Former Baylor star QB Jarrett Stidham spent the fall running a HS scout team

Published Dec. 14, 2016 8:35 a.m. ET

Aaron Torres

Maybe the most underreported story in all of college football this year has been the whereabouts of Jarrett Stidham. For those of you who don’t remember the name, he was the uber-recruit who signed with Baylor in early 2015, throwing for 12 touchdowns a season ago. Had Art Briles never been fired, Stidham would have been next in line of great Baylor signal-callers.

But when Briles was let go, Stidham decided to leave with him, rather than wait to see what the fallout around Waco looked like. Instead of immediately transferring to another school, he instead decided to sit out the entire 2016 season so there would be no restrictions on where he could go.

Earlier this week, we began to get the answer to “where has Jarrett Stidham been?” as USA Today did a long feature on the former Baylor QB. Apparently, he has been working out on his own and taking classes at a local junior college to make sure he will stay eligible for next season.

Maybe the most interesting part is this: To stay in football shape, he actually asked a local high school coach if he could come to practice and run scout team. Here are the details via USA Today:

That was how Stidham ended up having lunch with Jeff Hulme, head coach of Midway High School, one day in July. “He thought I was gonna ask to use the weight room or the indoor facility that they had,” Stidham says. “I was like, ‘You know, I don’t really have anybody to throw to. Do you mind if I come run your scout team every week?’ ”

Hulme had played for Briles at Georgetown High nearly 30 years before Stidham became Briles’ pupil. He checked with Midway’s athletic director, and by the first week of September, Stidham was throwing against Midway’s defense three days a week.

“You gotta remember, in Texas high school football, it’s like family. If you played for somebody and I played for somebody, then in a lot of ways we are family.”

That little snippet was just one of the many fascinating pieces of Stidham’s journey, all captured in the story. And it will be even more fascinating to see how it all ends for Stidham.

Despite his season in exile, he is as in demand as any recruit in college football this offseason, with his choices likely coming down to Auburn, Florida and Texas A&M (Auburn seemingly has a massive lead in the race). If he does go to play for Gus Malzahn, Stidham will have three years of eligibility remaining. And on a young Tigers club that remains several key pieces, Stidham could be the missing piece going into next year.

And if he does turn out to be the missing piece, we’ll know where his success came from: a high school football field in Texas.