McCoy's brilliance in high school and college was at the forefront of Texas' emergence as a state rich in top quarterbacks.
Current Browns rookie quarterback Colt McCoy playing last season for the University of Texas.Rookie Colt McCoy is the Cleveland Browns' quarterback-in-waiting.
Regardless of what he does in the NFL, though, McCoy's shining legacy in his home Texas is assured. All he did as a Lone Star State QB was leave Jim Ned High School as the all-time leading passer in 2A and a two-time state offensive MVP.
When the Browns drafted McCoy in the third round from the University of Texas last April, he left the Longhorns as their four-year starter and college football's all-time winningest quarterback.
The essence of a feature story by Bryan Curtis for the magazine, Texas Monthly, is McCoy's standing at the forefront of a Texas quarterback revolution. After a long drought in producing notable quarterbacks, Texas high schools can now claim the development of some of the best college and pro players at the position.
Curtis focuses on McCoy. He addresses the injury that McCoy suffered early in the Longhorns' 37-21 loss to Alabama in last January's BCS national championship game:
That one little hit, which came on Texas’s fifth offensive play, made Colt’s right arm go numb.
“They asked me to pick it up,” Colt says. “I could raise it to about right here.” He points to a spot just below his shoulder, then drops his arm and lets it dangle by his side. His doe-like eyes have always made him look childlike, but with his arm hanging stiffly he looks positively helpless, like a kid forced to try on a sports coat and check the length of the sleeve.
McCoy was disappointed that his competitive nature was questioned. Curtis quotes him:
“People say that I skipped out on it because of my future,” Colt says, a tinge of anger in his voice. “That’s stupid. If I could have gone back in the game, I would have. I couldn’t hold on to a ball. I couldn’t take a snap.”
McCoy's dad, Brad, was his high school coach. When Curtis writes "Coach," he's referring to Brad McCoy. Curtis writes about the aftermath of Colt McCoy's injury:
Colt told ESPN after that game that, despite the seeming unfairness of it all, he would continue to put himself in God’s hands, that he was “standing on the rock.” The statement proved powerful. When Coach repackaged the story of Colt’s unbreakable faith for a speech at a church, a speech he has given many times since, an account of it quickly appeared all over religious and football websites.
Curtis begins to detail how Texas has become fertile ground for premier quarterbacks:
But beyond being a great quarterback, Colt was heralding a new era of football in Texas. High schools have turned into a quarterback assembly line. The state is churning out great passers like Colt every year, and now those quarterbacks are beginning to overrun college football and the NFL.
There's much more about Colt McCoy in a Texas Monthly interview of Bryan Curtis by Kevin Sullivan.
For instance:
Do you see Colt McCoy as a direct result of post-7-on-7 football? He certainly benefited from 7-on-7s, but I think in the years to come, he’ll be seen as more of a product of the spread offense, which maximizes his skills. For instance, beyond his accuracy, one of the shocks of watching Colt play at Texas was how effective he was at running the ball. Colt’s not a wonderful athlete, as even he admits. And his rushing totals were padded by the fact that Texas’s running backs were pretty awful. But watch this play from last season [play from last season: youtube.com/watch?v=htpJjUAdkbo] against A&M. Two linebackers get caught blitzing, and once Colt gets past them, the defense is just too spread out to get close to him. Nice call by Greg Davis, but that’s a guy playing in exactly the right scheme for his talents.
Texas Monthly also includes a Nov., 2009 feature by Jeff Beckham on Colt McCoy's brother, Case, now a freshman quarterback at Texas.