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Auburn Is Lucky To Have Jeremy Johnson As Backup QB

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By @WestonBrown32

Jeremy Johnson

Shanna Lockwood-USA TODAY Sports

The first half of the college football season has been a wild and wacky roller coaster ride that has forced several desperate coaches to consider replacing their starting QB with an inexperienced backup. Now, that decision could be made for a variety of reasons. Maybe the starting QB is injured, perhaps he’s not playing up to the head coach’s expectations, or maybe the man under center just isn’t a great leader.

But one team that doesn’t have to worry about their QB situation from week-to-week is the Auburn Tigers. They have a confident and extremely talented starting QB in Nick Marshall, and the 6-foot-5 player backing him up is the incredibly gifted sophomore, Jeremy Johnson.

Johnson has started a couple of games for the Tigers in his two-year stint on the plains, and he has performed extremely well in each game that he’s played in. This season, Johnson has completed 22-of-28 passes for an astounding 79 percent completion percentage and has played an important role in a few of the games early on this season. Johnson is the most accurate passer in the country for the amount of passes that he’s attempted, has an NFL arm and supports the man starting ahead of him without complaint.

Now, many folks unfamiliar with the Auburn football program would think that Marshall would constantly be looking over his shoulder and wondering if a crucial mistake would bring in Johnson to replace him. However, Gus Malzahn has made it clear that Marshall is the undisputed starter for Rhett Lashlee‘s offense, and Johnson even publicly voiced his support for Marshall before the season began by telling the media that he thought Marshall would win the Heisman trophy at the end of the year.

If you’re Coach Malzahn, what more could you possibly want out of your backup QB?

Sure, Johnson hasn’t necessarily led Auburn to their current No. 5 ranking, but it sure makes Malzahn’s job as a head coach a heck of a lot easier to have such a talented and supportive backup QB that can be counted on to come into the game and perform effectively when needed.

Weston Brown is a College Football writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @WestonBrown32, “Like” him on Facebook or add him to your network on Google.

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