Hugh Freeze proposes change to spring game traditions, wants to play in-state schools

Hugh Freeze is over intrasquad spring scrimmages. Instead, he wants Auburn‘s annual A-Day spring game to feature to Tigers playing against a local university for a good cause.

“The solution is — allow us to scrimmage somebody on A-Day. Another team. I think everybody would get out of it exactly what they want and if everybody is doing that, let’s adopt a charity to give all the proceeds to,” Freeze proposed. “… Let Alabama play Troy and we play UAB or vice versa or whoever, I don’t care, or Alabama State or whoever, and people will come and see that.

“It lowers our injury possibilities by 50 percent. And coaches are smart enough to control not hitting each other’s quarterbacks. If you want to put a blue jersey or a different jersey on and don’t take them to the ground, we can do that.”

Hugh Freeze on his spring game proposal @abc3340

"Let Alabama play Troy and we play UAB or vice versa" pic.twitter.com/tl7lx57qZ1

— Chris McCulley (@ChrisMcCulleyTV) April 3, 2023

And who would say no? It helps out everyone involved, in theory. Auburn gets actual competition rather than playing themselves like they do every day in practice. It also gives the smaller school a great opportunity to see where they are at this point in the spring. It would bring a competitive edge that isn’t there in typical spring games.

“I just think it would be great for the sport,” Freeze said. “I think it would be awesome. NFL gets to scrimmage against each other, high schools get to scrimmage against each other. I cannot for the life of me understand why we haven’t gotten to that point where we can pull that off.”

If Auburn were to go through with a spring game change and one day play a different team during the event, it might bring more eyes to the product but doesn’t give as many players the opportunity to get on the field as an intrasquad scrimmage does. Auburn also runs the risk of that smaller school actually defeating them because they’re going through the bench and trying to get players as many reps as they can.

That potential loss would hang over their head for the entire offseason and could impact Auburn’s preseason rankings as well. It’s a safer bet to scrimmage each other and not worry about scouting another opponent when most of the players haven’t mastered Freeze’s playbook yet.

It won’t happen this year at least, but Auburn’s annual A-Day spring game is scheduled for 1 p.m. C.T. on Saturday, April 8 at Jordan-Hare Stadium. All general admission seats are $10.