Herbstreit: Clemson's "out of the playoff discussion" minus Bryant

On Monday Clemson's quarterback, Kelly Bryant stated that his ankle was 80-85 percent healthy when meeting with the media. Today on College Football Live, ESPN's Joey Galloway and Kirk Herbstreit discussed what Bryant's comments could mean for Clemson moving forward.

Galloway first stated, "When you're talking about an ankle for a quarterback that runs the football, then that is a big 20 to 15 percent. Now if he was a pocket-passer that was just going to stand there and deliver the ball downfield, that is a different conversation."

"When you think about 80-85 percent, it always depends, when you are talking football, where that 15 percent is located and what it means to your ability to do your job. We saw him last against Syracuse with the ankle situation, he didn't look good when he was trying to run."

"I would hope that if on Saturday, he was 85 percent, that he would sit this game out and just get ready for the next game."  

Herbstreit responded, "This is a huge deal. Not just for this week against Georgia Tech, we are all just kind of assuming that Clemson is going to do what they did last year. Lost to Pitt, had a couple of games left at the end of the regular season, righted the ship, won the ACC Championship and off the went into the playoff and eventually won it all in beating Alabama. But that's with the assumption that Kelly Bryant can run and that he is healthy."

Herbstreit went on to say, "This is not Deshaun Watson back there just throwing BBs all over the field with Mike Williams and Jordan Leggett and company. This is a team that has been able to build an identity around the quarterback run game as a real threat. It wasn't as big a threat with Deshaun Watson; it is with Kelly Bryant. So at 80 to 85 percent, and you're one tackle away from that going down to 60 percent because you're not just sitting, like Joey said, in the pocket protecting it."

"It affects the game plan and how they're going to call this game against Georgia Tech. That is not good news. He'll recover from the concussion and sounds like he's okay on that front. That ankle is big, not just this week, but for the rest of the year. Ankles just don't just heal unless you give them time. If he's out playing this week, that thing is going to linger all year long. He's an ankle turn away from Cooper getting in there and Clemson at that point, they're out of the playoff discussion."