When Georgia Tech quarterback Justin Thomas arrived at his locker before Saturday’s scrimmage at Bobby Dodd Stadium, he found an unexpected garment hanging for him to wear. It was a gold jersey he was to wear in the scrimmage, indicating he was not to be tackled.
Quarterbacks being held out of contact is commonplace. Thomas, in fact, wore a non-contact jersey during his four high-school seasons in Prattville, Ala.
“We’re unusual,” coach Paul Johnson said of his allowing quarterbacks to be tackled in practice. “Most teams put quarterbacks in gold from the time they get there. Some of them don’t even hit ’em until they get in the game.”
But circumstances have led Johnson to this rare decision to hew to convention. Thomas was an All-ACC selection last fall and will be an All-America candidate this fall. The Tech offensive line is missing multiple starters and the B-backs, A-backs and wide receivers are a largely new cast. Still, it irked Johnson.
“I doubt we’ll hit (Thomas) this spring,” Johnson said Wednesday, following the team’s fourth spring practice workout. “We might.”
Johnson and quarterbacks and B-backs coach Bryan Cook reached the decision in concert, Cook said.
“It’s just a risk-reward thing,” Cook said. “You want him to get some repetitions in the game, to get better in the pass game, option game, all that. He’s got stuff he needs to improve on, too.”
A factor in the decision was that the top two centers (Freddie Burden and Andrew Marshall) are out, as is offensive tackle Chris Griffin. This spring, Tech has no B-backs with playing experience and only one A-back (Dennis Andrews) with significant playing time.
Said Johnson, “You don’t want to put him in a bad spot because somebody else was going the wrong way.”
As former Tech quarterback Tevin Washington, who happened to attend Saturday’s scrimmage put it, “You’ve got to protect the franchise.”
Washington, now working for AT&T as an assistant manager at a Conyers location, could recall only one instance he was afforded such protection in a scrimmage.
“I just think he can get more reps and we’ll keep him healthy,” Johnson said of Thomas. “I know he’s tough — I watched him play 14 games.”
Johnson’s rationale to allow quarterbacks to take part in live hitting in practice and scrimmages is that they need to be ready for it in games. The Yellow Jackets’ record of health at the position would indicate that it has merit. Of Johnson’s four opening-game starting quarterbacks at Tech — Joshua Nesbitt, Washington, Vad Lee and Thomas — only Nesbitt failed to finish a season without starting every game. Of the two injuries that knocked Nesbitt out of the lineup, one was a hamstring strain in a non-contact situation and the other was a broken arm that he suffered trying to stop an interception return.
Thomas shrugged off the decision. “I just knew having it on doesn’t mean I don’t need to practice hard,” he said. “Just go out there and do the same thing I would without it on and getting hit.”
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