After a spectacular performance in Auburn’s 73-3 season-opening win against Alabama A&M (322 yards, four touchdowns), expectations were sky high for quarterback Payton Thorne heading into Week 2’s matchup against California.
Unfortunately for the senior signal-caller, he didn’t meet those expectations as he threw for just 165 yards and a touchdown with four interceptions and Auburn lost 21-14 to Cal despite being a 13.5-point favorite, per BetMGM.
Thorne revealed during an appearance on “The Next Round” on Tuesday that fans were so irritated with him that they started sending him Venmo requests because he and the Tigers failed to cover the spread.
“In today's world they come at you from all different angles,” Thorne said. “You hear it verbally, but that's probably the least one. Just walking down the street, you hear it sometimes. Then obviously on the social medias. They'll hit you on Venmo and all that type of stuff. … They're definitely not sending cash. It's funny, when they lose money, they want the money back, but when they win money on a parlay, no one is ever sending me any money.”
Despite his bumpy start against Cal, Thorne, who’s the most experienced QB on Auburn’s roster, doesn’t appear to be in danger of losing his starting job at least for now.
"We struggled to protect him tonight a lot." - Hugh Freeze when asked about QB Payton Thorne's four interceptions in the loss to Cal pic.twitter.com/bNnynX1VUN
— The Next Round (@NextRoundLive) September 8, 2024
However, head coach Hugh Freeze did insinuate that if Thorne doesn’t show some drastic improvement soon, he would consider going with one of the other quarterbacks on the Tigers’ roster.
“It's really hard for me to not play a young man who's consistently the best performer in practice over and over and over again,” Freeze said, via OAnow.com. “Having said that, you have to carry that over into the games. You have to. If that continues, we have to go in a different direction.”
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