Michigan State Football: 3 way-too-early storylines for 2020 season

1. All eyes on the quarterback battle

One quarterback has started three games in his career. One has never started a game and has thrown just a few career passes. One has never thrown a collegiate pass. One is an incoming freshman.

That’s Michigan State’s current quarterback room, and there’s some concern heading into the 2020 season that the Spartans don’t have a clear starter.

Rocky Lombardi is the veteran of the group who has started three games in his career, throwing for 812 yards, three touchdowns and five interceptions with a 43 percent completion rate. He’s not wowing anyone with his accuracy, but his arm strength is not a question. He’s a natural leader, but is he starting quarterback material? Jury’s still out.

Theo Day appeared in one game in 2019 and threw three passes, completing two for 12 yards and a first down. He has intriguing size at 6-5, 222 pounds and he can be mobile when he needs to be, but is he prepared for a heavy workload? Who knows.

Payton Thorne redshirted in 2019 and was the high school teammate of transfer Jayden Reed. He could have a solid connection with a potential No. 1 receiver, but will that be enough to feed him the confidence he needs to start? Hard to say.

Noah Kim is an incoming three-star quarterback who flipped his commitment from Virginia Tech. Will he be able to compete right away? It’s possible.

Four quarterbacks, four different backgrounds and four reasons to tune in this fall. The battle is just getting underway and now that spring ball has been cancelled, it’s only going to get hotter this summer.