Auburn Football: Cam Coleman and other receivers run routes during training
Auburn football wide receivers, including Cam Coleman and KeAndre Lambert-Smith, practice at the Woltosz Football Performance Center on August 6, 2024.
AUBURN – Auburn football quarterback Payton Thorne is ready to flush 2023 down the toilet.
In fact, he already has.
Thorne didn’t quite have the season he expected in his first season with the Tigers. In fact, it wasn’t even close. During his first availability to reporters after transferring from Michigan State, Thorne talked about his hopes of playing well enough to put himself in a position to “have the opportunity to hopefully make a decision” on whether to use his final year of eligibility in 2024 or move on to the NFL.
The decision to return to Auburn was made for him in many ways. The Tigers posted the SEC’s worst passing attack last season at 162.2 yards per game, and Thorne only eclipsed the 200-yard mark twice – 282 against Samford and 230 against Mississippi State.
But now that he’s back on the Plains for his sophomore year, there’s reason to hope that Thorne can bounce back.
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The main reason for optimism is that there is a plan for coach Hugh Freeze that the Tigers can follow. Thorne has won before, and at key moments. He led Michigan State to an 11-win season in 2021 while throwing for 3,232 yards. That passing total would rank 2nd in Auburn history, 46 yards shy of Dameyune Craig’s 3,277 passing yards in 1997.
What the Spartans did particularly well this season was surround Thorne with elite talent. Six of Thorne’s specialty position players went to the NFL this season after their college careers – running back Kenneth Walker III (Seattle Seahawks), tight end Connor Heyward (Pittsburgh Steelers) and receivers Jalen Nailor (Minnesota Vikings), Jayden Reed (Green Bay Packers), Tre Mosley (Cincinnati Bengals) and Keon Coleman (Buffalo Bills).
“You can always bounce back from setbacks,” Reed, who was with Thorne at both Naperville Central High School and Michigan State, told the Montgomery Advertiser earlier this month. “… He’s got a year of experience with these guys. He knows them a little better. He seems to have confidence in his receivers and the coaches and everything else. A lot can change in a year.”
“That’s just my perspective. I think you can definitely recover from that. He has the attitude. He’s shown he can win. He’s been part of successful teams and players. I definitely think he’s capable of recovering from last season.”
Thorne and Reed were roommates at Michigan State University, and the latter remembers he and Thorne inviting other receivers over to watch film. Reed also caddied for Thorne, a skilled golfer, despite not having much interest in the sport himself. Regardless of his golfing skills, building chemistry was necessary: ”I just think it was the brotherhood and bond we had with each other,” Reed said, “that made us better.”
The conditions for Thorne’s resurgence at Auburn appear to be coming to fruition. The Tigers have added to their receiver position by signing four true freshmen, a group led by former five-star recruit Cam Coleman, and adding three transfers: Sam Jackson V (Cal), KeAndre Lambert-Smith (Penn State) and Robert Lewis (Georgia State).
Could Cam Coleman one day become a professional like Keon Coleman? Thorne seems to believe so.
“We were watching some of (Coleman’s) training highlights from camp,” Thorne said of a recent conversation he had with Reed. “We were just talking a week ago. And I told him, ‘Man, I think this guy can jump higher than Keon Coleman.’ And he was like, ‘No, he can’t.’
“I said, ‘Man, I think he can do it.’ I’ve never seen anyone jump as high as he does in football. It’s really majestic, as strange as that may sound. There aren’t many guys that can do what he can.”
Reed added: “This is a game where you need all 11. Everyone has to do their job and you have to have people around you who can help you too. Sometimes we make (Thorne) look good, sometimes he has to make us look good. … Those guys have to make him better too.”
Thorne isn’t naive enough to think a handful of absolute newbies can come in and change everything for him, but he knows they can contribute to the turnaround. The challenge of getting back on his feet rests on his shoulders, but the talent around him should certainly help.
The constant harping on about the issues of 2023 will certainly not be the case.
“I’ve barely watched anything from last year,” Thorne said. “I look at it and see what our plays were and all that and the terminology, (and) it doesn’t make me feel good. I just don’t want to hear those words anymore. I’ve given up on that. Back in January and February, maybe I was just watching myself. I don’t watch any of our plays. The offense is a lot different than what we did last year.
“These are things that coach has put in place, that coach (Derrick) Nix has put in place, that I’ve done before and that I believe in as well. And I know our other coaches do that as well. I really don’t look at last year that closely, and of course our personnel is a lot different as well.”
