Arkansas doesn’t have a starting quarterback yet and honestly that’s not even the wildest part of this story.
The wildest part is that Ryan Silverfield sounds completely fine with it.
The Razorbacks open fall camp Wednesday and the quarterback battle between KJ Jackson and AJ Hill is still going strong. It’s been going since spring ball.
Neither guy has much experience but both bring plenty of promise and neither one has done enough to grab the job outright.
Silverfield met with reporters Monday morning and didn’t hand out a decision. What he handed out instead was a whole lot of patience.
“If we get to the point at some point during training camp or once school starts where we feel like ‘Hey this guy now needs to get the lion’s share with the ones’ that will probably be pretty telling us who to our starter will be at this point,” Silverfield said.
Translation for the folks scoring at home: nobody knows yet.
Not the coach. Not the fans. Not the two quarterbacks standing in line waiting for somebody to just pick already.
Silverfield sees an upside in staying quiet
Here’s the twist though. Silverfield doesn’t think the mystery is hurting anybody. He actually thinks it’s helping.
Utah shows up in week two. Georgia shows up in week three.
Traditional thinking is both programs will spend their offseason studying film trying to figure out who’s taking snaps for the Hogs and Silverfield would rather they keep guessing.
“So the more question marks you put into your opponents I know even some of our future opponents Utah, Georgia some of those other teams are going to start studying offseason studies on guys and if they have an understanding who the quarterback is going to be it just gives them maybe a couple days leg up,” Silverfield said.
It’s a fair point even if it’s wrong. Neither KJ Jackson or AJ Hill have shown the capacity to make that much of a difference. It still means Arkansas fans have to wait right along with Utah and Georgia to find out anything.
There’s a real cost to the mystery too. Two quarterbacks rotating reps means less chemistry for the whole offense and everyone else on North Alabama’s schedule already has game film to study once the Razorbacks kick off week one.
Old football sayings don’t apply here
You’ve probably heard the saying that if you’ve got two quarterbacks you really don’t have one.
Silverfield isn’t buying it and he made sure everybody knew it.
“The old adage ‘if you have two quarterbacks you got none’ I disagree,” Silverfield said. “We’ve got two guys with the capability..in a perfect world we name a starter and that guy lasts all the way through however long we get to play football this year.”
He may grow into wanting to re-think that. After covering the big-time colleges and NFL teams for over 50 years that’s generally worked out to be true at every level.
I’ve consistently seen it blow up at all levels.
Jackson and Hill keep splitting first team reps just like they did in the spring and Silverfield says don’t read anything into who lines up first.
National outlets have quietly leaned toward Jackson as the guy but Hill hasn’t been told that memo exists and he’s still fighting for the job on accuracy and timing alone.
Silverfield laid out exactly what separates knowing an offense from actually running it.
“I always say this it’s one thing to know the offense it’s another thing to have a full understanding of the offense,” Silverfield said. “Can you master it? And master it versus all different defensive schemes? Then when you do that oh yeah by the way the ball’s gotta go in the exact spot.”
He kept going.
“It’s one thing to sit there and say ‘Hey I’m really smart I know what I need to do.’ But now can I go out there and actually execute?” Silverfield said. “He’s showing that every single day so been very very pleased with his growth. I’m telling you guys right now it’s a neck-and-neck battle and that’s a very good thing for us.”
Say what you want about not having a starter this deep into camp but Arkansas has come a long way since the Chad Morris era when it felt like anybody breathing and wearing a helmet got a look at the job.
This time the Razorbacks actually have two real options and Silverfield seems downright thrilled about that problem.
Key takeaways
- Silverfield hasn’t named a starter and won’t rush the decision before camp or the start of the semester
- Keeping the competition open is meant to keep Utah and Georgia guessing during their offseason scouting
- Hill and Jackson keep splitting first team reps and Silverfield calls it a genuine neck-and-neck race
