Scott Davis: Spencer Rattler and the blessings, burdens of QB1

Though he’s surrounded by 10 teammates and a full squad of men in opposing jerseys, the starting quarterback of a college football team must often feel like every single floodlight in the stadium is pointing directly at him.

We always see him.

We never stop seeing him.

Everyone knows what comes with the position: The burden of expectations, the blessings of attention, glory and fame. A QB1 is supposed to be just one piece of the puzzle, yet he’s also singular, alone, forever in the act of fighting off challengers and protecting the role he’s earned on the practice field.

For better or worse, he’s often the one we remember as being the author of a team’s fortunes. Standing in a huddle, knowing you’re being counted on to lead, knowing everything that rests on your shoulders – I can only imagine that it’s a lonely feeling at times.

The best quarterbacks – the ones we revere down through the years – are the ones that wanted to be nowhere else but inside those floodlights. Some quarterbacks are charismatic and primed for everything that comes off-the-field – the cameras, the lights, the recognition. Some are so quiet and reserved when they’re away from the game that fans like us often wonder how they found the extra gear they needed to rally their teammates.

But the best of them all share the same quality: They could imagine no other life. They didn’t just want the ball when it mattered, they needed it.

New South Carolina quarterback Spencer Rattler – who recently arrived on campus and delivered his first press conference as a member of the team this week – has already experienced just about everything a QB1 can experience during a college career.

Rattler arrived at Oklahoma as a consensus five-star recruit in 2019. He led the Sooners to a Big 12 title and Cotton Bowl victory in his second year on campus. The next year, he found himself benched during OU’s Red River Rivalry game against Texas despite Oklahoma’s 5-0 start.

He’s been lauded for his talent, been a Heisman Trophy candidate, had his leadership questioned, had his game analyzed and dissected and scrutinized. He’s been to the mountaintop and down into the valley.

Now he’s in Columbia, South Carolina, to play for a program whose fans have been waiting a long time for an on-field leader to rally around.

And judging by his candid and intriguing comments last week, it sounds like he’s eager for the challenge.

Spencer Rattler – Refreshed and Renewed

The word kept coming up again and again during Rattler’s half-hour session with the media.

Refreshed.

“I feel totally refreshed to be at a new university, a great university like this,” he said.

The past, the Oklahoma years, the highs and lows…all of it seemed a distant memory as Rattler spoke enthusiastically about the present

In regards to how the South Carolina football facility is run and how the players seemed to enjoy being around one another and playing for Shane Beamer and his staff, Rattler said, “It’s a refreshing feeling.”

When asked about the exuberant attention he’d received from Gamecock fans since he arrived in Columbia, he said “It’s been a blessing,” then later noted, “It’s refreshing.”

After experiencing the peaceful, easy feeling of Rattler’s press conference, I felt like I’d just meditated for an hour. I too felt refreshed and renewed and ready for a new chapter. (It’s worth noting that Rattler wasn’t the only prominent Oklahoma Sooner to seek a new chapter at the end of the 2021 season. The team’s head coach, Lincoln Riley, left Norman to take over the Southern California program.)

Gamecock fans are more than ready to watch a quarterback step forward and take the reins as the program’s unquestioned leader. In the near-decade since Connor Shaw left campus as arguably the most accomplished South Carolina QB ever, the team has cycled through a series of signal-callers with varying levels of success.

Dylan Thompson led the Gamecocks to a bowl victory in the waning days of the Steve Spurrier Era. Brandon McIlwain and Ryan Hilinski couldn’t quite put a stamp on the program despite arriving as sought-after recruits, and later looked for playing time elsewhere. Jake Bentley hung some big numbers on the board but battled inconsistency and injury before transferring.

Rattler will compete with Luke Doty, who has won over fans with his fire and passion but has also been hampered by injuries.

Is Rattler finally the one we’ve been waiting for at QB1?

We won’t know until September. But the quarterback himself seems at peace with his decision to come here and excited to show the rest of us what he can do.

Refreshing, indeed.

Defeating the Distractions

Distractions have a way of creeping in on even the most tightly run college football teams, and for sinking many starting quarterbacks, too.

That’s why it’s not surprising that Rattler is already facing questions about distractions – about those years at Oklahoma, about his time as part of a Netflix documentary during his high school days, about whether he’s ready to lead – before he’s even taken the field in garnet and black. For his part, he seems ready to move beyond it all to focus on what he came to Columbia to do in the first place.

And that’s another quality the memorable QBs have: They defeat distractions again and again.

In the first season of the tear-jerking 2000s NBC TV series “Friday Night Lights,” a shy and slender backup quarterback, Matt Saracen, is called upon to step into the starting role after a career-ending injury to his predecessor. His coach, Eric Taylor (played by Kyle Chandler) recognizes that Saracen needs a pick-me-up, and takes him out to an empty stadium one night for a pep talk for the ages.

The focus? Eliminating all distractions.

“You’re QB1 of the Dillon Panthers!” screams Coach Taylor. “Your teammates, if they can hear you, they will believe in you!”

In the scene’s final moments, coach and player engage in a call-and-response that still gives me chills more than 15 years later.

“What’s your name?”

“Matt Saracen!”

“What do you play?”

“QB1!”

“How do you play it?”

“Perfectly!”

That, of course, is one of the hazards of playing QB1.

Your fans expect you to play it perfectly.

But even though perfection is impossible, the quarterbacks we remember most are the ones who always believe they can attain it.

They always believe it. They never stop believing it. And eventually, the rest of us believe, too.

When it happens, we never forget them.

When it happens, it’s a blessing.

Tell me how you’re feeling about watching Spencer Rattler at QB1 this fall by writing me at [email protected]. Thank you for reading my most recent newsletter. Please click here to get future newsletters.

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