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Size doesnt matter for Big 12 QBs

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  • JOHN MARSHALL - AP Sports Writer
  • Originally published July 23, 2008 at 11:47 a.m., updated July 23, 2008 at 11:47 a.m.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Nebraska’s Joe Ganz wasn’t highly recruited out of high school, told he was too small to play quarterback on the college level.

Any other conference, maybe that holds true.

Not in the Big 12.

As Missouri’s Chase Daniel and Kansas’ Todd Reesing showed last season, bigger isn’t always better, particularly in the Big 12, the conference that gives hope to little guys all across the country.

“What Chase and Todd have done, they’ve kind of opened the door for smaller guys to hopefully get recruited more,” Ganz said. “Hopefully, we can open the door for a lot more coaches to realize you don’t have to be the typical 6-4, 230 to have success in college. I know that’s what the pro guys look for, but you don’t need that big size, that big stature to be successful in college.”

Nowhere is that more apparent than the Big 12, land of the little quarterback.

Ganz is 6-foot-1, 210 pounds. Daniel is a stout 6-0, 225. Colorado’s Cody Hawkins is not bigger than some high school freshmen at 5-11, 190 pounds, Reesing only a little bigger at 5-11, 200. Texas Tech’s Graham Harrell is listed at a generous 6-3, 200 pounds.

There are a few more in the prototypical mold – Kansas State’s Josh Freeman is 6-5, 250 pounds, Oklahoma’s Sam Bradford 6-5, 213 – but nearly half the returning quarterbacks in the Big 12 are considered undersized by today’s standards.

The thing about these little guys, though, is they know how to make the most of their abilities and how to lead a team.

“They say a guy has to be 6-4 so he can drop back 10 yards and throw over a guy that’s 6-7, that’s a bunch of falsehoods,” Texas Tech coach Mike Leach said. “It’s more about passing lanes anyway. It’s better to be short and be on target than tall.”

Smaller quarterbacks also seem to have another, less discernible trait: will.

Because they’ve always been told that they’re too small, undersized quarterbacks often have that extra little something inside that pushes them to prove everyone wrong.

Doug Flutie had it. He was 5-10, yet he never stopped believing in himself, winning the Heisman Trophy in 1984 at Boston College and going on to a long career in the NFL and Canadian Football League.



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