Quarterback Devin Leary is out to rewrite his narrative at Kentucky
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David Hale, ESPN Staff Writer
LEXINGTON, Ky. — Devin Leary is always ready to answer the question. He thinks about it a lot.
He mentioned it when he first met Kentucky football coach Mark Stoops and he brought it up with offensive coordinator Liam Coen during spring exit interviews. It’s the whole reason he’s here, really. Leary would be cashing NFL checks already if it weren’t for that big, looming question about his health.
Leary is injury-prone. Like it or not, the narrative persists. Oh, he can argue against the label and make a compelling case, but the details are often ignored in favor of the big, glaring headline.
“Man, I just took two bad hits,” Leary said, beginning a speech he has repeated again and again since his 2022 campaign ended suddenly after a wonky throw against Florida State.
Leary was a burgeoning star quarterback for NC State in 2021, throwing 35 touchdowns and just five interceptions, but that season was bookended by a broken leg after a seemingly routine slide five games into the 2020 season and a torn pectoral muscle after his right arm hit a defender following a throw six games into 2022.
No pulled hamstrings. No ACL tears. No sprained ankles or sore elbows. Leary hasn’t dealt with any routine injuries that typically befall a QB. Indeed, after renowned surgeon Dr. James Andrews assessed Leary’s MRI last fall, he lamented it was the first time he’d ever seen a QB with that type of pec injury.
Injury-prone? Heck no, Leary insists. Strange things happen, and he was just unlucky enough to have them happen to him twice.
The more Leary dodges the label, however, the more it feels like it defines him as he prepares for his sixth season of college football and his first at Kentucky. He entered the transfer portal in December as one of the most sought-after players in the country. He has legitimate NFL aspirations when this year is done. But for now, what’s on his mind is simply proving he can get back on the field, escape the wrath of the injury gods for another year, and fight that narrative with his arm instead of his words.
“I pride myself on being tough and taking hits and standing in there,” Leary said. “But that’s just a part of my journey, and I’ve learned to embrace it.”
Leary’s journey was never supposed to include a pit stop in Lexington. After his stellar 2021 campaign ended with a canceled bowl game, he considered leaving school for the NFL, but instead opted to polish his résumé for one final season at NC State. Last summer, he worked out at the Manning Passing Academy with soon-to-be draft stars Bryce Young, C.J. Stroud, Anthony Richardson and Will Levis, and he held his own. By the time the 2022 season began, NC State was ranked in the preseason top 10, and Leary was named the ACC’s preseason player of the year.
And then it all fell apart.
In the days after the injury, NC State coach Dave Doeren said he was hopeful Leary could return later in the 2022 season, but Leary said he instantly knew his year was over. His final numbers for the season that was supposed to propel him into the NFL: 11 touchdowns, four picks and less than 1,300 yards of offense.
Leary flew with his mother to Alabama for a consultation with Andrews, still hopeful he could recover in time for the NFL combine. The news wasn’t good.
Andrews offered two options. Leary could attempt to rehab the injury, and if all went perfectly, he could possibly throw during the combine or a pro day. But if the rehab didn’t remedy the problem, he’d need surgery, and he’d set his return date back even further. If he opted for immediate surgery, he faced an extended recovery that would see him plummet on draft boards. Oh, and just to add another wrinkle, it would be the first time Andrews would ever perform the required procedure on a quarterback.
“It turned my whole world around in one conversation,” Leary said.
Leary and his mother retreated to a waiting room and called his dad. The three talked it over and opted for surgery. Once that decision was made, it opened the floodgates for even more world-altering choices.
“I had to reevaluate everything that I was planning for the following year,” Leary said, “… and that included where I was going to play.”
Leary said he kept Doeren informed each step of the way, but after five years in Raleigh, he ultimately decided it was time for a change of scenery and entered his name into the transfer portal.
The first call Leary got came from Kentucky receivers coach Scott Woodward. Back in high school, Leary had attended a camp at Wagner University at the behest of a coach from Florida, but it was Woodward, then an assistant at UMass, who made a real impression on the young QB. Six years later, that relationship paid dividends for both.
Leary was widely considered among the best players available during the winter portal window, and he had interest from dozens of schools. Leary eventually narrowed his options to five and took just two official visits — to Kentucky and Auburn.
He knew before he left campus in Lexington, however, that he wanted to play for the Wildcats.
Woodward was the one who opened the door, but Leary found support in Kentucky’s most recent QB, Levis. The two actually met while at the airport waiting for a flight to the Manning Passing Academy in 2022. At the time, they talked about possibly sharing a stage at the 2023 NFL draft. When they met again at UK, just two months before Levis would head to the NFL combine, the conversation was much different.
“I’m sitting with Will, and he’s talking about why I should come to Kentucky,” Leary said. “It’s crazy how the world spins around sometimes.”
It was Kentucky’s new offensive coordinator who sealed the deal for Levis, however. Coen helped Levis blossom into a star as a transfer QB in 2021, but Coen soon departed to work as the OC for the Los Angeles Rams. At the end of 2022, Coen opted to return to his college roots, coming back to Kentucky to groom another transfer. Still, it was that one-year hiatus in L.A. that convinced Leary he’d found a home with the Wildcats.
“He pulled up three or four plays they ran here in 2021,” Leary recalled, “then they pulled up three or four plays from the Rams, and Matthew Stafford is running the exact same concepts.”
Leary’s NFL dreams have been delayed a year, but in Coen, he saw a coach who could make him a better QB when those dreams finally become reality.
Coen did his homework on Leary, too. Years ago, Coen had worked with a QB at Maine named Danny Collins. Coen loved the guy. He was tough, singularly focused, lived in the film room. He had a big arm but thrived by reading a defense. He played with a chip on his shoulder, Coen said, was beloved by his teammates and played with a little New Jersey swagger. Leary checked all those same boxes, right down to his home state.
“You see the ball jump off his hand on the film,” said Coen, who even watched Leary’s NC State teammates’ press conferences to see how they spoke about their QB, “but you see a player who everyone gets better when he plays.”
The key there, however, is the last part: “When he plays.”
Leary’s missed 15 games over the past three seasons, and when he arrived at Kentucky in January, it was with no guarantees he’d be throwing without pain.
Andrews helped provide a protocol for Leary’s return, slowly ramping up his workload until he’d regained his lost arm strength. Leary tested his arm for the first time in early March, just before Kentucky began spring ball. The goal was 60 throws vs. air.
“The first 10 throws,” Leary said, “my arm feels shot.”
Slowly, things improved. Doctor’s orders limited how many throws he could make each day, and by Kentucky’s first scrimmage of the spring, Leary looked like his old self.
“You can see the toughness, and he has the ability,” Stoops said. “We were trying to limit his throws a little bit, but there were certain throws that jumped out at us.”
His new teammates had taken notice, too. At NC State, Leary was the unquestioned leader after five years of hard work and big wins. At Kentucky, he took a more measured approach, hoping to earn respect with his game rather than rock the boat in a new locker room.
It was that first scrimmage when it all came together. The offense was down and needed a big play. Leary read the defense, took the snap and zipped a laser over the middle between two defenders for a huge gain. The entire tone of the practice changed. With one throw, it was clear: Leary’s arm was back, and his role was established.
“All the guys were juiced up,” said right guard Eli Cox. “And that’s when you know.”
There are still some unknowns for Leary. Coen wants him to work more under center this season — something he rarely did at NC State. Coen has been impressed by Leary’s field awareness — a gift, he said, that reminds him of Stafford — but he also thinks Leary sometimes lets the big picture get in the way of his precision. Leary has earned the respect of his teammates, but this summer, during seven-on-seven drills, is when he’ll need to become a more vocal leader of the offense.
And yes, there is still the question of his health, because after two serious injuries in three years, the narrative won’t die until Leary puts it to rest on the field.
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Dan Wetzel
As victims go, Lane Kiffin doesn’t seem like one.
He could have stayed at Ole Miss, made over $10 million a year, led his 11-1 team into a home playoff game and become an icon at a place where he supposedly found personal tranquility. Or he could’ve left for LSU to make over $10 million a year leading a program that has won three national titles this century.
Fortunate would be one description of such a fork in life’s road. The result of endless work and talent would be another.
But apparently no one knows a man’s burdens until they’ve walked a mile in his hot yoga pants.
Per his resignation statement on social media, it was spiritual, familial and mentor guidance that led Kiffin to go to LSU, not all those five-star recruits in New Orleans.
“After a lot of prayer and time spent with family, I made the difficult decision to accept the head coaching position at LSU,” he wrote.
In an interview with ESPN’s Marty Smith, Kiffin noted “my heart was [at Ole Miss], but I talked to some mentors, Coach [Pete] Carroll, Coach [Nick] Saban. Especially when Coach Carroll said, ‘Your dad would tell you to go. Take the shot.'” Kiffin later added: “I talked to God, and he told me it’s time to take a new step.”
After following everyone else’s advice, Kiffin discovered those mean folks at Ole Miss wouldn’t let him keep coaching the Rebels through the College Football Playoff on account of the fact Kiffin was now, you know, the coach of rival LSU.
Apparently quitting means different things to different people. Shame on Ole Miss for having some self-esteem.
“I was hoping to complete a historic six-season run … ,” Kiffin said. “My request to do so was denied by [Rebels athletic director] Keith Carter despite the team also asking him to allow me to keep coaching them so they could better maintain their high level of performance.”
Well, if he hoped enough, Kiffin could have just stayed and done it. He didn’t. Trying to paint this as an Ole Miss decision, not a Lane Kiffin decision, is absurd. You are either in or you are out.
Leaving was Kiffin’s right, of course. He chose what he believes are greener pastures. It might work out; LSU, despite its political dysfunction, is a great place to coach ball.
Kiffin should have just put out a statement saying his dream is to win a national title, and as good as Ole Miss has become, he thinks his chance to do it is so much better at LSU that it was worth giving up on his current players, who formed his best and, really, first nationally relevant team.
At least it would be his honest opinion.
Lately, 50-year-old Kiffin has done all he can to paint himself as a more mature version of a once immature person. In the end, though, he is who he is. That includes traits that make him a very talented football coach. He is unique.
He might never live down being known as the coach who bailed on a title contender. It’s his life, though. It’s his reputation.
One of college sports’ original sins was turning playcallers into life-changers. Yeah, that can happen, boys can become men. A coach’s job is to win, though.
A great coach doesn’t have to be loyal or thoughtful or an example of how life should be lived.
This is the dichotomy of what you get when you hire Kiffin. He was on a heater in Oxford, winning in a way he never did with USC or Tennessee or the Oakland Raiders.
That seemingly should continue at resource-rich LSU. Along the way, you get a colorful circus, a wrestling character with a whistle, a high-wire act that could always break bad. It rarely ends well — from airport firings to near-riot-inducing resignations to an exasperated Nick Saban.
LSU should just embrace it — the good and the not so good. What’s more fun than being the villain? Kiffin might be a problem child, but he’s your problem child. It will probably get you a few more victories on Saturdays. He will certainly get you a few more laughs on social media.
It worked for Ole Miss, at least until it didn’t. Then the Rebels had to finally push him aside. This is Lane Kiffin. You can hardly trust him in the good times.
If anything, Carter had been too nice. He probably should have demanded Kiffin pledge his allegiance weeks back, after Kiffin’s family visited Gainesville, Florida, as well as Baton Rouge.
Instead, Kiffin hemmed and hawed and extended the soap opera, gaining leverage along the way.
Blame was thrown on the “calendar,” even though it was coaches such as Kiffin who created it. And leaving a championship contender is an individual choice that no one else is making.
Blame was put on Ole Miss, as if it should just accept desperate second-class hostage status. Better to promote defensive coordinator Pete Golding and try to win with the people who want to be there.
To Kiffin, the idea of winning is seemingly all that matters. Not necessarily winning, but the idea of winning. Potential playoff teams count for more than current ones. Tomorrow means more than today. Next is better than now.
Maybe that mindset is what got him here, got him all these incredible opportunities, including his new one at LSU, where he must believe he is going to win national title after national title.
So go do that, unapologetically. Own it. Own the decision. Own the quitting. Own the fallout. Everything is possible in Baton Rouge, just not the Victim Lane act.
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Ryan S. Clark
St. Louis Blues rookie forward Jimmy Snuggerud will miss up to six weeks to have surgery on his left wrist, the team announced Monday morning.
The 21-year-old Snuggerud, who was a first-round pick by the Blues in 2022, used the opening quarter of the season to establish himself as a top-nine forward. His five goals were two away from being tied for the team lead while his 11 points are tied for sixth. He is also seventh in ice time among Blues forwards at 15:26 per game.
His performances also allowed him to maintain a presence within a rookie class that has seen several players make an impact. Snuggered entered Monday tied for eighth in goals among first-year players.
It appears the earliest Snuggerud could return to the lineup, should the six-week timeline hold, would be mid-January. That would allow him to play about 10 games before the NHL enters the Olympic break. The Blues play their last game before the break on Feb. 4.
Snuggerud isn’t the only injury the Blues are managing, with the team also announcing that forward Alexey Toropchenko is week-to-week after sustaining what they described as scalding burns to his legs in a home accident. He’s the second NHL player this season to sustain an injury at home, with Florida Panthers forward Eetu Luostarinen out of the lineup indefinitely after a “barbecuing mishap” that Panthers coach Paul Maurice shared with reporters on Nov. 19.
Toropchenko has a goal and two points while averaging 11:29 in ice time over 17 games this season.
Those absences are the latest developments in what has seen the Blues, which made the playoffs last season, endure one of the most challenging starts of any team in the NHL through the first quarter of this season.
St. Louis (9-10-7) entered Monday as part of a cluster of five teams that are within two points of the Chicago Blackhawks for the final wild-card spot in the Western Conference.
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