How Payton Thorne stood out at Auburn well before his first practice

The coaches haven't gotten to see him throw yet. But the Tigers' new quarterback is still making some big impressions rather quickly.

QB Payton Thorne (Instagram)

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — There’s only so much the Auburn football program has been able to see from Payton Thorne since the first time he transferred onto campus.

NCAA rules prohibit head coaches from watching on-field work in the summer, so Hugh Freeze can just go off of what the transfer quarterback did at Michigan State when it comes to actually throwing a football. And even the player-led drills aren’t exactly what the Tigers will go through when fall camp opens in two weeks.

But it hasn’t taken long for Thorne, who announced his move to the Plains in early May, to make an impression on his new coaches.

“What I’ve been impressed with is his attention to detail, his desire to learn the systems, to be a leader, to have position group meetings,” Freeze said Tuesday. “He definitely has those leadership qualities.”

His teammates see it, too.

“I think Payton is an incredible leader,” veteran tight end Luke Deal said. “He's a really good guy. I've gotten to know him on a personal level. I really like his leadership qualities that he brings. He's got that savvy quarterback demeanor that you look for.”

On top of his work as a quarterback who put up program record-breaking numbers en route to double-digit wins and a New Year’s Six bowl victory at Michigan State, that leadership is exactly what Auburn signed up for when it quickly landed Thorne out of the transfer portal.

Freeze spent a lot of his first spring at Auburn speaking about the importance of leadership at the quarterback position. He’s seen progress in that area from returning starter Robby Ashford, who he said “helps us win football games” when speaking to local reporters at SEC Media Days.

Thorne might not have had the same level of on-field success in 2022 as he did in 2021 — a function of Michigan State undergoing some major personnel changes elsewhere on the offense — but he made strides as a leader by being elected team captain for the second straight season. (Yes, he was named a captain before he even made his first start for the Spartans.)

That’s helped Thorne accelerate the process of, potentially, becoming Auburn’s starting quarterback for the 2023 season. He didn’t go through spring practices with the new staff, like Ashford and Geriner. So he’s had to speed-run the work toward building chemistry with his new teammates.

“I think that a lot of the guys trust him,” Deal said. “And that's the main thing whenever you come in and you're a new guy on a team — especially a team that has some older guys on it. … So he's built a lot of trust, and that's a big thing for me.”

And that’s required Thorne to do a lot of learning rather quickly.