Favian Upshaw was a dual-threat co-starting quarterback at Georgia Southern from 2014-2016, helping the Eagles reach their first-ever bowl game in 2015. Upshaw rushed 12 times for 199 yards and four touchdowns in Georgia Southern’s 58-27 win over Bowling Green in the GoDaddy Bowl that season.
Upshaw finished his college career with 1,295 rushing yards and 10 touchdowns on the ground with 1,126 passing yards with six more scores through the air in 32 games.
After graduating from Georgia Southern with a degree in sport management in 2016, Upshaw got his start in coaching as a co-offensive coordinator with Astronaut High School in 2017. After that, Upshaw served as a graduate assistant for Tulane from 2018-19 while earning his master’s degree in liberal arts.
Upshaw then coached quarterbacks at Savannah State in 2020 before returning to his alma mater, Georgia Southern, as running backs coach in 2021. He returned to Tulane as an offensive analyst in 2022, marking his sixth year of coaching at a college or high school level.
Upshaw will not get his first coaching opportunity in the NFL after being hired by Sean Payton to serve as an offensive quality control coach with the Denver Broncos this season. He will work alongside fellow OCQ coach Logan Kilgore, a former QB who coached Arch Manning in high school.
Quality control work is not a glamorous job in the NFL, but it is a starting point for coaching at the highest level. The list of coaches who started as quality control assistants before later going on to become head coaches includes Jon Gruden, Ron Rivera and Robert Saleh.
Upshaw and Kilgore are now getting their first opportunities to coach in the NFL on Payton’s new staff in Denver.
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