Where does the Ole Miss quarterback competition stand in Charlie Weis Jr.'s eyes?
New co-offensive coordinator Charlie Weis Jr got in front of the local Ole Miss media on Thursday for the first time since his hiring in January. The topics were what one would expect but the quarterback battle was still centerstage.
Weis is the quarterbacks coach and besides head coach Lane Kiffin is the only other person who spends more time with Luke Altmyer, Jaxson Dart and Kinkead Dent.
Weis in front of the podium is rare as coordinators do not speak often much throughout the season. He would have the second best perspective of where the competition stands after two days through fall camp.
Similar to Kiffin and from watching through the spring and a couple practices in August, there seems to be no clear front runner in Weis’ eyes.
“When I was at FAU we had quarterback competitions both years I was there with coach Kiffin,” Weis said. “The great thing is my job as quarterback coach is to get both those guys as ready to play as possible. At the end of the day coach Kiffin will make that decision on which gives us the best chance to win.”
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The buck is going to stop with Kiffin, according to Weis, when it comes to making the final call at quarterback.
Despite the apparent chain of command when it comes to the final decisions with offensive personnel, Weis still provides input on what he is seeing from his quarterbacks daily.
Wednesday’s practice did not reveal too much in term of if the summer provided any kind of separation between Altmyer and Dart.
The second day of fall camp saw both make deep passes and complete some flashy plays while also still struggling to make throws in tight windows in the red zone.
It feels the competition between the two is currently as close as a photo finish at Talladega.
“They’re both really talented players but the thing I love about them is they’re the hardest workers you’re going to find,” Weis said. “They’re always watching tape on their own, doing studies on their own. Doing workout stuff over the summer. Doing the best job that they can possibly do to position themselves to win the job.
“I think the biggest compliment I can pay both those guys is they’re intelligent and they’re both really hard workers. Obviously everyone’s skillset is a little bit different and all that right there but they’ve both done a tremendous job of getting themselves ready for fall camp.”
With a little over four weeks before Ole Miss opens its season against Troy the quarterback situation is still murky.
Throughout his stops Kiffin has traditionally liked to have his quarterback decided and settled on prior to the season starting. Dragging a battle as tightly contested as the one between Dart and Altmyer appears is not something that is ideal to the third-year head coach.
A timeline on when a decision might be made or a self-imposed deadline set by Kiffin is also just as murky.
“Yeah, I mean we’d like to find out sooner rather than later, and like everything else we do here we have analytics, so with the more information we have the better we can make a decision,” Kiffin said. “We can’t rush that. I can think of one time in the past where we did and ended up making the wrong decision because we didn’t have enough information yet, so however long that takes. Ideally we’d never like for that to go into the season, but we’re never going to rule that out without knowing for sure who it’s going to be.”
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