One thing is certain- new South Carolina head coach Will Muschamp wants to be as thorough as possible when he and his staff evaluate the quarterback position.

If you look back at Muschamp’s tenure at Florida, the lack of recruiting quality options at the most important position on the field essentially did in his tenure. After John Brantley led the Gators to a 7-6 record in 2011, Florida essentially was left with a star-crossed Jeff Driskel (when healthy) and no other ideal personnel.

Jacoby Brissett transferred and went on to have a good career at North Carolina State. Tyler Murphy was an Urban Meyer recruit who was a good player when running a Meyer-style offense (as he showed after transferring to Boston College and playing under Meyer disciple Steve Addazzio). Then, Muschamp’s two-year offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Brent Pease went way out on a limb, taking Skyler Mornhinweg and Max Staver- two guys who were FCS-level at best- in back-to-back classes. After Kurt Roper was brought in, the Gators did manage to land Treon Harris, who is more suited for another position but was forced into duty the last two seasons and was at least serviceable, and Will Grier, who was a starter for Jim McElwain this past season before being suspended and ultimately transferring.

By then, it was too late. After going through three different offensive coordinators in his career and a season-ending injury in 2013, Driskel was not himself and clearly needed a fresh start (he played well at Louisiana Tech this past season), Grier wasn’t ready and redshirted in 2014 and that left Harris, who could not throw the ball.

As Muschamp said in his introductory press conference, a lack of production at that position impacts “the entire organization” and if you look around college football, it certainly does. Georgia was a talented enough team to win the SEC East this past season, but the Bulldogs didn’t have a quarterback, finished 10-3 and Mark Richt was fired and now is coaching at Miami. How good would LSU have been and would we have been talking about Les Miles’ job had the Tigers been at least above average at quarterback? Also, we mentioned the Gators, who ultimately won the SEC East- they were much, much better with Grier than with Harris and ended up suffering two rough losses- 27-2 to Florida State and 41-7 to Michigan- in their last three games.

So with that, look for Muschamp and Roper and the rest of the staff to be meticulous when evaluating the position and to always make it a huge priority. During an interview with Kipp Adams on the Gamecock Sports Radio podcast, Muschamp mentioned camp as a good way to dig deep into evaluating that position.

“You look at how they learn and what they respond to (in a camp setting),” Muschamp said. “That’s critical moving forward and at that position specifically.”

Muschamp hit on a good point here- so much of playing quarterback is psychological and the reason for that is that response to adversity and the impact you have on the rest of the players around you is rooted in that psychology. That’s not something you can necessarily see on film, even though film is an excellent baseline talent determination.

One thing is certain- he and Roper are going to use every tool they can to avoid making mistakes and, again based on Muschamp’s comments the day he was hired, don’t expect them to pigeon-hole themselves into a certain “type” of signal caller. Roper’s offense, schematically, can be a fit for nearly any style of quarterback.

But it, and every other system, will fit one type of quarterback nearly every time.

“We want a winner,” Muschamp said, alluding to former South Carolina quarterback Connor Shaw, who was a high-level competitor.