Auburn LB Deshaun Davis, Gus Malzahn impressed with Jarrett Stidham’s start to training camp
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Despite the strong start to his Auburn career, Jarrett Stidham hasn’t won over all his critics. If you missed this earlier in the week, an anonymous SEC coach (speaking to Sports Illustrated) called out a few flaws in Stidham’s game that he claims came out late last season.
The SI article doesn’t reference that fact that Stidham was injured and required surgery on his non-throwing shoulder during the offseason, which forced him to miss the majority of spring practice on The Plains. Now back on the field with two healthy shoulders, Stidham has impressed those that have watched him during practice.
While Gus Malzahn noted that three interceptions were thrown during the team’s most recent practice, Stidham claims none of those came from balls he threw.
During his recent media availability, linebacker Deshaun Davis offered up this take on what he’s seen from Stidham thus far in training camp.
“If you could see the scrimmage, you would think he’s practiced every day since the spring,” Davis said regarding Stidham. “They made some big throws downfield, protecting the back shoulder. He was very accurate today. He looked good in the pocket.”
Stidham offered up his own take, noting he did well but there’s always room for improvement.
“I thought I did alright,” the quarterback said. “Obviously, some things to work on but I thought for the first day, collectively as a unit, we did some really good things. Made some positive plays down the field. Trying to see some of these running backs and they took care of the ball, so that was good to see. I thought the offensive line played really well.”
Here’s what Malzahn offered up on his quarterback’s return.
“I thought he looked really natural. He’s off to a good start. It feels different with him out there. It should,” Malzahn noted.
If he returns to the form that helped lead the Tigers to an incredible November run — he completed 73.4 percent of his passes during the final four regular season games and had an eight to one touchdown to interception ratio while throwing for over 200 yards in each game — despite facing off against two top-ranked teams, the sky is the limit for this Auburn team.
Going up against the Auburn defense should certainly help Stidham prepare for just about any unit he’ll see come the fall.
“Our defense is our defense, and they’re going to be lights-out just about every single day,” Stidham following the team’s recent practice. “So it was good to go up against them finally and get some good reps.”
A graduate of the University of Tennessee, Michael Wayne Bratton oversees the news coverage for Saturday Down South. Michael previously worked for FOX Sports and NFL.com
