- Commissioner’s statement on Ventura, Marte
- Ronnie O’Sullivan: Masters champion ‘felt so vulnerable’ in final
- Arron Fletcher Wins 2017 WSOP International Circuit Marrakech Main Event ($140,224)
- Smith challenges Warner to go big in India
- Moncada No. 1 on MLB Pipeline’s Top 10 2B Prospects list
- Braves land 2 on MLB Pipeline’s Top 10 2B Prospects list
- Kingery makes MLB Pipeline’s Top 10 2B Prospects list
- New Zealand wrap up 2-0 after Bangladesh implosion
- Mathews, Pradeep, Gunathilaka to return to Sri Lanka
- Elliott hopes for rain for Poli
Tom Savage Isn’t Typical First-Time Starter for Playoff Hopeful Houston Texans
- Updated: December 23, 2016
Tom Savage will stare down a long list of looming and daunting questions Saturday night. Then he’ll either be engulfed by them or put out fires one at a time.
He’s the Houston Texans’ starting quarterback now after the Brock Osweiler experiment mercifully reached its messy conclusion. There’s no brighter stage to make your first career start nearly three full seasons after being a mid-round pick (135th overall in 2014).
Savage will be responsible for keeping the Texans’ playoff hopes afloat as they enter Week 16 still leading the AFC South, but only because of a tiebreaker with the Tennessee Titans. Both teams have identical 8-6 records, and the Indianapolis Colts are just one game back.
He’ll be playing under the searing prime-time lights against the Cincinnati Bengals, a team that’s struggled all season but still employs a defensive tackle who can gobble up quarterbacks. Geno Atkins is tied for the league lead among all interior defensive linemen with eight sacks, according to Pro Football Focus, and is second with 65 pressures.
And he’ll be doing it all on Christmas Eve, a time when family and football blend together seamlessly to put more scrutinizing eyes on a quarterback who’s attempted just 55 career regular-season passes.
Savage likely won’t be functioning at warp speed, though, because that’s not his style. It’s not how football has shaped him. You can’t take the long, winding road of his career at high speeds.
His performance Saturday night will be a product of that journey and the hurdles jumped by a 26-year-old who didn’t find his college football home until the third try. Now, after suffering two injuries and then being pushed aside by the Texans’ free-agency splash at his position, it’s finally Savage’s turn.
He’s a bargain compared to Brock Osweiler, as ESPN Stats & Information noted. But the size of his paycheck has little bearing on what really matters: stepping into a game that doubles as a rattling washing machine and having the maturity beyond his years to handle the weight of the moment.
Tom Savage replaces Brock Osweiler.Savage has $300,584 guaranteed in his current dealOsweiler has $37,000,000 guaranteed in his deal
— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) December 18, 2016
To understand Savage and why he’s more experienced than his game logs let on we have to travel back in time, briefly stopping at three schools.
Our first stop is 2009, when Savage was a freshman starter at Rutgers. He was reliably solid and showed quality vision with just seven interceptions all season alongside 14 touchdown throws. Savage was also named a freshman All-American and his future looked bright.
Then that flame quickly flickered and faded. Savage suffered a hand injury early in 2010 that eventually cost him his starting job at Rutgers. He went from a highly touted recruit to being a castoff and needing to sit out a season after transferring to Arizona.
A year of critical development time without game action went by, and Savage still couldn’t find permanent footing. He transferred once more after Arizona hired Rich Rodriguez as its new head coach. Yet again he had to sit for a season, and yet again his draft stock and future took a roundhouse kick to the gut.
That’s when he arrived at the University of Pittsburgh and came under the watch of then-quarterbacks coach Brooks Bollinger. Immediately it was clear to Bollinger that, despite all the mental beatings Savage had taken while going from prized recruit to repeatedly discarded, he still had the physical tools to be an NFL quarterback.
“He had an NFL arm …
