"They get off your back a little bit": Patrick Mahomes once felt "relieved" after committing to Texas Tech
Patrick Mahomes has over the years grown to be one of the best players to have played football at the collegiate and professional level. Mahomes has won three Super Bowls and has a chance to lay claim to the GOAT title if he can match Tom Brady's seven rings.
The quarterback had his college career at Texas Tech and was highly recruited during his high school days. In an 11-year-old video resurfacing online, Patrick Mahomes explained how relieving it was to finally ease off the interest pressure after committing to the Red Raiders.
“It gets old a little bit, getting letters and calls from coaches,” Mahomes said (0:30).
“It’s such a relief to get that commitment. It shows what schools really do care about you, and it tells everybody that you have a school that you like and they get off your back a little bit.”
Patrick Mahomes had a great belief in Kilff Kingsbury
Kliff Kingsbury played a crucial role in the development of Patrick Mahomes at Texas Tech.
The coach had a reputation of developing quarterbacks into world beaters, having coached Johnny Manziel at Texas A&M a year before Mahomes had committed to Texas Tech.
“He's a great quarterback's coach and I know if I go there, he'll help improve me and make me the best quarterback I can be,” Mahomes said (1:05).
“He's followed me playing football and baseball, so that was a big deal for me. He was perfectly fine with that, and that was one of the reasons I committed there.”
Keeping a true Kingsbury worked out well for Mahomes at Texas Tech. He was among the best quarterbacks in college football during his years with the Red Raiders. He threw for an astonishing 11,252 yards and 93 touchdowns in 32 games across three seasons.
Playing baseball and football was crucial to Patrick Mahomes’ commitment
The opportunity to play baseball and football at the collegiate level was pivotal to Patrick Mahomes' decision to commit to Texas Tech. He played both sports as well as basketball at high school and was brilliant in all of them.
“Playing football and baseball was one of my main factors, and it kind of just gave me that over-the-top reason to commit there,” Mahomes said (1:30). “I talked to both the baseball and football coach, and they both were perfectly fine with me playing both.”
Mahomes, though, stopped playing baseball to focus mainly on football ahead of his junior season at Texas Tech.
His father, Pat Mahomes, played in the MLB from 1992 to 2003 and also had a dream of playing the game professionally. He was drafted to the MLB after high school by the Detroit Tigers but failed to ink a deal.