Jake really needs to become a man. He talks the big talk. After every game, he says "I'm going to learn from this and nobody's going to outwork me" and then he comes in and stinks it up the next week and looks even more afraid to get hit. Thus far, he is the Jimmy Claussen of BYU. Claussen had unreal talent, but he came to Notre Dame in a limo predicting four national championships. Jake did essentially the same thing, but just held a big conference announcing BYU (because Claussen had already stolen the limo idea). I think with that start, he rubbed a lot of BYU fans and players the wrong way. It is absolutely clear from the body language of the team and even post game comments by guys like Ogletree that this is still not his team. Whereas Jake has all the tools to be a good QB (that Riley doesn't), he needs to grow up and be a man. Maybe this benching has humbled him and will make him realize that he needs to play well to start. I highly doubt he has ever been benched in his entire career until that point. We'll see.