Spartan Coordinator Jay Jhonson Talks Spartan Quarterbacks
East Lansing, MI— Michigan State offensive coordinator Jay Johnson not only has to install a new offense in East Lansing, but he has to figure out who his field general will be. The previous staff did a terrible job of preparing for the future, and Johnson has to overcome that without a benefit of spring football due to COVID-19 safety protocols. He talked of the quarterback position search.
"I've had a little bit of an opportunity before obviously the current situation happened to be with those guys and around them, and so far, I was very pleased with them. I think they have a good foundation for them; I think their football IQ's are good. And so that seems to keep coming out the more and more I'm around them and the more and more I get to meet with them and kind of visit with them, so I'm excited about that piece because my big challenge with those guys is what is your plan and having a plan and being prepared. We are missing the physical component, but so much of us offensively, particularly with the quarterback spot, is that mental piece. So I still feel like we're able to drill that in a certain sense, and so I'm excited about them. We've got to kind of be able to put it all together, and obviously, we don't have a returning starter; I know Rocky's (Lombardi) had a few starts. The interesting piece which nobody knows this answer even if we had spring ball, is what's going to happen when the lights come on Saturday at Spartan Stadium, that's the end result. Can we take the mental approach with the physical approach to get it done when we need to on Saturday? We'll miss that a little bit, but to date, I'm really excited about what they bring to the table, and their backgrounds seem to be very strong and just football sense, and so we've had a lot of great discussions – I think that's very exciting and positive as we move forward."
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