The 2023-24 Texas quarterback room was the first in college football history and -- now that we're fully into the NIL era -- likely last to feature two No. 1 overall recruits on the same depth chart. By all accounts, all five gentlemen that lived in the eye of that Hot Take Tsunami (head coach/offensive coordinator Steve Sarkisian, 2021 No. 1 recruit Quinn Ewers, 2023 No. 1 recruit Arch Manning, co-OC/QBs coach AJ Milwee and assistant QBs coach Michael Bimonte) handled that unprecedented situation as well as could be expected. Quinn was the starter, Arch the heir apparent. “It’s probably pretty annoying having me as a backup," Manning deadpanned this spring.
It was my take all along that after the 2024 season ended and Ewers officially passed the torch by entering the 2025 NFL draft, in their heart of hearts all four of Sarkisian, Ewers, Manning and Milwee had the same conversations with themselves: Glad it happened, even more glad it's over.
Even now, with Ewers a Miami Dolphin and Manning the unquestioned QB1 in Austin, the QB Room That Launched a Thousand Takes is still producing content, as none other than Steve Spurrier himself cannonballed into the pool with the take that many were thinking.
“Most people are picking Texas to win the SEC in football,” Spurrier said on Another Dooley Noted Podcast, via Inside Texas. “They’ve got Arch Manning already winning the Heisman, too. My question is, if he was this good how come they let Quinn Ewers play all the time last year? He was a 7th round pick?”
In his own HBC way, Spurrier cuts to the heart of the quagmire Steve Sarkisian will find himself this fall, regardless of how Manning performs on the field. Seriously, it's going to be Door No. 1 or Door No. 2:
1) If Manning beats Ohio State in the opener and leads Texas into the national championship race, the take will instantly become "Did Sark cost Texas two national championships by not starting Arch???"
2) If Manning struggles early or generally fails to meet his lofty expectations, every First Take chyron, every YouTube thumbnail this fall will be "Is Arch Manning college football's biggest bust ever???"
This has all been in the works for years now. Arch will either be The Prince That Was Promised, a quarterback with Alexander the Great's leadership qualities and a right arm gifted from Zeus himself. Or he'll be the most overrated, overhyped quarterback to ever step on a football field. On one side of the coin, you had longtime recruiting reporter attach his name to the "Arch would've been a 3-star if his last name wasn't Manning" take before his senior year of high school. On the other, you had none other than Adam Schefter breathlessly hyping Arch as a possible starter after his first spring practice at Texas.
The truth will almost likely sit somewhere in the middle. Arch will be a toolsy quarterback with evidently bright future, but also a first-time starter with some growing pains to fight through. The odds of the Take-O-Sphere settling on that take feel about as likely as a flipped coin landing on its ridge, though.
As for the question at hand, the answer Sarkisian will give will be that, in his view, Ewers was a better quarterback than Manning in 2024. The Texas head coach stood steadfastly behind Ewers for his entire career in Austin, with only a single moment of invited controversy.
In the middle of Texas's October home game with Georgia, Sarkisian replaced Ewers with Manning after the Longhorns fell behind 20-0 in the second quarter. On Manning's first series, he moved the Longhorns from their 25 to the 48, their most successful drive to that point in the game. Had Manning seen an open Matthew Golden on 3rd-and-6 instead of forcing an inaccurate ball to a double-covered DeAndre Moore, maybe the rest of that drive, that game, that season plays out differently. But he didn't. Manning fumbled to end his second and final possession; he wouldn't see another competitive snap until the Texas A&M game six weeks later.
“You only have to ask Coach Sark how come you played that one instead of this one,” Spurrier said. “Hopefully he’ll say ‘Because we thought he was better than that one.’ Isn’t that why you play one guy and not the other? Unless it was discipline, and there was no discipline or anything.”
To be clear, no one's asking anyone to feel sorry for Sark, Arch or Ewers. They all signed up for this nonsense, and are paid quite well to do so. The point of this article is to prepare you, the innocent bystander, for the Take Tsunami coming your way this fall. And it was started by none other than the Head Ball Coach himself, because of course it was.