Auburn senior wide receiver Montez Billings will miss the first four games of the season because of an academic issue, the school announced Thursday.

Billings, who sat out last spring, graduated in May but had an undisclosed NCAA-related academic issue he had to satisfy. Head coach Gene Chizik recently said the issue was in “somebody else’s” hands.

“This is unfortunate for Montez, but we’ve exhausted all avenues to get him on the field as soon as possible,” Auburn senior associate athletics director Rich McGlynn said. “While we don’t necessarily agree with the NCAA’s ruling, we have to respect and abide by their decision.”

Billings is the Tigers’ leading returning receiver. He caught 24 passes for 277 yards last season. He has 55 career catches for 645 yards and one touchdown.

Check back for more tonight after we do interviews.

We reporters just got to see what is probably our last bit of open practice for the foreseeable future, and we came away with a few observations. Here they are, as usual, in a tidy, bullet-point format:

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• WR Darvin Adams and LB Eltoro Freeman did not practice. Adams, one of three projected starters at wideout, was not in pads and rode on a stationary bike during our viewing period. Freeman was also on the bikes, not using his left leg. He also had a big cast back on his right wrist.

• Other Muscle Beach participants included OL Kevin Carroll, OL Darrell Roseman, LB Jonathan Evans and S Mike McNeil. TE Robert Cooper, LB Spencer Pybus and OL Andre Harris did not dress out or do conditioning work.

• WR Tim Hawthorne did not dress out, but he did not have a protective boot on his broken foot. He even participated in a drill where receivers threw passes back and forth to each other.

• WR Montez Billings wore a blue No. 19 jersey and appears to still be on the scout team. He returned a few punts during a special teams drill, but that was all.

• DB D'Antoine Hood (Central-Phenix) tested his ankle on the sideline during field goal drills. He was on the field in what appeared to be a scout team capacity on punt coverage. He has been out of action the last few weeks with a high-ankle sprain.

• Wide receivers coach Trooper Taylor wasn't wearing his trademark backwards hat. He looks strange without it.

• We saw some more 11-on-11 work, with an eclectic mix of first- and second-team players. Here are the highlights:

• Neil Caudle took all eight snaps in the drill. He went 4-for-8 in the drill, completing screen passes to Onterio McCalebb and Dontae Aycock, a quick slant for a first down to Terrell Zachery and a pass to the flat to TE Gabe McKenzie.

• After McCalebb caught his screen pass, running backs coach Curtis Luper yelled at him that he was out too wide on the play. "You make it too hard on him," Luper said, referring to the lineman who had to race farther out toward the sideline to make the initial block. By the way, it looked like that forced the lineman to hold his defender in order to spring McCalebb.
  

• CB Harry Adams gave up the first-down pass to Zachery. Offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn called the exact same play the next time and Adams broke the pass up.

• Walk-on CB Caleb Blanton had a nice pass break up against Quindarius Carr.

I wrote a story for today's newspaper about the running back depth chart. Here's how it starts:

AUBURN, Ala. — Auburn running backs coach Curtis Luper spoke confidently about his group last week, touting the experience of his multitude of veterans and the raw skills of his newcomers, seemingly immune from the crippling depth problems his fellow assistants have had to deal with all month.

Eric Smith’s arrest and tenuous standing on the team doesn’t bring the Tigers’ running back depth to a critical level, but it certainly changes the position’s dynamic.

Auburn, at least for now, has one less option in its running game. Coaches have already determined that senior Ben Tate will be the primary ballcarrier, but they still need to establish a clear No. 2 out of a group that includes H-back Mario Fannin and true freshmen Onterio McCalebb and Dontae Aycock.

“Obviously, you need two in this league. We think we have three who could possibly do what we ask them to do,” offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn said last week, before the Smith ordeal. “We’re going to figure out that order pretty quick.”

Read the rest online here. Also, follow the blog on Twitter by clicking here.

If there was one position where Auburn could afford to lose a player, it was running back. Tate has a lock on the No. 1 job, Fannin can play there in a pinch and McCalebb and Aycock have impressed for being youngsters.

Still, Smith, at 237 pounds, was the power back of the group. Tate and Fannin could probably play that way, but they're not as big. So it will be interesting to see how Auburn handles short-yardage situations.

But the biggest question is how Auburn will split the carries this season. Just for fun, I looked back at how Malzahn split the carries among running backs in his three years as a college coach at Tulsa and Arkansas:

Tulsa in 2008

• RB Tarrion Adams, 247 carries, 1,523 yards, 6.2 avg., 14 TD
• RB Jawad Williams, 86 carries, 523 yards, 6.1 avg., 3 TD
• RB Charles Opeseyitan, 45 carries, 355 yards, 7.9 avg, 2 TD
• FB Courtney Tennial, 45 carries, 220 yards, 4.9 avg., 7 TD
• HB Charles Clay, 25 carries, 151 yards, 5.8 avg., 2 TD

Tulsa in 2007

• RB Adams, 202 carries, 1,113 yards, 5.5 avg., 7 TD
• RB Williams, 104 carries, 452 yards, 4.3 avg., 2 TD
• HB Clay, 49 carries, 255 yards, 5.2 avg., 1 TD
• FB Cody Madison, 8 carries, 25 yards, 3.1 avg., 0 TD

Arkansas in 2006

• RB Darren McFadden, 284 carries, 1,714 yards, 5.8 avg., 14 TD
• RB Felix Jones, 154 carries, 1,225 yards, 7.6 avg., 6 TD
• RB Michael Smith, 35 carries, 247 yards, 7.1 avg., 3 TD
• RB Hezekiah Smith, 9 carries, 61 yards, 6.8 avg., 0 TD
• FB Peyton Hillis, 13 carries, 57 yards, 4.4 avg., 1 TD

And just for fun, here's Auburn breakdown of carries from last year:

• RB Tate, 159 carries, 664 yards, 4.2 avg., 3 TD
• RB Brad Lester, 80 carries, 314 yards, 3.6 avg., 2 TD
• RB Fannin, 54 carries, 238 yards, 4.4 avg., 1 TD
• RB Smith, 21 carries, 98 yards, 4.0 avg., 0 TD
• RB Tristan Davis, 8 carries, 44 yards, 5.5 avg., 1 TD

So what does this tell us? Well, a couple of things (and yes, I do realize that each situation, including Auburn's this year, is as unique):

1. That Arkansas backfield in 2006 was amazing. No wonder the Razorbacks never threw the ball, driving Mitch Mustain's mother crazy. I wouldn't put the ball in the air either with that roster of backs.
2. Auburn's running game was abysmal last year. The team leader had 664 rushing yards? Seriously?
3. Malzahn clearly likes having a No. 1 guy, but he does not hesitate to give the backup running back a major role in the offense. In two of his college seasons, the No. 2 running back got at least 50 percent of the carries as the starter.
4. There is clearly a No. 2 guy and not a group of players getting equal carries behind the starter.

So who is Auburn's backup going to be. Here's guessing that it's going to be McCalebb, just because his speed something different to the equation. I think Fannin will do the most of his work at H-back, which will get him out in the passing game more. And although Aycock might not redshirt this year, I doubt he'll have a major role.

Thoughts?

AUBURN, Ala. — After three weeks of focusing on itself, Auburn is finally turning its attention to Louisiana Tech.

Head coach Gene Chizik has slowly added bits of game preparation into the Tigers’ daily routine, splitting practices up between fundamentals and scout work for their season opener against the Bulldogs on Sept. 5 at Jordan-Hare Stadium.

“It’s kind of been a breath of fresh air,” offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn said. “You can tell our guys have kind of raised their level. I know it’s getting close to the first game when you actually game-plan specifically for a team. It’s been good for our players and our coaches.”

The Tigers have practices today and Friday before an off day Saturday. They’ll begin their regular game-week routine on Sunday, something players have been itching to do for a while.

“It gets old after a while going against the first-team offense, everyone out there banging and stuff, getting little nicks and bruises,” linebacker Craig Stevens said. “Now you get a chance to see the other team you’ll see out on game day.”

Follow the blog on Twitter. Also, read some more observations from post-practice interviews ...

• Prior to his return Tuesday, the last time injury-riddled linebacker Adam Herring practiced with the team was Iron Bowl week last November. Apparently, he has picked up where he left off. “I thought when he came back he was going to be out of shape,” Stevens said. “He’s not too out of shape. He’s been running around out there, making plays. He knows all the calls and stuff. ... I think he’ll be ready for the season.”

• Herring, who played in 11 games last year mostly on special teams, missed the spring, summer and first part of August with a variety of undisclosed injuries. Now that he’s back, the 6-foot-1, 216-pound sophomore provides a boost to a linebacking corps low on numbers. In addition to being another body on the field, he’s versatile, able to play in the middle and on the strong side. “He’s fighting hard to get back in the mix,” defensive coordinator Ted Roof said. “I was real pleased with his initial deal. It looked like he had been playing, it didn’t look like he had been watching. So that was positive to see. He’s a guy that has a motor. He’s shown some natural instincts for the ball yesterday and took another step forward today.”

• Stevens on Herring: “I think he’ll be able to help us out in the long run.”

• Former Tigers quarterback Randy Campbell was unanimously nominated to fill the District 6 position on the Auburn Board of Trustees currently held by Paul Spina, according to a university press release. The Alabama state senate must approve the nomination before Campbell joins the board. Campbell played at Auburn from 1981-83, the last two years of his career overlapping with Bo Jackson’s. He helped lead the Tigers to the 1983 SEC title.

• He graduated in 1984 with a Bachelor of Science degree in industrial operations management. Campbell currently lives in Shoal Creek, Ala., and is the president of Campbell Financial Partners and Harland Partners, both in Birmingham.

• Freshman QB Tyrik Rollison returned to practice after missing Tuesday’s session with the flu. He was not wearing a surgical mask as a precaution.

• RG Byron Isom got some reps Wednesday. He missed a few practices last week with an undisclosed injury.

• LG Mike Berry has been working at every guard, center and tackle just to stay ready in case he needs to be moved around. "You just have to learn how to tie it all in together," he said. "You have to be a big-picture type learner. There are different techniques at each position. As far as everything else, it's pretty basic." This does not speak well for Auburn's offensive line depth.

• Malzahn and Roof both said the depth chart is not yet complete, but it’s not bound to surprise many players. “I think everybody knows where they stand,” Stevens said.

• Roof, in fact, joked that the depth chart was 91.3 percent complete. "Things clear up, but there's different situations that come and go by packages," he said. "We pretty much have got to the point where we're pretty set on things, but you don't want to ever have people feel like they don't have a chance to compete and earn playing time. We look at all the tape from all the kids, whether they're scouts or whoever, so that's something we keep a beat on."

• This always seems to happen after I write a story about someone. I led yesterday's notebook with an item about walk-on linebacker Wade Christopher. Then Roof has this gem of a quote today: "He's been an Iron Man. He's played all three linebacker positions. He's been an Iron Man. I think he's earned the respect of his teammates and certainly his coaches. He's a guy that always knows what to do and he's always available and always willing. You ask, 'Can you do this?' He says, 'Yeah coach I got it, I know what to do.' As a coach, you have a lot of confidence and respect kids like that." Kind of wish I had that yesterday.

• Roof has been happy with what LB Eltoro Freeman has done while battling injuries this August. "He's done a good job throughout the course of two-a-days when he's been nicked of getting mental reps and studying the game," Roof said. "He does a lot of extra work on himself, additional time that's voluntary. He's been able to stay up with the speed of the game and get mental reps, which any of the time there's first-year player -- you hear me talk so much about the transition from high school or junior college to the SEC ..."

• Roof on DL Nick Fairley, a junior college transfer who has worked at a variety of spots on the line: "I've seen him do some good things. He seems to have some natural instincts, still got to work to become more physical and the speed of the game and the tempo of the game. He's gotten better each day. He's not where we want him to be, but he's gotten better. I have every reason to believe that he'll develop into an awful good player for us."

• Don't know if you've heard, but RB Onterio McCalebb is FAST. This quote from Malzahn prove it: "He’s a burst, now. He can be a 1-play drive type guy if we can get him in the right situation. He’s gotten better and better. He’s tough. Coach (Curtis) Luper has really strained him and stressed him to try to get ready. He’s responded and showed a lot of toughness. He’s not a physically big type guy but he’s pretty tough."

• Stevens on tackling McCalebb: "It's hard trying to catch him but once you get him, you know he don't feel you because he's light. The problem is just catching him. If you catch him, you'll put something on him. ... You're going to have to get ready for his speed when you see him in the game. Ben and Mario, they're more power and they're still elusive with it, but Onterio, he's just straight speed and you'll have to get ready for that."

• But does he have any moves? "Nah," Stevens said. "I haven't really seen him put too many moves on people. He just basically, once he gets the ball, he just runs past everybody for real, to tell you the truth. Just runs and uses his speed to run past everybody."

I wrote a story about quarterback-turned-wide receiver Kodi Burns for today's newspaper. Here's how it starts:

AUBURN, Ala. — Weak-side linebacker Eltoro Freeman is slowly working himself back into Auburn’s rotation from a hamstring injury. Walk-on Wade Christopher has kept his spot warm.

Christopher, a redshirt sophomore from Vestavia Hills, Ala., has moved around all three linebacker positions, filling in whenever there’s been a need.

“I feel like my strength is just knowing how all three positions work,” he said. “I feel like I can play at any one of them. I know as far as what one guy does and how the others defend off it.”

Freeman, a projected starter, returned Tuesday after missing most of the last two weeks with hamstring and hand issues (he no longer had a cast on his right wrist). But Christopher worked with the first team at weak side during an 11-on-11 drill.

“I’m just happy to help the defense any way I can,” Christopher said. “Obviously you don’t want guys going down in front of you, but that’s the point of having depth. You have to have guys behind you stepping up.”

The 6-foot-1, 225-pound Christopher didn’t have any major scholarship offers coming out of high school but got a chance to walk on at Auburn, his favorite team growing up. He also chose the school for its strong Biomedical Science program.

He played sparingly his freshman year on special teams before being redshirted last year. But with Auburn’s depth situation at linebacker this August, there’s a good chance he could get on the field early this season.

“I haven’t been on the field and I’m fittin’ to get out there,” Christopher said. “So I’m really excited.”

Here are some more late practice notes (which you can find out even quicker about if you follow the blog on Twitter) ...

• Freshman quarterback Tyrik Rollison, who is battling junior Neil Caudle for the backup job, missed Tuesday’s practice because of the flu, Auburn head coach Gene Chizik said. Coaches have given Rollison the majority of reps with the second team since naming Chris Todd the starting quarterback two weeks ago. Caudle worked with the second team during a portion of Tuesday’s practice open to the media. According to the Opelika-Auburn News, 25 players on Opelika High’s football team sat out of practice Monday, most with flu-like symptoms. Chizik is trying to avoid a similar situation on the eve of the season. “We’re trying everything we can do to keep it from spreading to our team,” Chizik said. “(Rollison’s) just got a little bit of that. He’s fine. He’ll be fine.”

• Wide receiver Montez Billings has to meet more than Chizik’s standards to get back on the field. Days after wide receivers coach Trooper Taylor said all he was waiting for was Chizik’s approval to allow the senior back into the receiver rotation, Chizik said he was waiting for word from someone else. “It’s in somebody else’s (hands),” he said. Billings, who graduated last spring, sat out the spring because of an academic issue. He returned this summer but still has an ambiguous team standing. On Tuesday, he worked as a scout team player, wearing a blue No. 18 jersey during drills instead of his usual 84. “I don’t really know exactly where we are with that,” Chizik said, “but obviously we’re going to be paying close attention to that in the next few days.”

• It sounds like Auburn is doing some more prep for Louisiana Tech than the last couple weeks. "We've got to the point now where we've started to do some looks teams. We spent some of the day going against each other, trying to keep a fastball tempo mentality, but still work enough Louisiana Tech. We're working Louisiana Tech, there's no question about it, we're more in that mode than we've been, but we've got so many things within ourselves that we've got to fix that we just can't go full-bore on Louisiana Tech yet."

• DE Antonio Coleman did some of his pass rushing standing up instead of coming out of his stance. "Antonio is a guy right now that athletically you can do both with," Chizik said. "You can stand him up; you can move him down. I think he kind of likes standing up. It's a whole different perspective because you can see and you're a linebacker some, you're a defensive lineman some, you're a hybrid. I think he's kind of built for that. And it's good to kind of be able to possibly have those options with a guy like him. And before we got here, he's done that before too. So I think he's got a comfort level with it."

• Chizik said Coleman IS NOT working at linebacker.

• TE Tommy Trott's description of Gus Malzahn's offense: "Detailed, detailed, detailed." Sounds like Malzahn is a nit-picker when it comes to placement. "He’s chewing you out before the ball’s even snapped because, really in this offense, alignments are so critical," Trott said. "I’ve never really realized it but the way he stresses it, it totally makes sense. Things that he says, ‘We’re going to stretch the field vertically and horizontally.’ You never really realize that if your alignments aren’t perfect with where he wants them, if you’re in a yard or two, that doesn’t make the defense accountable for the horizontal, or the width of the field, and the length of the field. He’s all about details. Routes, they’re precision routes, precision passing. The quarterback is taking three steps and he’s getting rid of the ball instead of sitting back there and patting the ball and waiting to see if the receiver going to keep it high or if he feels like he has to banana it or stuff like that."

• Count Trott among those who think Todd's shoulder is back. "He’s slinging the ball around," Trott said. "He looks so good. Honestly, we saw it from him for a while last year. I’m not sure when his shoulder got tired. He says he was never 100 percent. We thought he was throwing the ball around really well last year at the end of the season. Looking back at it, and what we see now, it’s pretty obvious that he wasn’t there last year. Being the competitor that he is, he was trying to battle through things to say on the field. It’s evident of what we see now, it’s pretty obvious he was 100 percent last year."

• Trott thinks Todd wants to show a thing or two to Auburn fans who got increasingly vocal with their displeasure for how he played last year. "I’m sure he does – not that you’re going to go out there and prove yourself to the fans – but you’re going to go out there to have fun and succeed," Trott said. "He came and busted his butt, and obviously last year didn’t go as well as he wanted. I’m sure he got a lot of criticism. That’s just the way it is in SEC football. I’m sure he is real excited about the chance to go out there and prove himself, and truly show what he is capable of doing."

• DB D'Antoine Hood (Central-Phenix) is still not practicing right now because of a high-ankle sprain. DB T'Sharvan Bell is back but working between safety and cornerback.

• That leaves only four scholarship players working exclusively as cornerbacks -- Walt McFadden, Neiko Thorpe, Harry Adams and Demond Washington. McFadden's not concerend. "I’m not going to be the iron man," he said. "We’ve got four DBs that can help out. You can put them in at any time of the game and they would help out. I believe that if any one of us goes down, we’ve got a guy that can back him up. They’ve just got to grow up."

• Former Auburn running back/kick returner Tristan Davis signed with the Detroit Lions on Monday. The 5-foot-9, 210-pound Davis was not drafted last April.

• Chizik said he hopes to have the depth chart, which is about 90 percent complete, finalized soon. He didn't say he would post it for players to see, per se. "They know, "Chizik said. "You can tell how many reps you're getting or things of that nature. Obviously they know that we're not going to be spending a lot of time repping guys right now that we don't think can help."

We had the chance to view about 25 minutes worth of practice today and saw a little bit more than we normally get to see. There was about a five-minute period where the team went 11-on-11, with the ones matching up against the ones and the twos against the twos in full pads.

Although you can't read much into it, here's some observations from that brief period (also, follow the blog on Twitter for instant updates):

• QB Chris Todd completed all four of his passes.

• DE Antonio Coleman got to Todd at least twice. They didn't whistle anything dead, but Coleman clearly got a hand on Todd (they weren't live).

• LB Wade Christopher, a walk-on, worked with the ones at weak-side linebacker.

• S Daren Bates, a freshman, was with the first unit. So was DL Nick Fairley for at least a portion of it. He worked at end.

• Freshman OL John Sullen ran some with the first team at right guard.

• WR Kodi Burns was with the ones. They threw a WR screen pass to him for a small gain.

• QB Neil Caudle threw a pick with the second team, but it didn't appear to be his fault. It went right through the wide receiver Travante Stallworth's hands.

And some other non-11-on-11 drill observations ...

• LB Eltoro Freeman looked like he was closer to a return, but he still did not participate in drills during the portion we saw. He did not have the cast on his right wrist, although Gene Chizik said he was bothered by a hamstring problem.

• Freshman QB Tyrik Rollison was not at practice. Don't know if that means anything at all.

• RB Eric Smith was not at practice. He hasn't been since his arrest last Friday.

• Injured DB Aairon Savage was at practice and appeared to be in good spirits. His left foot was in a boot.

• Today's group at Muscle Beach was small: LB Joey Caldwell, OL Darrell Roseman, OL A.J. Greene and LB Jonathan Evans.

• TE Robert Cooper was not dressed out. Neither was LB Spencer Pybus.

• RG Byron Isom was back at practice after missing some days with an unknown injury last week, but he still gave way to Sullen during a few drills.

• OL Rudy Odom wasn't out there and is not on the roster. We'll ask Chizik about that tonight.
  

• There weres ome rumors out there about Burns returning punts. We saw a No. 18 out there doing some punt return work, but it was not Burns. We think, THINK, it was wide receiver Montez Billings wearing a scout team jersey.

AUBURN, Ala. — Backup Tigers running back Eric Smith turned himself in to the Auburn Police Department at a little after 1:30 p.m. Monday on a third-degree assault charge, police Capt. Tom Stofer said.

Smith, 19, had a warrant out for his arrest stemming from an altercation early Friday morning in the parking lot of an area hotel.

After turning himself in, Smith was transported to the Lee County Detention Center, where he was booked for third-degree assault, a Class A misdemeanor in Alabama. He was released on $500 bond, Lee County Sheriff Jay Jones said

Smith was originally arrested for disorderly conduct, a Class C misdemeanor, at 1:42 a.m. Friday in the parking lot of the Lexington Hotel. He was released on bond, but assault charges were filed later that day by a 22-year-old male Auburn student who was injured at the hotel and transported to East Alabama Medical Center for treatment to a laceration over his left eye.

Reports in the Birmingham News and Opelika-Auburn News, citing the second page of the original police report, said officers responded to the scene after receiving a call about a fight. While there, they witnessed Smith strike the alleged victim, Decari Jenkins, in the back of the head, causing him to fall forward and hit the asphalt. He was knocked unconscious.

Smith alleges in the report that Jenkins punched him in the nose earlier that night. The officers noted that Smith appeared to have blood coming from his nose at the time of the incident.

Smith is scheduled to appear in Auburn Municipal Court on Nov. 5, assistant police chief Tommy Dawson said. Punishment for a Class A misdemeanor, according to Alabama law, is not to exceed a $6,000 fine and one year in jail.

Smith, a sophomore from Seffner, Fla., has not practiced since the incident. Auburn head coach Gene Chizik has refused to comment on his status with the team.

I wrote a story for today's newspaper about defensive end Nosa Eguae. Here's how it starts:

AUBURN, Ala. — There isn’t a move Auburn defensive end Antonio Coleman makes that his understudy Nosa Eguae doesn’t watch with a discerning eye.

Driven to make as few mistakes as possible, the freshman culls information in every possible manner, whether it’s watching the senior All-SEC performer come out of his stance or simply carry himself in public.

“I don’t know if I’d be where I am right now if I didn’t have a dude like AC in front of me,” Eguae said. “Every time he’s in, I’m taking mental reps. It doesn’t matter what he’s doing; if he’s stretching, I look at him. He’s just one of those guys that you can look at no matter what.”

People might be saying that of Eguae soon. The 6-foot-2, 244-pound freshman has been a quick study in his short time on the Plains, working primarily as Coleman’s backup at rush end while cross-training on the other side of the line.

Although it might be difficult for him to get playing time this year, Eguae has drawn rave reviews from teammates and coaches for his attention to detail and eagerness to get things right.

“He’s the type of kid that gets it,” defensive coordinator Ted Roof said. “Football makes sense to him. As a coach, you tell you him something and then you coach him and you see it transform so he doesn’t make the same mistake again.”

Read the whole story here.

I'm not sure if Eguae will get on the field much this season. Coleman obviously has the rush end position locked down, and Antoine Carter and Michael Goggans will rotate at the end positions as well. You wouldn't want to burn a redshirt on someone to play in a reserve role like, especially when size and strength are going to be an issue, as they always are when a freshman defensive lineman is involved (at 244 pounds, he could stand to gain about 15 or so).

But it seems like Eguae can be a sleeper in this freshman class. He was only a 3-star recruit. And while we have admittedly seen very little of him in any kind of practice situation, what fellow players and coaches are saying about him is hard to ignore. He should be a n interesting player to see develop at Auburn.

AUBURN, Ala. — If the season started today, true freshman DeAngelo Benton would start at one of the outside receiver spots, wide receivers coach Trooper Taylor said Sunday.

“I really didn’t expect it,” Benton said. “I figured I was going to have to work hard. I’ve been working hard and I finally got a chance to get to the No. 1 spot. I have to do my job and stay there.”

Benton, the 21-year-old former Parade All-American who spent the previous two years trying to qualify for college, has made giant strides in his game since arriving on the Plains this summer.

“(He’s) making plays,” Taylor said. “We’re about play-makers, guys. And again, that could change tomorrow. If a guy doesn’t make plays, it has to be consistent. But he’s done a nice job and he’s earned that, and we’re going to play the best players no matter if he’s a freshman (or) walk-on.”

Here are some other notes about Sunday's practice that you'd find out about quicker if you followed the blog on Twitter (shameless plug alert!) ...

• Taylor listed about a million different scenarios about his wide receivers and who might be on the field. The crux of what he was trying to say I think boiled down to this: Benton and Terrell Zachery are expected to be the starting wide receivers on the outside. Taylor said depending on the formation, Darvin Adams or Tommy Trott would be the other starter on the inside.

• Zachery returned to practice after dealing with some tendinitis in his left Achilles’ heel, something that bothered him this summer. The junior worked on a stationary bike for a few practices last week

• Taylor has made several comments about wanting to rotate no more than six players at receiver. That group got more competitive, apparently, with Kodi Burns moving into the mix." With Kodi moving into the wide receiver room, that has opened up some doors and closed the slot for somebody else," Taylor said. "He's going to be out there. He's proved that he can make some plays For me, it's like having another coach in the room. He understand this offense. He knows where the receivers are supposed to be. He has brought a lot to that room. The confidence he bring to that room was really shocking to me. He has that presence about him. It makes a difference."

• There was a lot of good Kodi material out there today which I plan to put into a feature story for Wednesday, so I won't spoil it here.

• Trooper said competition for those six spots is intense. "Going into it, I thought it was going to be a really easy decision," he said. "I was fortunate that these guys have stepped up. ... I'm excited about it because I feel like I have some depth and some choices. Before, it was almost going to be by default."

• Wide receivers Montez Billings and Philip Pierre-Louis continue to have an ambiguous standing with the team. Both players have been allowed to practice but still have issues they must resolve to Chizik’s satisfaction before Taylor can think about putting them in the rotation. How ambiguous are their situations? Read some of these quotes from Taylor about both of them and see if you can decipher what exactly is going on.

• On Billings: "He is not out there yet. He is practicing and he's not been back out. Until Coach tells me I can have him … Today, I put him back down with the scout team and brought him back for different scenarios. Until he gets everything cleared with Coach and back on page with doing things right, he and Philip are still in the same boat. Both of those guys have to prove they want to be Auburn Men to be back out there." Trooper seemed to differ from Chizik in his opinion about if Billings has done enough to get back in his good graces. "It’s really at the head coach’s discretion to be honest with you guys," he said. "As far as I’m concerned, he’s really done everything we’ve asked him to do. Again, I didn’t set that rule. Coach did and he’s going to make that decision when he’s ready. As far as Tez’s work habits and what he’s been doing so far, I’m proud of him. He’s already graduated. He has his degree and now he’s trying to earn his way back on the football field."

• Asked if Billings would be part of the team's plans if given the proper approval, Taylor said absolutely. “You’ll see him in the very first game,” he said. “He’d be in the (outside) position right there. He’d be able to help us.”

• Now to Pierre-Louis, who worked his way back from a torn ACL suffered in last year’s season opener but was not with the team at the start of camp while dealing with personal issues: "He’s got to do everything right," Taylor said. "When coach talks about being an Auburn man, it’s about making choices and if you choose to not be a part of this team by the choices that you make, I’m not going to waste my time teaching you and coaching you because you’re not going to be out there and it’s not fair to those other guys. He’s got a little ways to go, but he’s took it on the chin. He hasn’t had any blemishes since and he’s really trying to earn his way back and I told him it’s at the head coach’s discretion. I don’t make those choices. Once he clears him to go 100 percent, I’m going to try to get him back in the mix if I can"

• And then Taylor caps it off with this statement about PPL: "It may be one of those things where it’s too far gone and he just waits a year." That doesn't make it sound like Pierre-Louis will be in Auburn's plans any time soon.

• Taylor said his decisions to play young guys will not be affected by Billings and Pierre-Louis' situations. "The guys that I picked as young guys, they’re going to play already," he said. "It’s not going to be based off Tim or Montez because they play different positions."

• Taylor said freshman Anthony Gulley has improved, but out of the freshmen (assuming he's not including Benton, who he claims is as old as he is) Emory Blake has been the most impressive. "I would say Emory Blake really has jumped out of all of them and really shown me he understands football," Taylor said. "The thing that those four guys do, they do exactly what you tell them. Most guys, you feel like you’re retraining them. These guys know. They came in and they bought in right off the bat. So they come in and doing just what you tell them and that helps you because you can trust them. That’s big as a coach – being able to trust them."

• Taylor said doing conditioning work during practice on the sidelines with strength coach Kevin Yoxall is not a fun experience. "I promise you, you’d rather practice than be on Muscle Beach®," he said. "He comes up with some stuff – I don’t know how anybody puts their son through that. I promise you, you get healthy in a hurry rather being over there on Muscle Beach®. You ain’t over there building no muscles, I can promise you that."

• Quarterback Chris Todd joked about working at wide receiver when he sat down with reporters, saying coaches "saw potential in my athletic ability." But seriously, Todd commented about being mobile enough as a quarterback in Gus Malzahn's offense. "The biggest thing is taking care of the ball, no matter what you're doing," he said. "Really, that's it. Knowing where to fill in and where to squeeze into gaps and reading the defense. You get more comfortable every day."

• Chizik said he’d like to get another scrimmage in before the start of the season to work on procedural matters and situations like the team did Saturday.

• Chizik again refused to comment on the situation surrounding running back Eric Smith, who will surrender to police Monday on a third-degree assault charge, according to the Opelika-Auburn News. "As I've said the other day, I'm not going into the details of Eric Smith's situation," he said.

• Auburn does not practice today and will resume in the late afternoon Tuesday.