you think? but really, i think any coach would've done the same with jefferson. it would've been perfect if lee would've performed and jefferson could have redshirted. but this season didn't give us any breaks. oh well. i'm more concerned with miles and his pr... which will never change.
I think the decisions made were correct at the time they happened. Early on, it looked like Lee was going to be a decent QB. Hatch as a change of pace type gave us the ability to redshirt JJ to stagger their eligibilty. JJ knowledge of the offense probably did lag behind, because being in the system for a whopping 2-3 months, plus being planned to redshirt, did not give hime the time needed to truly learn it. Plus the staff probably worked with the two youngsters that were actually going to play a good bit more than a guy who wasn't supposed to. When Hatch got hurt in the UGA game we had no choice but to play Lee. JJ wasn't prepared to play because he wasn't supposed to play. Did these decisions work? Not very well. Was the logic behind them faulty? IMO, no. JJ played very well last night, and his future looks really bright. But to automatically assume that the way he plaed with a month and a half worth of practice as "THE man" is the same way he would have played being thrown into the fire unprepared vs. Bama might be a stretch.
Wait a second he BURNED his redshirt after coming in for the North Texas game. After that they were gonna "TRY" for a medical. Once Hatch went down in Auburn what would have been the problem with brining Jefferson in to start getting him ready then INSTEAD of placing the whole season on Lee's shoulders? Would that not have worked 2 fold? 1. It gets someone ready in the case Lee gets hurt. 2. IT TAKES PRESSURE off of LEE having someone to come in and run plays. HAD Jefferson started seeing playing time AFTER the Auburn game BY ALABAMA I think it would be safe to say that what we saw last night is what we would have seen. Reguardless of who we played last night Jeffersons FIELD PRESSENCE was LIGHT YEARS beyond anything Lee or Hatch for that matter showed all year and that was with 2 games and 2 months of soild play and practice time under his belt. We can sit and second guess and think we know better all we want but you CAN NOT deny the FACT that with alittle time and PT under his BELT Jefferson LOOKED like a QB that knew what he was doing. LEE had much more practice and play time and didnt IMPROVE AT ALL. And weither they want to admit it or not the coaches made the wrong bet here and by not having FAITH in a freshman qb and NOT GIVING him A CHANCE to either prove or disprove them cost this team 2 maybe 3 games!
Well, Les stated that Jefferson was using a limited offensive play list on his radio show earlier in the season . . . and he ought to know. Coaches bring young quarterbacks along slowly for a very good reason. Better to get comfortable with ten plays and then learn ten more than try to go into the game with 80 plays that you don't understand very well.
With the mistakes Lee was making and the lost of confidence he was killing LSU. No matter how limited JJ was he would have been an upgrade who could learn on the fly like OSU did with Pryor. Plain and simple JJ should have played sooner. If he starts to fall then theres a problem but he should have been given the oppertunity.
did you just skip over the part where I said the decision they made didn't work out very well? It didn't work. They were wrong. These things happen. It's easy as hell to sit here after last night's game and say "it obvious JJ should have started all year" But before last night, JJ never completed 50% of his passes in a game, appeared too reliant on his feet and not waiting long enough for a play to develop. Would he have developed this quickly during the season? We'll never know. But he's had a month to correct these problems. Without them costing us any games during the process of correcting them. Lee's problems need to be corrected on the fly against SEC defenses, but his head was too phucked up to get that done. The coaches guessed wrong, but I can completely understand WHY they guessed the way they did.
I agree. I agree JJ showed very good field presence, and did not look like a freshman at all. However, it was the GT defense he faced, not the tough SEC defenses that Lee faced. Only time will tell. However he looks very promising. I was disappointed that Lee had difficulty correcting his flaws. Was that an issue with vision, decision making or habits (like staring down his receivers and helping the other teams secondary)?
