Mike Leach has always coached one of the most prolific passing offenses in college football, first at Texas Tech and now at Washington State. But his quarterbacks haven’t found much success in the NFL.
Leach thinks the problem with the NFL is that coaches don’t teach quarterbacks and therefore can’t take a passer from his college offense and teach them to play under the center in the NFL.
“Like there is something magical about teaching somebody to do that because whichever caveman invented football, they were taking snaps under the center,” Leach said on 710 ESPN in Seattle. “And I’m not talking just one scout or one person has asked me this. But somehow the insecurity that exists with some of these people and their ability to teach a quarterback to take a quarterback snap from under center I think is a disturbing commentary.”
Leach thinks it’s silly that NFL teams worry about a quarterback’s ability to take a snap from under center, as Leach believes it’s one of the easier skills to learn.
“Every youth league coach that I’ve ever met . . . has mustered the ability to teach sixth graders to take snaps under center,” he said. “So, if you’re a scout and if your guys at your whatever NFL team are a fraction of the coaches that you hope they’re going to be, I should think that they’re able to teach somebody to take a snap from under center. I mean, obviously, the guy already knows how. A chimpanzee can take the snap from under center.”
Just as NFL teams don’t think much of Leach’s quarterbacks, Leach doesn’t think much of the NFL’s ability to teach quarterbacks.