Jimbo Fisher explains decision to start Conner Weigman, names him starting QB moving forward

Even though Texas A&M lost to Ole Miss on Saturday to fall to 3-5 on the season, the Aggies have at least one positive to look back on. True freshman quarterback Conner Weigman got the first start of his collegiate career, and he impressed in a performance that left a strong impression on Texas A&M head coach Jimbo Fisher.

Ultimately, Weigman completed 28 of his 44 pass attempts for 338 yards and four touchdowns with no interceptions in Texas A&M’s 31-28 loss to Ole Miss.

Fisher said that Haynes King was “banged up,” which played a role in the decision to start Weigman on Saturday. But in the end, Fisher felt comfortable with Weigman playing in this game.

“I liked what I saw, and Haynes was banged up,” Fisher said when asked about the decision to start Weigman. “And we knew it. He could’ve been available, but it wasn’t right to play him again this week. I feel very comfortable with Conner. He’s done it in practice and really gotten the reps and jumped in there.”

Moving forward, Weigman seems poised to lead Texas A&M’s offense. Even as a true freshman, his performance was one that has been desired all year by the Aggies. Fisher took notice, and he plans to start Weigman again next week.

“Yeah, he should be,” Fisher said when asked if Weigman is now Texas A&M’s QB1. “Look forward to playing him next week and getting the other guys healthy and seeing where they’re at. But I’m very comfortable with Conner starting for us.”

Fisher addresses if Texas A&M considered starting Weigman sooner

Weigman came to Texas A&M as a five-star recruit and the No. 4-rated quarterback in the 2022 class, according to the On3 Consensus, a complete and equally weighted industry-generated average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies.

Even after Texas A&M saw mixed results with Haynes King and Max Johnson under center, Weigman didn’t get his chance. But that changed on Saturday, and Fisher believes that the time is right for his talented youngster to continue leading the offense.

“Well you can always say that, but you’ve got to make sure when you put a guy in there — you could ruin a guy, a true freshman,” said Fisher when asked about playing Weigman sooner. “He had a little bit of fall and he had some other guys, and that limits reps because he had other quality guys getting quality reps. If you don’t have guys, you get him more reps. You could’ve done that, but at the same time you can ruin a guy a lot quicker than you can make a guy when they’re a freshman like that.

“Everybody wants to throw them in there and you see in the NFL when they throw these rookies in there and there are some teams that aren’t doing as well. But I love him. I told him he was going to be a good player. I said it all along and it’s not hindsight. Hopefully it’s the right timing for him to play and he keeps playing like he’s playing. I love him to death.”

Texas A&M has a home date against Florida up next in Week 10, with a road trip to Auburn the following weekend. The Aggies round out the regular season with home games against UMass and LSU.