Georgia Football: Frustrated Mark Richt Still Has Time to Find a Starting QB

ATHENS, Ga. — "I'd like to know and have peace. I'm looking for some peace."

Georgia head coach Mark Richt didn't get any Saturday morning during a scrimmage at Sanford Stadium regarding the three-headed quarterback battle going on that includes junior Faton Bauta, sophomore Brice Ramsey and Virginia transfer Greyson Lambert. In fact, that has turned into one of the biggest SEC mysteries of August, with information on where each member of the trio stands being as scarce as water in a desert.

Saturday was no different.

Richt was mum on quarterback specifics from the morning scrimmage (save for Nick Robinson's 4-of-4 performance with the "threes") but certainly let it be known that this is one of the most challenging quarterback decisions of his 15-year Georgia career.

"I don't know. Walking away from the practice, I feel like I know less about what to do than going in," he said. "That's just my first impression of that. We will watch the film and make a determination. We've had 17 or 18 practices, so there's a lot of things to start making some judgments by. Is it time for 'racking them' right now? I don't know."

John Bazemore/Associated Press

The absence of useful statistical information is par for the course during fall camp, but some insight into the frustration going on behind closed doors that nobody has stepped up was a slight change.

I wrote earlier this month that there shouldn't be reason to panic if Georgia goes deep into fall camp without much resolution to the battle, and that remains true now that we are in late August, deep into fall camp.

Offensive tackle Kolton Houston doesn't think the three-man battle is hurting the offense as a whole.

"Regardless of which quarterback it is, it's not like the quarterbacks are terrible," he said emphatically. "They're good quarterbacks. People are putting all of this emphasis on the quarterback race, but it doesn't matter which quarterback it is. They're all three good. It's not like we are choosing from three bad quarterbacks."

John Bazemore/Associated Press

With that said, though, the eventual winner of the battle needs to start getting first-team reps, and that's hard to do if there is no real separation among the three contenders. 

It's a lot easier to learn on the fly against Louisiana-Monroe and at Vanderbilt with two, and if the eventual winner is robbed of those first-team snaps late in fall camp because nobody in the trio can stand out, that's going to make it hard for that eventual winner to be a difference-maker in 2015. He'd be more likely to adjust on the fly.

That's not to say quarterbacks can't succeed while adjusting on the fly.

They can.

John Bazemore/Associated Press

Look last year at Alabama quarterback Blake Sims. All he did was get progressively better as the year went on under first-year coordinator Lane Kiffin and lead his team to the SEC title.

The previous season, former Georgia defensive back and junior college quarterback Nick Marshall landed at Auburn in the summer and led the Tigers—under first-year head coach Gus Malzahn—to the SEC title and to within 13 seconds of a national championship.

Neither of those situations were ideal for those programs that, like Georgia and first-year coordinator Brian Schottenheimer, were implementing new offensive systems at the time.

This isn't plan A for the Bulldogs.

Plan A for Georgia would be for two of the quarterbacks to pull away and at least allow the staff to give more first-team reps to the eventual winner. Anything more than that—like a starting quarterback being named—would be too much. After all, Lambert—the most experienced of the group based on his time as the starter with the Cavaliers—only arrived on campus in late July and has to get a fair shot at winning the job.

Make no mistake, though. This is plan B.

"I'm a pretty patient guy, but the clock is ticking," Richt said.

Gut feeling, this quarterback battle will remain a mystery until one guy trots out to the huddle against ULM on Sept. 5.

Quotes were obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted. Recruiting information courtesy of 247Sports. Statistics courtesy of CFBStats.com. Barrett Sallee is the lead SEC college football writer and national college football video analyst for Bleacher Report as well as a host on Bleacher Report Radio on SiriusXM 83.

Follow Barrett on Twitter: @BarrettSallee.