With Peter Parrish No Longer on the Roster, Freshmen Max Johnson, TJ Finley’s Role Vital for LSU Football
Peter Parrish’s name has been removed from the 2020 LSU roster, leaving the Tigers with three scholarship quarterbacks for the upcoming season.
Shea Dixon of Geaux247 was the first to report that Parrish’s name no longer appeared on the team website following a March suspension for violating team rules. With Parrish appearing to longer be with the program, the Tigers will roll with junior Myles Brennan and freshmen Max Johnson and TJ Finley as the three scholarship quarterbacks this season.
The coaching staff is going to move forward with Brennan behind center, something coach Ed Orgeron is very comfortable with as walkthrough practices are now just three weeks away.
“He's been around us, he's paid his dues and I'm so proud of Myles," Orgeron said on WWL radio in May. "The days of transfer portal, you know Myles said 'hey coach, I'm a Tiger, I'm staying here' and not many quarterbacks do that. He's taking a leadership role, I feel comfortable with Myles right now that he's going to have an excellent year."
As for the backup spot, it’ll be imperative that one or both of Finley and Johnson pick up the offense and prove to the staff they can lead if thrown into game action. That will be easier said than done as the coronavirus pandemic left the freshmen with hardly any reps with their receivers for the last three months.
Both quarterbacks put in plenty of work during the quarantine and Orgeron was particularly bullish on Johnson back in the spring.
“We feel that Max is going to be an excellent quarterback. We feel that we got great quarterbacks," Orgeron said in his spring practice press conference. "We're going to look at our quarterbacks this spring. We're going to see what they do, we're going to give them a chance to compete and see what they got."
Johnson trained during the quarantine with his brother Jake, who is a highly touted prospect in the 2022 recruiting class. As for Finley, the Ponchatoula High School product wants to make sure his offseason work shows the improvements he’s made since joining the team as an early enrollee in January.
“I’m just using this time as a time period to get better personally and individually,” Finley told Geaux Nation’s Chessa Bouche in May. “When the summer kicks off I just want to show the team and everybody and all the coaches how hard I’ve been working in this Corona time.”
