After Payton Thorne exhausted his college eligibility following the 2024 season, Auburn football found itself in need of a new starting quarterback.

After a brief search in the transfer portal, head coach Hugh Freeze and the Tigers landed on former Oklahoma signal caller Jackson Arnold, who was coming off a difficult redshirt freshman season in 2024.

Despite Arnold’s struggles last year, Freeze has talked about his confidence in him throughout this offseason, consistently claiming that Arnold just needs a reset.

In an episode of David Pollack’s “See Ball Get Ball” podcast, Freeze explained what he liked about Arnold when evaluating him, and it didn’t have much to do with his time at Oklahoma.

“Truthfully, it comes back to what I saw from him out of high school,” Freeze said. “I just thought he was elite. He was Gatorade Player of the Year and maybe the No. 1 quarterback in the country coming out of high school.”

Freeze added that he thought Arnold had all the tools necessary to run his offense at Auburn. He also made the case that even Oklahoma must have been high on Arnold, based on how he got the starting job.

“Even at Oklahoma, when you let a guy like Dillion Gabriel walk out the door believing you have, I would assume that was the feeling, you’ve got a guy here that’s the heir apparent,” Freeze said.

Freeze also said that Arnold dealt with difficult circumstances at Oklahoma, highlighted by having three different offensive coordinators during the season and a receiving corps that was battered by injuries.

Arnold finished the 2024 season with 1,421 yards, 12 touchdowns and three interceptions, and was briefly benched during the middle part of the season.

He’ll be one of Auburn’s three player representatives at SEC Media Days, joined by Connor Lew and Keldric Faulk. Auburn’s day on the stage is July 15.

Peter Rauterkus covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @peter_rauterkus or email him at [email protected]m