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Spring practice is just a few short months away, and enough teams have upcoming quarterback quandaries to have the general SEC population more than a little uneasy. Half of the conference — Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, LSU, Ole Miss, South Carolina and Vanderbilt — will have a new quarterback next year or have an open competition for the job, a number that dropped after Kenny Hill’s decision to transfer from Texas A&M last week.
How impactful will those open positions be? We run down the list of those six battles, from the least to most impactful on the SEC landscape in 2015.
7. Vanderbilt — Derek Mason simply needs to settle on who he wants to play quarterback early on. The Commodores won’t be ready to compete yet, but having a quarterback from day one will be a huge improvement over the four passers Vandy gave playing time to in 2014.
6. South Carolina — Connor Mitch is more than likely the man for the job, with little competition behind him. However, the Gamecocks are going to be thin on offense while the defense is still trying to rebuild from the recent talent exodus. Whether Mitch, incoming freshman Lorenzo Nunez or former walk-on Perry Orth starts, the Gamecocks will be inexperienced at signal caller in what’s already shaping up to be a down year.
5. Auburn — The Tigers already have their quarterback of the future lined up in Jeremy Johnson. The biggest question for Auburn is making sure that Gus Malzahn’s explosive offense continues to function as well as it did with Nick Marshall calling the shots.
4. Georgia — When Mark Richt brought in Brian Schottenheimer as his offensive coordinator, he guaranteed that the Bulldogs will be as run-centric as ever going forward, not a bad thing with the talent at running back. Georgia will still need a quarterback capable of managing the game and making good decisions with the ball, which Richt and Schottenheimer will likely turn to Brice Ramsey to do.
3. Ole Miss — Once again, the Rebels should have a championship-caliber defense. The question will be if the offense can keep up. Bo Wallace was many things both good and bad, but he was there for Hugh Freeze this year. Now, Freeze is left to decide between Chad Kelly, who has already proven to be a headache, DeVante Kincade or someone else.
2. LSU — The Tigers, just like Ole Miss, will have top-notch talent all over the roster, even more so on offense than the Rebels. While LSU has two quarterbacks on the roster, one (Anthony Jennings) was inefficient and unproductive in 2014, while the other (Brandon Harris) couldn’t beat him out for the job. Unless LSU ends up bringing in a transfer quarterback, the options aren’t great and could hold the Tigers back from reaching their potential.
1. Alabama — Nick Saban’s team is expected to be a championship contender every year, especially with four straight No. 1 recruiting classes and a fifth on the way. The Crimson Tide certainly have enough talent at quarterback, with Florida State transfer Jacob Coker, former four-star recruit David Cornwell and incoming five-star Blake Barnett. The problem is that none of them has any real game experience, and if one of the freshmen wins the job over Coker, Alabama is looking at having an unsure quarterback for the first time in years.
A former freelance journalist from Philadelphia, Brett has made the trek down to SEC country to cover the greatest conference in college football.
