MADISON, Wis. - Football season is around the corner, so BadgerBlitz.com contributors Jon McNamara, John Veldhuis and Dan Broughton ranked the top 30 players who will make or break Wisconsin's first year under new head coach Paul Chryst.

The series will run every other day, counting down until we reveal this season's key player.

Playing time, past performance and positional depth all factored in to our individual rankings, which were combined into a final score.

No. 10: TANNER MCEVOY, S

Tanner McEvoy's turn at quarterback didn't go how he had hoped, to say the least.

In five starts under center last year McEvoy completed just 57.2 percent of his passes for 629 yards, ultimately ceding the full-time job to Joel Stave midway through UW's 20-14 loss to Northwestern on Oct. 4.

And while the Badgers managed to cobble together a two-quarterback system that tried to take advantage of McEvoy's top-tier athleticism, it was clear after Paul Chryst took over as Wisconsin's head coach that McEvoy's career at Wisconsin would continue on the other side of the ball.

The Badgers experimented with playing McEvoy at safety at the end of last season, and it didn't take long for him to rise to the top of the depth chart during spring camp. McEvoy finished camp as one of Wisconsin's two first-team safeties, and showed an ability to make plays in the passing game through out the spring.

Adding McEvoy to the mix gives the Badgers their deepest secondary in years, but his days of playing on offense might not be over yet, either. The Badgers gave McEvoy some reps at wide receiver during their last few practices of the spring, and the 6-foot-6 athlete looked pretty smooth running routes downfield and catching passes over out-matched defensive backs.

Leaving McEvoy at wide receiver might be tempting for the Badgers, who have struggled to develop a consistent passing game over the last few seasons. But McEvoy seems likely to spend most of his final season with the Badgers on defense, shoring up a defensive backfield that might have to support a young front seven in the first few weeks of the season.

This linebacker should give the Badgers some stability in their front seven.