Texas A&M Football: This media outlet thinks Max Johnson is a mid-tier QB

The Texas A&M football team will, for the first time since 2020, feel a sense of security at the quarterback spot. The Aggies will have three strong quarterbacks competing for the starting spot in Haynes King, Conner Weigman, and Max Johnson.

A&M got a distinct upgrade in Johnson after moving on from Zach Calzada, who was seemingly unable to vault the Aggies’ offense to an elite level. Johnson is a transfer from LSU, where he was a high-usage player for Ed Orgeron’s team in the final season of his tenure as head coach.

But will he pan out with the Aggies? The easy answer might be yes, as A&M has one of the most talented rosters in the country. But so did LSU. In fact, some media outlets are skeptical of Johnson’s ability to perform in 2022.

247Sports ranked Texas A&M football’s Max Johnson as the 7th-best quarterback in the SEC

Each year, 247Sports ranks starting SEC quarterbacks — 2022 is no exception. For this upcoming season, Brad Crawford ranked all 14 quarterbacks on a list led by names like Bryce Young and KJ Jefferson. Former Texas A&M football QB Zach Calzada transferred to Auburn and would find himself at the 12th spot on the list.

Johnson landed at 7th. Here’s what they said about the potential A&M starter.

"With Zach Calzada moving on in the transfer portal to Auburn, Jimbo Fisher gets his pick of two talented passers at the position and will have understudy Conner Weigman to groom as a true freshman. Johnson threw 27 touchdown passes at LSU last season as the star of an offense that called more passing plays than they would’ve liked given the struggles in the run game and up front."

This isn’t the first time Johnson has been placed in the middle of the pack by a media outlet. Last week, USA Today landed the Aggie quarterback in the same position as 247Sports did this week.

The bright side is that 247Sports was more complimentary of the QB spot at A&M. Crawford went so far as to call the Aggies’ current QB situation “great,” which isn’t an easy compliment to come by in SEC play. This is an underrated aspect of A&M’s upcoming season, as the team was playing with a freshman walk-on as its backup quarterback for nearly the entirety of 2021.

A genuine concern and something that was mentioned in Crawford’s article was that of inflated numbers from Johnson at LSU due to a pass-heavy scheme. This, for obvious reasons, inflated his numbers but may not be indicative of what he can do with a Jimbo Fisher-led Aggie team, which tends to lean pretty heavily on a strong run game.

For A&M, this simply means that the incoming Aggie quarterback may struggle to replicate his 27-touchdown, six-interception season from a year ago. If there is any sense that he is being underrated, this is likely the root cause.

Still, Johnson will have a ton of talent around him and should be able to prove the doubters wrong.