Will Rogers committed to Washington on December 15, 2023. He has been a member of the Huskies for less than one full month. He is not allowed to play for his new team this year.
The former Mississippi State quarterback is set to replace Michael Penix Jr. in Seattle next season. Rogers has one year of eligibility left and will serve as the Heisman Trophy Award runner-up’s successor.
And yet, despite his lack of affiliation with the school prior to last month, he was on the sideline with Washington during the College Football Playoff National Championship in Houston on Monday. It was a bizarre representation of the modern era and the impact of the transfer portal on college football.
Someone who has been part of the team for less than 25 days was wearing a jersey on the field at the biggest game of his future teammates’ lives. Many of them won’t even be his teammates next year!
And not only was Will Rogers there, he threw the ball to active players. The future Huskies signal-caller threw the ball around with current Huskies running back Dillon Johnson.
To make it even weirder, Johnson spent three years with Rogers in Starkville before deciding to transfer out west and star for the undefeated Pac-12 champions. It was a reunion of former teammates who will play in the same backfield next year, on the field of a national championship game that one of the two did not have any role in reaching.
Rogers not only got to toss a football around on the field of a national championship, he got to be amongst the players who worked hard to reach the game on the sideline. And depending on the result, he gets to enjoy a win he did not earn. Crazy!