Start as you mean to go on
Football is a game of long-standing edicts.
“Defense wins championships.” “You have to take it one game at a time.” “Herm Edwards at Arizona State? What the entire …”
But there’s one common edict that Clemson is trying to buck this season:
“If you have two quarterbacks, you have none.”
Granted, the crucible of Furman is not enough of a forge to declare Kelly Bryant and Trevor Lawrence the exceptions to the rule, but the evidence of why the rotation should remain vastly outweighed any evidence of either quarterback separating himself from the other.

It’s not the first time that the Tigers have come into the season without absolute clarity at the sport’s signature position. But for the first time, it feels like a true two-quarterback situation may be unfolding between Bryant and Lawrence.
In Saturday’s opening game, they handled five drives apiece — three each in the first half and two each after the break with Bryant getting the first batch of both halves.
The senior had some shaky moments, but he led three scoring drives and finished with his two best plays of the day — a great downfield throw under pressure to Derion Kendrick before a 35-yard touchdown run.
The freshman showcased an electric arm, and every drive with him at the helm ended in points — a field goal and then four touchdowns — but there were missteps that are to be expected by a first-game player.
If it had to be scored like a boxing round, you’d probably say 10-9 to Lawrence. There were no knockdowns and certainly nothing close to a knockout, but the challenger landed a few more punches than the defending champ.
The parallels between the Cole-Stoudt-versus-Deshaun-Watson quarterback battle of 2014 are inevitable, but I didn’t see the same “Oh my god, he’s ready” vibe from Lawrence that I saw from Watson in Athens. Nor do I see the same “I don’t see what he’s bringing to the offense” vibe from Bryant as with Stoudt.
So why the rush to declare the fight over after one closely competitive round?
Or is there a rush?
You certainly wouldn’t think there was listening to the Clemson coaching staff. Dabo Swinney declared he isn’t playing both quarterbacks just to keep them both happy, saying “it’s just the nature of where we are with this situation.” Co-offensive coordinator Jeff Scott described the “ideal scenario” as both quarterbacks continuing to play well — I mean, hell, if the staff can make co-offensive coordinators work so well for four years, a co-quarterback situation sounds like a piece of cake.
Even ignoring the relative performances in week 1, there are more reasons to stay with the Bryant-then-Lawrence status quo.
For one, Bryant was nothing if not a road warrior a season ago. You could argue his four best performances of the year all came away from home against ranked opposition — true road wins over №14 Louisville, №12 Virginia Tech and №24 South Carolina to go along with earning ACC Championship MVP honors against №7 Miami.
Four ranked foes, four nearly flawless performances, four decisive victories. He averaged just south of 300 yards of total offense per game over those four contests, 294.8 — nearly 50 yards more than his season average of 247.6. Even more importantly, the Tigers won the four games by an average of 24.8 points.
We still know very little about the Texas A&M team that will run onto the Kyle Field around 6 p.m. local time on Saturday, but we know that more than 100,000 fans will be there to watch it. Fans rushing to anoint Lawrence with a crown to match his golden locks would be sending a freshman into a very hostile environment from the word ‘go’, while relegating an justifiably peeved Bryant to a relieving role in this theoretical scenario.
So Bryant will start. And Lawrence will play. And perhaps there will be another switch after that. And we have no idea who will be the final quarterback to take a snap. Shoot, if the Tigers’ first road game of 2018 goes anything like their first one of 2017, it may even be Chase Brice.
And that’s all OK.
Somewhere through the ages, it was decided that this sport that prides itself on having a deep team and often substitutes players would take a Highlander-esque, “there-must-only-be-one” attitude toward the quarterback position. A lot of quarterback battles are resolved because one quarterback is better than the other, but just as many are “resolved” because the coach knows that his staff and his team and his fanbase and his administration will rake him over the coals if his two-quarterback’d team loses. Because the expectation of that position is to ride-or-die with one guy, even if the two-quarterback system didn’t cost the team the game and even if the one quarterback may turn out to be the wrong quarterback.
I choose to end this column by echoing a small girl from an El Paso commercial.
The commercial starts with a family clearly divided over whether to buy hard shell or soft shell tacos for dinner. The warring factions resort to drawing options out of a hat and spinning a wheel to decide before a little girl shrugs and says:
“¿Porque no los dos?”
For those whose Spanish classes are a distant memory in el mirror de rearview, there are helpful subtitles that translate her question, “Why don’t we have both?”
She is wildly celebrated by her family, who carries her off on their shoulders.
Perhaps you feel strongly about whether Lawrence or even Bryant should be given the keys to the offense on Saturday.
But when using both quarterbacks are as possible as buying hard and soft shell tacos in the same box, why not use both?
You started the season with a two-quarterback system because that appeared to be your best option.
Start as you mean to go on.
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Robbie Tinsley is an award-winning columnist from his time as the sports editor of The Journal in Seneca, S.C. He now works on a freelance basis from his home in Medford, Mass. For compliments, he can be reached either via Twitter @RTinMan13 or email robtinsley13@gmail.com. Any complaints can be directed to esprott@upstatetoday.com.

