Everything From Georgia Tech QB Coach Chris Weinke After the Yellow Jackets' Monday Practice

After their scrimmage over the weekend, Georgia Tech was back on the practice field today, continuing fall camp. The Yellow Jackets are now 18 days away from their season opening game against Colorado and after practice today, Yellow Jackets QB Coach Chris Weinke spoke with the media and here is everything that he had to say:

1. On How Haynes King Compares With Other Quarterbacks...

"Yeah, I always shy away a little bit of comparing to certain individual guys, but been very fortunate to coach a lot of good ones. I'll say this, Haynes is as dedicated a quarterback as I've ever worked with, right? High football IQ, grew up with a dad that's a very successful high school coach and has been in his blood since he was a little kid. That has continued to carry on. I think you have to fight human nature every day to be able to sustain and create consistency. This guy models that, right? He's as tough as they come. He works as hard as anybody I've been around. It's important to him, and he's always looking to improve"

2. On Graham Knowles...

"Yeah, so that's the old cliche. It's a process. I think it's a perfect example of trusting the process. When you talk about a guy that came in as a true freshman, it's hard, especially in our offense with all the volume that we have for any young guy to come in and grasp that right away. There's no substitute for experience. And what you see in terms of when he first arrived to today, it's night and day. You look at just his first spring compared to his second spring, and you can see the jump that he made.

Again, dedicated, works hard, and a lot of fun to you know, here's a big guy that's 6 -6, athletic, and has a knack for just making plays. So I think that the ability to be able to do that is a lot easier when you have a better understanding of the offense. And he has spent the last year dedicating himself to learning our offense and all the intricacies of it. And you can see the huge strides that Graham Knowles has made in our offense."

3. On If This Is The Best Quarterback Room In The Country...

"Yeah, so I'll second and third that and I sit in that room with them every single day. And I know that I've said this before but they understand that the standard is the standard. And the expectations are very high for that room. We look for that in recruiting. We want to find guys that love the game, that are willing to work, that it's really important to. My room is filled with those guys. They push each other. They're very competitive. They hold each other accountable. I've sat in a lot of different quarterback rooms as a player and as a coach. This is as good as it's ever been."

4. On the number of reps each QB is getting at this point in camp...

"Yeah so you know obviously, in camp Coach Key does an outstanding job of putting all of these guys in difficult situations, right? It's the grind of camp, obviously, I've got to be very conscious of how we operate and the reps that we get with the quarterbacks, and so it's very important to understand that there is a pecking order, and there are certain guys that probably need more reps than others. As you continue to embark on the first game and you get closer to it, those reps start to change a little bit, but I've been very pleased with all of them.

I think it's important we understand that we've got a quarterback in that room that just got here in June, so he didn't have the ability to be able to go through spring with us, but fits right in, competitive, strong as an ox, and again another guy that's dedicated himself in learning it. So as we get closer to game time, you start to see those reps change throughout the course of camp."

Haynes King Georgia Tec — Dec 27, 2024; Birmingham, AL, USA; Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets quarterback Haynes King (10) throws the ball against the Vanderbilt Commodores during the second half of the 2024 Birmingham Bowl at Protective Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Vasha Hunt-Imagn Images | Vasha Hunt-Imagn Images

5. On Aaron Philo's Growth as a QB...

"Yeah, so first of all, we all know that the type of high school career that he had, he is a natural passer. He's been blessed, and I think for him it's having an understanding of all the little pieces of our offense. There's so much that goes into playing this position in our offense and there's so much put on the quarterback knowing and understanding. I think he's got a little riverboat gambler,, and he wants to take a shot down the fiel,d and I think the biggest strides that I've seen in his game, his ability to be able to process

But I always have to throw the ball deep down the field and no one understands that sometimes the best throw is to check it down. So I think he continues to mature. He's got a really bright future."

6. On the depth of the O-Line and how that helps the QB's...

"Yeah, so you know, been here a little bit now and going on my fourth year and I'll say this that when I look at that offensive line room and the guys that Coach Wade and our staff have recruited, it's as good as I've been around here and so you start to get excited. I still think there's, You know, the understanding that we're still going through camp, right? And we want to challenge these guys, but the ability to be able to have more depth than we've ever had at that position allows us to continue to rep more quarterbacks in a more real environment, right? And so the ability for our quarterbacks to continue to develop even the younger guys has has been really good for us."

7. On the vertical passing game...

"Yeah, I think you look at college football, and I think the one thing we all say is we want to be explosive, and that's one way to be explosive is to put the ball down the field. When you have quarterbacks that you trust, you can call, Buster can call those plays, and no one understand if it's not there, that they'll check it down. There's still opportunities for explosives. I think this day and age, with the players that we have, not only at the quarterback position, but all the guys that are surrounding them, at least gives us an opportunity to push the ball down the field. And with a veteran quarterback, some guys on the perimeter that can go get it. Um, I do think that that will be a big part of our offense."

8. On having a new starting center...

"Yeah, you know, you look at that position. I, we say that a football team is built right down the middle, right? You're talking about the center, you're talking about the quarterback. You're talking about the safety that controls the defensive side of the ball. So when you start looking at how important it was when we had a veteran center last year in Weston, right? A guy that played a lot of football, and now you're breaking in some new guys, right?

Obviously Harrison has played some ball for us. But you got a guy in Tana and a young guy, Jimmy, that just got here. So you talk about young guys that are really talented and continue to get reps and every day get a little bit better. I feel very good about our quarterbacks getting under center or in the gun behind any three of those guys."