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Orgeron’s not lying: QB is open
Published 6:41 pm Sunday, April 22, 2018
<div class="article_viewer_container"><div class="this_article"><div id="articleViewerPopup_articleViewer" class="article_viewer ArticleViewer text use-3d ltr" data-olive-control="ArticleViewer"><div class="animation-wrapper"><div class="align-wrapper offset-wrapper"><div class="zoom-wrapper"><div class="article" lang="en" xml_lang="en" data-view-mode="text"><div class="Content"><p class="indent">BATON ROUGE — ESPN wrankled a few feathers in these parts with its recent prediction that LSU will win a grand total of six games next season.</p><p class="indent">Hey, don’t fret. That’s bowl-eligible in this day and age.</p><p class="indent">But suffice it to say, more will be expected.</p><p class="indent">The network did not identify the science who came up with a .500 season for the Tigers.</p><p class="indent">But purple-and-gold emotions are easily annoyed at such proclamations.</p><p class="indent">Maybe the Tigers can play the no-respect card.</p><p class="indent">But if LSU’s spring game was an early chance to refute the dire notion, the Tigers might want to burn the tapes, particularly early, even though it was on the ESPN-owned SEC Network and the world-wide leader presumably has copies.</p><p class="indent">That’s not really a cause for deeper alarm.</p><p class="indent">What that made it was a spring game, and all that suggests, which mainly is a once-a-year chance to set the game of football back 50 years, except they throw a lot more.</p><p class="indent">It was a nice, nostalgic touch that, with LSU’s stat computers on the fritz, stats were hand-scribbled for the press box vultures just like in the days of leather helmets and telegraph.</p><p class="indent">Still, it was hard to know what to make of the game.</p><p class="indent">If you want to scan the country and overanalyze the wide array of spring games, you’d come to the conclusion that no team will crack the .500 mark next season.</p><p class="indent">In LSU’s case, as Orgeron said, it was a lot of “fumbled snaps, people going the wrong way, people jumping offsides, dropping the football. That stalls drives.”</p><p class="indent">Orgeron spent most of the spring begging for patience and warning fans not to expect much — they should know better by now, but it was a nice gesture on his part — pointing out that among other things only 35 percent of the offense had been installed.</p><p class="indent">That doesn’t sound like a very efficient spring, but apparently it is part of the master plan.</p><p class="indent">And the game got better, smoother anyway, as it went along, enough so to leave Orgeron pleased overall.</p><p class="indent">Maybe the tough stuff is out of the way and it’s just bells and whistles still to make an appearance.</p><p class="indent">Maybe by the fall, they’ll add some running plays.</p><p class="indent">Spoiler alert: Even when the Les Miles/Cam Cameron cartel was (stubbornly) running the offense (mostly off tackle), the spring game tended to turn into an aerial circus.</p><p class="indent">So don’t make too much of the way the ball was flying all over Tiger Stadium, although new offensive coordinator Steve Ensminger has threatened to carry it over into the fall.</p><p class="indent">“We love to do that,” Orgeron said. “We started out throwing the short, intermediate routes, but we wanted to hit them deep, especially when we get 1-on-1 coverage. They can throw the football downfield, that’s what you saw.”</p><p class="indent">They’ll need to work on catching it a little more often.</p><p class="indent">The White team was basically the first-team offense against the first-team defense attired in purple.</p><p class="indent">Do the vice-versa and with the Purples you mostly had the No. 2s against the No. 2s.</p><p class="indent">All three quarterbacks were in-game free agents, free to swap squads at any time on the whim of the coaches.</p><p class="indent">The biggest impression from the game?</p><p class="indent">Orgeron may not have been just spewing gumbo when he declared all spring that the quarterback race was far from over.</p><p class="indent">Don’t assume anything.</p><p class="indent">It might even still be a three-way race between (presumed favorite) Myles Brennan and left-handers Lowell Narcisse and Justin McMillan.</p><p class="indent">McMillan, assumed by most to be third in the pecking order, actually looked like the better option Saturday.</p><p class="indent">None threw for better than 50 percent, but the offense seemed to move smoother more often with McMillan under center.</p><p class="indent">“Justin played better than the others,” Orgeron said. “That’s a fact.”</p><p class="indent">But he also said it could easily be a different story if LSU played another game today. One day one quarterback stands out, the next another looks like the guy.</p><p class="indent">McMillan was 14 of 29, for whatever that’s worth, and for 216 yards. Brennan was 11 of 23 for 113 yards, Narcisse was 6 of 14 for 205 yards.</p><p class="indent">Orgeron isn’t just dragging this thing out.</p><p class="indent">“We have some guys that are coming. You saw that,” he said. “If we had a quarterback that had been dominant all spring and was the clear leader we’d name a starter.</p><p class="indent">“But we haven’t seen one. The quarterback competition will stay open. We’ve got to find out who plays best in camp.”</p><p class="indent">I was skeptical.</p><p class="indent">But now I believe him.</p></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>
<div class="this_article"><div id="articleViewerPopup_articleViewer" class="article_viewer ArticleViewer text use-3d ltr" data-olive-control="ArticleViewer"><div class="animation-wrapper"><div class="align-wrapper offset-wrapper"><div class="zoom-wrapper"><div class="article" lang="en" data-view-mode="text" xml_lang="en"><div class="Content">Scooter Hobbs covers LSU athletics. Email him at <span class="text_link link_wrap type_eml" data-link-target="shobbs@americanpress.com" data-link-type="EML">shobbs@americanpress.com</span></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>
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