I was glad to see a reporter ask these questions of Mark Richt at yesterday’s practice.  They illustrate nicely what I was talking about in yesterday’s post about the importance of Gray. (Transcript courtesy of UGASports.com):

How important is it having Logan Gray around to emulate Bobby Reid for the scout team in practice?

It is very important for us. He has requested to be live tomorrow. He wants to give the defense as realistic a look as possible. We usually allow our Oklahoma State quarterback to be live to help our defense try and tackle somebody. We truly have not sacked anybody all year, so we may let him do that. He is excited about it and he is very talented. He is a hard thrower. He kind of knew on signing day that he would be a redshirt and he knew there would be a time when he would need to help us by being the scout team quarterback. He is already taking a lot of pride in it and he is helping us.

How much does it help having an athletic quarterback like Logan since in the past you had to use a defensive back or another player to emulate an athletic quarterback for the scout team?

I know at times Ramarcus Brown and others have been back there. I think he can do it.

It’s very interesting that Gray requested to be a live player for the purposes of improving the defense – “please, come hit me!”.  It’s especially significant when you are practicing against a mobile quarterback.  In a non-contact situation, you let up at the last minute.  In a game, that’s exactly when a mobile quarterback might make that one move to get himself out of trouble and into space.  Finishing through on the pursuit is a crucial concept to practice and master when preparing for a quarterback liked Reid.