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Last year, the college football world lost an absolute legend after Mike Leach passed away at the age of 61 following an incredible career where he used his revolutionary “Air Raid” offense to rack up more than 150 wins between his time at Texas Tech, Washington State, and Mississippi State.
That particular strategy was a quarterback’s dream and helped the man, myth, and legend who is Gardner Minshew attract the attention he probably would’ve failed to generate if he’d remained at East Carolina (the school where he drank a bunch of Jack Daniels and battered his own hand with a hammer to earn a medical redshirt).
Minshew briefly took the NFL by storm during his rookie season with the Jaguars but has spent the past few years attempting to recapture that magic, and while it seems a bit unlikely he’ll top Anthony Richardson in the battle to become the newest starting QB for the Colts, it seems like he’s still enjoying the ride.
Minshew recently sat down with Ryan Hockensmith of ESPN for a lengthy interview where he recalled the fairly wild ride he’s taken to get to where he is today, which included a tidbit about the conversation with Leach that convinced him to take his talents to Washington State to exhaust his final year of eligibility.
While he’d initially planned to serve as a backup at Alabama, he said he had a change of heart after Leach provided him with a little bit of perspective with the kind of sales pitch you’d expect from the man known as “The Pirate,” who asked him, “Do you want to hold a f****** clipboard? Or do you want to come to Washington State and lead the nation in passing?”
Leach had previously shared a slightly less profane recollection of that conversation, but I like Minshew’s version a lot better.