Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback Gardner Minshew II has always fought hard for the time he’s earned to start, and that was especially the case in college and the NFL. During his senior year at Washington State he got the nod from coach Mike Leach after transferring from Alabama and went on to put up historic numbers for the team.
While Minshew made things look easy during his 2018 campaign, the fact of the matter is his 2019 successor, Anthony Gordon, pushed him hard and didn’t make the decision an easy one on coach Leach. In a recent interview posted by Crissy Froyd on Titans Wire, Leach discussed the quarterback competition that occurred before the 2018 season and how it brought the best out of Tyler Hilinski (before his passing and prior to Minshew’s arrival), Gordon and Minshew.
“I thought it brought the best out of all three of them. I thought it was very closely contested,” Leach said. “I think the edge that Gardner had was that he’d actually played in a game, so he had a little more experience. I thought that each of the three did things that were better than the other. Gardner, for not having been exactly in the offense, really gained a lot of ground quickly, and in the end I found that to be quite impressive, and then statistically you could argue that Anthony at various points was ahead for sure.”
Minshew also discussed the competition and his relationship with Gordon.
“Watching Gordo play with a lot of aggressiveness and creativity challenged me to push outside of my comfort zone,” Minshew said. “I just tried to help him as he goes through the whole process, giving him advice any time I thought I could help.”
That mentality helped Minshew when he came into the league, and he was as prepared as a sixth-round pick could be for Nick Foles’ unexpected collarbone injury. By the end of the season, he was 6-6 for the team and was able to win seven Pepsi Rookie of the Week awards.
If the 2020 season is played out, it looks like Minshew’s impressive display showed the Jags enough to get him the starting role. Whenever he retakes the field, fans should expect him to have the same mentality he had while with the Cougars before the 2018 season regardless of who he’s battling.