Whatever happened to Jerrard Randall?

In Tiger country, they think they stole one from the Oregon Ducks.

Last year on Signing Day the Oregon coaching staff passed on Jerrard Randall, a 6-1, 180-pound dual-threat quarterback from Chaminade Madonna College Prep in South Florida. Randall had good potential with a strong arm and reported 4.3 speed in the 40, but he didn’t have a qualifying test score at the time, or the grades to get into the University of Oregon.

He and his high school coach opened up his recruiting, and Les Miles came calling right away. They liked the young signal caller’s athleticism, and academic standards are a little more flexible in the ESS EEE SEE. They talked, and Randall committed to the Tigers on March 23rd. He’s in camp now as the Tiger’s fifth quarterback, behind returning starter Jordan Jefferson, Jarrett Lee, jc transfer Zach Mettenberger, and fellow freshman Stephen Rivers, a pocket passer. Miles loves athletic quarterbacks, and he may need a extra one as starting quarterback Jordan Jefferson was involved in a bar fight last night at Shady’s bar in Baton Rouge. Jefferson isn’t quite 21, and four people went to the hospital. The LSU athletic department is still gathering information, but if past actions are the best predictors of future results, Jefferson won’t miss any time unless he’s charged with attempted manslaughter. Then he might miss a half. Against Northwestern State.

As for Randall, he’ll be helping the Tigers in the next couple of weeks, impersonating Darron Thomas on the LSU scout team.

Kris Brauner of the excellent LSU blog Saturday Night Slant provided an update on Randall’s progress for The Duck Stops Here:

While media access to fall camp is limited, true freshman quarterback Jerrard Randall was often discussed as a guy that was turning some heads, both with his athleticism and his strong arm. From what the media could see, Randall often showed off his big arm, but was inconsistent with his accuracy. That’s pretty much in line with the scouting reports on him as a prospect during the recruiting process.

Prior to fall camp, word leaked out from summer workouts than many of the veterans were very impressed with Randall. Shea Dixon of Tiger Sports Digest reported that many of the upperclassmen said that it was Randall, not starter Jordan Jefferson or junior college transfer Zach Mettenberger, that threw the hardest ball on the team.<

Despite impressing some very early in his career, Randall is likely headed for a redshirt. In 2012, most reasonable fans expect Mettenberger to be LSU’s starting quarterback but for Randall to come in and run some packages, whether Wildcat, option, or otherwise. In 2007, LSU won a national championship with a primary quarterback (Matt Flynn) but also with a more athletic type (Ryan Perriloux) to run different sets of plays. 2012 could be similar.

 Once Mettenberger leaves, Randall will compete with fellow Class of 2011 signee Stephen Rivers, along with anyone else on the roster at that time, for the starting position. My opinion is that Miles prefers someone a bit more athletic and that could give Randall an edge over Rivers, depending of course on how much his accuracy improves between now and then. LSU fans, and reportedly the coaches, are very glad that Randall fell into their lap this spring.