On Twitter at least, when Jonathan Wallace went behind center and finally stayed behind center Saturday night against Texas A&M, there was a lot of cussing—but the positive, why-the-****-hasn’tt-Wallace-played-sooner kind. The freshman quarterback finished the nightmare with 71 yards on the ground and went 6-9 for 122 yards through the air.
So here are some Gene Chizik quotes from his post-game press conference on why the **** Wallace hasn’t played sooner, and on whether he’ll start next week.
On why Wallace didn’t play earlier in the season:
“I have said it pretty much weekly that Jonathan has been taking bits and pieces of the offense, and I think he has been digesting them for a young guy pretty well. He got in at a point in the game tonight where it was really, really good to see him do some things that really show flashes and signs of him maturing some. But again, you can’t throw everything at a young guy and expect him to be able to execute at all. That’s number one. Number two, at that point and time in the game, it had calmed down a little bit with a lot of the blitzing and pressures and things of that nature. Not to take anything away from what Jonathan did because I am very proud of him, but when you are asking a guy to take on the whole game plan and all of the things that come with it, it is just not that simple. But I think as everybody saw tonight, you saw flashes of a guy that again, has an opportunity to keep getting weaned on to the different parts of the offense that he can succeed at. I think he showed that tonight.”
On whether Wallace will start against New Mexico State:
“Well, we are certainly going to look. I think the film tells a lot, obviously, but there is nobody that could argue he was very productive tonight. It was really good to see that, and I think the players caught a little spark. He is a very confident young man. We will evaluate this upcoming week, and we will see where we are at. Again, the packages that he has had from week to week have been smaller. Even tonight as much as he played, we didn’t really vary off of all of the things that we have slowly been feeding him. But for the most part, he executed the things that we asked him to do and in a lot of ways, very well, it appears until we watch the film.”
Photo: al.com.
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Stan White was a pretty darn effective freshman QB. I bet Wallace could be as well!
Wallace hasn’t played as much as he should for the same reason Mason and Prosch don’t play as much as they should. The coaches don’t know what they have nor how to use their best players.
Bad excuse. A few weeks ago people may have excepted that but deep in the season and CM & KF have not been executing the entire game plan all year. JW is the only one that has been effective with his plays. Not a lot of negative plays. He looked more urgent. Would rather see an small effective package than an entire Playbook that can’t move the ball. There was a lot of talk on Wallace before the season for some reason. Now we know. I’ve been screaming for him to play for weeks. If we just use Wallace and run ball with a few passes we probably have a few more wins. More points and the defense gets more motivated. This is just a pathetic excuse on Chizik’s part. Too many freshman QB’s are being productive for them not to give him a chance.
Freshman Quarterbacks often excel throughout Div 1-a when they are given the CHANCE–development is the KEY & the suposed QB Guru teacher, Scott Lefler, for whatever reason did not do it!!! The program is at the lowest level I have seen in my LIFETIME–The Photo of the Auburn Student Section at the beginning of the third quarter tells the Story–The committed 2013 recruiting class should become an urgent PRIORITY for the Auburn President–time to announce MAJOR CHANGES in the COACHING STAFF or give them Support–If you don’t react now committed RECRUITS are going to defect in droves !!!! It’s DECISION time now or we may lose our FUTURE–Do nothing & it’s going to have a major NEGATIVE impact on the FUTURE of AUBURN FOOTBALL—WAR EAGLE
Did Harvey put Spike 80 in the locker room also?
Texas A&M using Manziel a red shirt Freshman to totally shred us totally shoots down Chiznuts excuse. That’s all he has done all year is make excuses. Worst coaching hire ever bar none!!
It is as if coach doesn’t think he can do it. Coach needs to start shoving these young guys out of the nest to see if they can fly. Look at how our freshman DBS are breaking up big passes in the end zone. Give Wallace the reigns against NMSU. Run the ball a lot, let him run some zone reads, and then let him pass off play action.
If mosely is hurt again now and Frazier is hurt, why not just give it to Wallace?
This Auburn man is totally digusted Chizik and his staff. If I performed even similar to him, I would have been fired long ago. Why is Jacobs not doing something NOW? Wallace is our only hope and Chizik is still evaluating? As a freshman I used to watch Terry throw it 60 yards like a bullet to Terry and now we have this. WAR EAGLE FOREVER! Feel bad for the team.
I meant Pat to Terry, just a little upset. Sorry.