MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – West Virginia University senior quarterback Jarret Doege has been working on his moves.
 
No, not his dance moves but rather his ability to move around in the pocket a little bit more effectively this season. Pocket awareness and elusiveness are some of the things he said he's been working on this summer. 
 
"The main focus has been moving in the pocket and realizing when to run and realizing when not to take a sack," Doege said last week. "Maybe just one little, small move before making that throw helps a lot and just throwing on the run."
 
This begs the question: How does one do that without wearing shoulder pads and a helmet?
 
"Just having a bag right there in my face and making a throw with someone standing right there in my face, or just making a small move to get away from the bag and getting a couple of extra inches to where I can make a throw," he explained.
 
Doege, recently rated by The Sporting News as one of college football's top 25 quarterbacks for 2021, had a solid junior season in 2020. He completed 239-of-374 passes for 2,587 yards and 14 touchdowns with only four interceptions in leading WVU to a 6-4 record. He performed well for most of the season, the exception being the Liberty Bowl when a slow start led to him being replaced after halftime by backup Austin Kendall.
 
That game last December is now in the rearview mirror for Doege, who got out in front of the transfer craze that is now taking over college sports, coming to WVU from Bowling Green after his sophomore season in 2018.
 
Doege admits transferring to another school can be difficult because it's such a solitary process.  
 
"You don't get to come in with a class," he explained. "You're making those relationships as they commit with your class so you're coming in with a class. When you come in as a transfer, you come in all alone a little bit and it takes a little longer to develop those relationships. 
 
"For me, a kid coming from Bowling Green up to West Virginia, it was kind of like, 'Who is this guy?' A kid from Bowling Green, it's kind of hard instead of a guy from Alabama transferring out. It's like, 'Oh, he's from Alabama' so it could go either way," he said.
 
According to Doege, transferring up to the Power 5 level requires having a little bit of a chip on your shoulder. He admits there is an element of that in his game each time he steps onto the field.
 
"I play for my family, and I play to prove a lot of people wrong," he said. "I had one offer out of high school and a lot of people said I couldn't play at this level, and that's all I've ever wanted to do is prove to people that I can play with the highest competition."
 
Quarterback transfers can be particularly difficult because of the attention the position normally gets. West Virginia has had a long history of four-year transfers performing well at quarterback, including some recent ones.
 
Just in the last seven or eight years, Florida State transfer Clint Trickett and Florida transfer Will Grier enjoyed considerable success at WVU, although it's not always as easy as it appears.
 
Doege explains.
 
"Quarterback is tough either way, whether you come in as a freshman or transfer just trying to learn a whole new playbook, a whole new staff and develop relationships with the players," he said. "I tried to hang out with as many guys as I could, have a little cookout, take some linemen out to eat and do everything I could to build those relationships."
 
Doege thought the offense made some strides this past spring. West Virginia didn't have the benefit of going through a full spring practice in 2020 because of COVID-19, and that probably hindered the Mountaineers a little bit during the season because of the newness of coach Neal Brown's system.
 
Now, many of these guys have played a full season together and added a spring practice on top of that to refine things. Overall, Doege is seeing a much more confident group of offensive players right now.
 
"I think we had a really great spring," he said. "There really wasn't a bad practice - maybe an average practice - but I think that's when you are going somewhere when you have an average practice over a bad practice."
 
Doege said the strides have continued this summer with the player-led workouts.
 
"I will run the offensive player practice and the defensive guys will run the defensive practices and we'll do those about three times a week, so we're getting a lot better, and there is a huge amount of confidence in our offense right now," he said.
 
Like many other college players, Doege's confidence and understanding of the new Name, Image and Likeness (NLI) legislation that is about to be adopted in July is not quite at the same level.
 
He said he is still wrapping his arms around what it's going to mean for him and others when players are finally allowed to market themselves and make money.
 
"All we were thinking about was 'oh, we can make money' but no one knew exactly what we could do and couldn't do, so coach Brown and (football's director of 5^th quarter program) Paige (Diggs) have done a good job of teaching us what's smart and what's not smart to do," he said. "They have brought in some people to talk about contracts, taxes, investing and planning, so that's helped a lot in learning what to do when this thing comes out.
 
"I think there are going to be a lot of learning experiences with it as well. It's hard to tell really what's going to happen but they've prepared us as well as they could," he said.
With the rapid changes that continue to take place in collegiate athletics these days, not to mention the regular demands that are placed on student-athletes, you sometimes wonder if there is even enough time for athletes to be regular college students anymore?
 
Doege admits it's getting tougher.
 
"You've got to find just enough time to have some time to yourself," he said. "I will say the NLI stuff will come second for me. Football, personal health, mental health and family … all of that will come first and then I will check out the NLI stuff."
 
In the meantime, Doege's focusing on the beard that seems to be filling in quite nicely these days. Who knows, maybe he can give 2021-22 Mountaineer mascot Colson Glover a run for his money this fall?
 
"I'm rocking with it right now," he chuckled. "I'm doing a little mountain man action and my brother is growing one as well, so I'm just seeing how it goes."