Josh(ua) Nesbitt: The Unquestioned Leader of the Georgia Tech Offense

When current Georgia Tech coach Paul Johnson brought his triple option offense from Navy, many critics said it wouldn't succeed at a BCS school.

20 wins and an ACC title later, we know that's not the case.

The triple option offense at Georgia Tech is thriving and it's led by quarterback Joshua Nesbitt.

Formerly known as Josh, Nesbitt wishes to be called by his given name Joshua.

When you are as good at playing quarterback as Nesbitt is, you can be called whatever you want.

This offseason saw Georgia Tech lose All-ACC talents RB Jonathan Dwyer and WR Demaryius Thomas to the NFL draft. They also lost three starters along the offensive line and backup QB Jaybo Shaw.

The good news is taht Joshua Nesbitt is back for his senior season and Nesbitt is the engine that makes Johnson's offense go.

For people unfamiliar with the triple option, you may think that the quarterback is just a handoff machine who at times runs it himself, but the offense requires instant snap decisions during a given play.

He may fake the dive play, get out on the ends and then decide whether to pitch to the trailing RB or take it himself. It requires as much intelligence as any offense out there and Nesbitt is probably the best pure option quarterback college football has seen since Nebraska's Tommie Frazier.

Nesbitt has a lot of the same competitive characteristics that made Frazier and Cornhuskers so great in the mid-1990s.

There were three sequences last year that proved to me that Nesbitt had what it takes to keep Georgia Tech in the upper echelon of the ACC despite the other player losses on offense. They are:

1) Against Wake Forest in OT down by three, Georgia Tech was facing a fourth and inches. The smart play would have been just to just kick the FG, but Johnson had enough confidence in Nesbitt to go for it. Nesbitt picked up the first down and scored the winning TD on the next play.

2) Playing Florida State in offensive shootout, the Jackets were up 42-38, but fumbled a football that was recovered by Florida State's Nigel Carr. Nesbitt ripped the ball away from Carr and Georgia Tech kept possession. The Jackets scored on the drive and won the game 49-44. This play more than any other defines Nesbitt as a competitor.

3) With the ACC Championship game on the line and trailing the Clemson Tigers 34-33 with just over six minutes left, the Jackets were on their own 14-yard line. Nesbitt orchestrated a 13-play, 86 yard TD drive that would have made Joe Montana proud. It sent Georgia Tech to their first major bowl in over 30 years.

Nesbitt has improved his understanding of the triple option offense each year of the last two years.

His accuracy passing can still be better, but I wouldn't bet against Nesbitt and I wouldn't bet against Georgia Tech again being in the thick of the ACC title race.

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