Already recovering from an ankle injury, Sean Maguire's bid to become Florida State's starting quarterback took another hit Saturday after Jimbo Fisher said he'll miss at least four weeks with an injury to his other foot.
Fisher said Maguire injured his right foot Wednesday, a day after the Seminoles opened preseason camp. He had only recently returned from a broken ankle sustained in the Seminoles' 2015 Peach Bowl loss to Houston.
The injury means Maguire, a redshirt senior from Sparta, N.J., will miss the Sept. 5 season opener against Ole Miss in Orlando.
"The outside little bone in his foot, they're going to have to put a screw in it," Fisher said. "About four weeks. That's the same one Derwin [James] had. Same injury Derwin had. ... He'll be back by the second or third game of the year."
Fisher was asked if redshirt freshman Deondre Francois was now the official starter for the season opener, to which Fisher replied, "Right now, I ain't naming a starter. Right now he's going with the ones.'"
Fisher did say that Francois would be taking the majority of the reps with the starters going forward.
The redshirt freshman already was splitting first-team reps with Maguire. He likely will be backed up by redshirt sophomore J.J. Cosentino and true freshman Malik Henry.
"He felt something funny he thought, then [Friday] it started really bothering him toward the end of practice," Fisher said. "We just had it looked at and you could see a real slight break. It's that wee little bone on the outside of your foot."
It's been a challenging 2016 for Maguire. He missed all of spring practice while recovering from the previous ankle injury. While he was rehabbing, Francois began laying the foundation in his attempt to unseat Maguire as the team's No. 1 quarterback.
"OK. He's been good," Fisher said of how Francois has looked in practice. "Some good. Some bad. I mean, I'm pleased. I'm not unhappy. I'm not unhappy at all. About where I thought."
* Read more news and notes from FSU's Saturday practice
Fisher said Maguire was "down" about the injury, but he praised his quarterback for his character.
Maguire drew positive remarks from Fisher and his teammates throughout 2015 when he lost last year's starting competition to Notre Dame graduate transfer Everett Golson.
An injury to Golson gave Maguire his second career start against Syracuse. He threw for 348 yards, three touchdowns and rekindled the quarterback battle.
Maguire would eventually win the job, and FSU finished 4-2 to end the year.
"It hurts me," Fisher said. "It does. When you see guys that stand for the right thing just get bad breaks. Life isn't fair sometimes, and it's not being fair to him."
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