Notre Dame Football: Full Practice Report No. 5 - Quarterbacks

Thursday was Notre Dame’s first full-padded practice of fall camp, and the Irish quarterbacks got a lot of action. To follow up yesterday’s hot takes and initial observations let’s take a deeper dive into practice, beginning with the Irish quarterbacks.

There’s an expression that exists for quarterbacks and coaches, and it’s called “dead arm,” and that’s what Ian Book seemed to be dealing with in camp today. It happens during camp to almost all quarterbacks, if not all.

There comes a period where the arm has thrown so many passes that it gets heavy and a QB can’t get quite as much gas on the throws. It’s about fatigue, and on Thursday, Book seemed fatigued. There were throws he normally makes with ease that he was short on or off target.

That’s the bad news. The good news is it’s something that you work through and overcome with relative ease. Like I said, it happens to almost everyone. Getting tomorrow off will help Book, but the Irish staff also wisely limited Book’s reps a bit during practice, but he still got plenty of action.

Book got off to a rough start, missing some easy throws during drills without a defense, and then going just 2-7 during 1on1s. He missed short and long on separate post routes and missed on an outside go route. Book finished the 1on1 period with an impressive completion on a drag route for a touchdown, and that seemed to spark him a bit.

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