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Well he decided to start working out with me and for some damn reason he cant do the bench with a barbell and seem to control it. I had him do dumbells and he can put up 45's in sets of 12. When I stick 2 45 plates on the bar to equal 135 he cant even handle that. Personally I never had a problem with the bench since I started. My advice to him was go to a lower weight and work his way up. Might it be his extemely long arms that is hurting him.
This is normal, he just needs to work with it until his stabilizer muscles get used to the movement.
Like yellows2k said - this is normal. The first 4-6 weeks he will gain a lot of strength simply from CNS improvement - his mind/muscle connection will improve. His ability to recruit muscles correctly and fluidly. His tendons and ligaments will go through some adaption as well. He needs to keep focused and get past the first few weeks until this subsides. Working in more machines during this time will help him learn to recruit his muscle groups as well... but supplemented with free weights of course.
If he is new - and you are advanced or intermediate, I am sorry to tell you... but he make a lousy training partener for you. Don't put him on the same split you do. You guys can help each other in the gym (which is always a good thing to have) - but if you are at different stages of development... you will have two different splits. Bottomline - don't overtrain your friend... let him ease into it with a beginners split...