The Athletic Football Show: A show about the NFL - The QB2 Series: Case Keenum on the Minnesota Miracle and other tales from life as a backup

Episode Date: December 31, 2022

Not many perennial backup quarterbacks can say they authored one of the most iconic plays in NFL playoff history. Case Keenum, however, is an outlier. He sits down with The Athletic's Kalyn Kahler to discuss his football life in the latest installment of The QB2 Series.Subscribe to The Athletic Football Show...AppleSpotifyYouTube Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is The Athletic Football Show. Hey everybody. I'm Kaelin Kaler, senior NFL writer with The Athletic. And welcome to QB2. This is the show where we interview my favorite players in football, the backup quarterbacks. I love to talk to them because they have the best stories in the game. And they are underrepresented in interviews and press conferences around the NFL.

Today's guest is a real miracle worker. He had one college offer and he turned that into an election. year in counting NFL career, including one very important playoff win in a career-defining play. He went undrafted out of the University of Houston in 2012 and then signed with the Texans and became a starter halfway through his second season in the lead. He's probably best known as the architect of the 61-yard touchdown pass to Siffon Diggs, the Minneapolis Miracle, his first playoff appearance, and his first playoff win. He's now in his 11th season in the NFL and his first at the Buffalo Bills.

Welcome to QB2, Case Keenum. Appreciate it. Quite an introduction there. Thank, Kayla. Appreciate that. I know. It's really fun when I have you guys on to just kind of go through your whole careers and be like, oh my gosh, so much has happened here.

Like, how do I put this into four or five sentences and like get to the essence of who you are? And I feel like maybe we did that right there. I don't know. You can tell me. Was that a fair summary? Is anything missing? I don't know. If you're on my Wikipedia page, you need to go ask my sister.

She always changes it on me and puts embarrassing facts on there. So it may or may not be true. I don't know. Is she the official manager of the case keynote Wikipedia? Well, she has not been appointed. She's self-appointed. She likes to go in there and do that sort of stuff. That's awesome.

That's great to have a family member take on that responsibility for you. The question I want to start with for you, as I kind of mentioned that in You are known for this one amazing play. What is it like to be known for one thing like that? How often are people approaching you in public knowing it's Case Keenum? It's the miracle play. Like, how often does that happen to you? You know, it depends.

You know, on the anniversary of it or if some other big play happens in the playoffs or kind of a walk-off type touchdown that people might mention something. I'm actually playing on the same team now with Stefan Diggs, you know, who's the other half of that. And actually, he probably did more work than I did. I threw it, gave him a chance, and he made a heck of a play, made a couple of guys miss, and thankfully did not run out of bounds like we were all yelling at him to do. Instead, went ahead and scored a touchdown, and we ended the game like that.

So a pretty incredible moment. You know, it was a blast. you know, it's nice to still have a few moments ahead of me, though. So we'll see, see what else is in store. So a question I like to ask all the guys who come on the show is how would you summarize your career and your role if you had to pick a word? Because there are so many words that we use, and we, I mean, journalists, to describe backup quarterbacks, some of which are not, some of which are not the nicest terms. So I want to give you a chance right now to, you know, identify with whatever word you want to identify with for your career.

Yeah, that's a tough one because it's changed. It's evolving. You know, I remember my wife and I both, like, year five or six, people started using the word journeyman. And, you know, we've been on two teams, I think at that point, you know, moved once or twice, maybe three times. But we're like, we're not journeymen. And then, you know, five years later when my wife's speed dial consists of the moving company, the car relocation, you know, all these different people to help us as we have moved from Houston to St. Louis to L.A. to Minnesota, Denver, Washington, Cleveland, now Buffalo. I would say it probably fits a little bit.

Yeah. You know, and I don't think of it as a negative thing. Like you said, at the beginning, this has started my, you know, career with one college offer. And, you know, I'm sitting here in year 11. And, you know, we got a pretty stinking good football team. And it's fun to be a part of. And I love playing football. I love playing quarterback.

You know, I love the camaraderie of a team, the camaraderie of a QB room, the mesh that happens there. and I can say that I'm in the best quarterback room I've ever been in. I normally don't rank them like that. I normally say one of the best, but this is incredible. Josh is awesome. Matt is awesome. We got some great things going. And I'm getting off your question of the one word.

That's okay. You know, it's been a journey, you know, so I guess you could say journeymen. I wasn't planning on adopting that one when you ask. but, you know, it's been a heck of a ride, and I'm enjoying it. Yeah, okay, so I have so many follow-up space off of that answer. So I am actually really surprised that you did rank a quarterback room because normally I've asked that question to people before and they'll just be like, oh, well, this one was fun, this one was good, you know, so what specifically makes this buffalo room the best?

And I want to, for our viewers who aren't familiar with who's in the room, obviously it's Josh Allen, then you have you as the backup. And then we have Matt Barkley, another very experienced veteran. I think he's just one year younger than you on the practice squad. So why is it the best? Is it the way that it's structured? Is it the roles that you guys are filling? What is different about this room?

It's a lot of things. You know, Josh being one, he's talented. He's so, so talented. He's a lot of fun to watch play football. he's a lot of fun to be around. We hang out all the time, off the field, on the field, quarterback dinners, Bible studies at our house here in a few hours. You know, there's something going on.

You know, every off day, the team is extremely close. It's a very, very close team here in Buffalo. Coach McDermott has done an extremely good job, great job, of implementing a culture that is, you know, it's par none. And it's fun to come in to his, you know, I guess it's year five or six for him and just what he's built in his time here. And to kind of see, I wouldn't call it a finished product, but to kind of see the work that's gone into it and see this product that's now here and what we've got going on. But it's a blast. Joe Brady, quarterback coach, Ken Dorsey's office coordinator.

It's just, it's just working. It's good. It's good communication. We all love golf. We love settlers at Catan. I don't know if you know about the board games. Yeah. Yeah.

A bunch of nerds basically here trying to pretend to be athletes. But, yeah, we're having a blast. That's what makes it the best. It's just so much fun. Do you guys play that game, like, in the facility? Doesn't it take, like, hours? Yeah, I wouldn't say we play in the facility. We've got our phones on the facility.

Okay. On road trips on our phones. But whoever's house is we're at, you know, we all have it. expansion packs we're all about it. We're settling whenever we can. Nice. Did you ever play that before you came to Buffalo? Uh-huh. Yeah. My wife and I played with some friends in St. Louis, we learned. Hadn't played much with, I guess my sister taught me how to play. And then we got here and they were like, do you settle? And I was like, oh, yeah, let's go.

And so we got it going, had a good time. And yeah, the whole team, I think, settles. That's amazing. So with job, in particular, I know different starters have different things that they need from their backups. And it can vary, you know, who you're playing behind. What does Josh, being younger than you and less experience than you in the NFL, what is that dynamic? Like, what does he want from you? How do you help him and, like, support him in your average game league? Yeah, I guess he is younger.

He may actually be more experienced than starts now, maybe not years, but I think he's getting out of where he's played some ball. And he's playing some really good ball. You know, he doesn't need much. He's just good-natured. Loves the guys, loves being around the guys, loves playing football. You know, he's great.

I mean, he is his low-key and chill, come-as-a-go type of guy. So, you know, we watch film together in meetings and talk about plays during practice and that. most of the time it's relaxed, you know, talking about TV shows or movies or, you know, whatever's going on in the world or, you know, all sorts of stuff. It's just being good friends. So he, to me, seems like kind of like an overgrown child in his personality. And, you know, maybe I'm off there, but that's what I've kind of observed of him in his press conferences and what people say about him. And he seems like, as he mentioned, like he jokes around the line.

he brings the fun. And it's interesting to me because typically if you look at quarterback rooms across the NFL, that is often something that the backup brings as like, you know, the person who is doing that lighthearted, keeping it light, keeping it fun in the room and it can get really serious. So with the starter kind of taking that role, what, I don't know, if you can take us inside the quarterback room, like what is either the funniest thing he's done or if he's pranked to you guys in any way? are there any are there any kind of stories you can tell about josh in that sense um yeah uh i mean he is he is a full on prankster um you have to be on your guard at all times uh with whatever's going on um you can walk around any corner in the building and he's ready to jump out at you and scare you

um you know with that with just the jokes um i mean i think he's got a he's got a he's got a new joke every week for us, you know, officially. I mean, he's got jokes all the time, but it's a good, it's a good mix, you know. We keep it lighthearted and fun, but we also focus when we need to and, you know, get locked in when we need to, and he does a great job of leading the guys with that. There's a lot of different ways of playing quarterback and a lot of different ways of leading men. and I've really, really enjoyed getting to know Josh and his style of quarterbacking leadership,

just relationally around the building. You know, he's definitely a household superstar type guy name, but, man, you wouldn't know it, you know, the way he interacts with everybody in the building. So I try to bring a few of my jokes here and there. we've got them on a few different things, but it's good giving taken there. Yeah, so one thing I think is interesting about you guys, you two in particular,

and I might be making too much of this, but I think you're 6-1, if I'm right, and Josh, I believe is 6-5. So that's a 4-inch height difference, and I'm wondering if that impacts any of the ways that you would run plays or if you ever had to come into a game what you might do versus what he does.

Like how does a height difference like that affect the dynamic there if it does at all? Yeah, I probably won't be jumping over anybody anytime soon. He's been known to do that and scramble around and run. You know, I have done my best to persuade him to slide a little bit more, which I think would be beneficial to us all. You know, he runs and plays with his hair on fire. so that's, he's going to be him, no matter what. But, yeah, so there's, there are some physical differences there when it comes to that.

But, you know, I'm fully confident and I can come in and run the offense whenever I need to. So are you trying to be kind of like the voice of reason for him of like, hey, it's really cool when you do this, but like, don't get hurt. So you need a slide. What are those conversations like between you two? Yeah, I might have incentivized him a little bit if, uh, you know, if he would slide during a game, and he did. And so it was good. It was not a monetarily incentivized thing. It was more something that I would do. And I'm a man of my word. I did it. Can you say what it was, or at least give us a hint?

Allegedly, I may or may not have told him I would wear only a jockstrap to one of our walkthroughs if he slid in a game feet first with nobody around him. And he did it. What game was that? Yeah, you can go watch the film and see if he did it. Oh, I'm going to have to go back and see which game. Oh, my God. And how did that go?

Did the whole team know that you had incentivized him in that way, or was it a surprise to everyone when you showed up wearing a jockstrap to a walkthrough? They found out. That is a great detail. Wow, we're going to break the internet with that one when this airs. Just don't worry. That's amazing. I don't even have a follow-up.

I don't even know where to go from there. Yeah, we can change the subject. I'm going to go to. A general question that I really like to ask you guys, because I think a lot of us don't realize when you're a backup or when you're anywhere, not the QB1, further down on the QB depth chart, you really don't get any reps. How do you steal or sneak or work around what you get in practice to make sure you're prepared in any given week? Yeah, that's a great question. Kaila,

that's one of the harder things about being the NFL and being the backup is there just aren't enough reps to go around. I mean, we don't run all the plays on our game plan, you know, in a normal practice week as the starter. So he's, you know, there's plays we run in the game that are the first time you're ever running them, you know, game plan type stuff. So for me, it's a lot of visualization. I try to stand behind, you know, the quarterback as close as I can safely and see the field as close as I can to what he's seeing. And the way Diggs might come out of a break or the way Dawson or Gabe run, you know, run a route. this way or so I can, you know, feel, feel that, you know, that communication that happens

between a receiver and a quarterback visually. That type of communication, I think, is key in any offense, especially in this one. So trying to get that as much it can and then on top of that visualization and film watching as much as I can. Yeah, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Standing behind makes a lot of sense. I want to ask you something that you said earlier where your wife, you know, she's got the moving company. She's got everything relocation specialist on speed dial. What has been the most chaotic move or, you know, situation in your career where things changed like that? Yeah, I think it was probably, probably my third, I think it was my third year when I was on the St. Louis Rams practice squad and it was the last two games of the season. And

Ryan Fitzpatrick back with the Texans had gotten hurt because I started the year with the Texans on their squad. Got cut in training camp. They had traded for Ryan Mallet. Tom Savage was there. And all three of those guys had wound up being hurt. And I literally get a call on a Sunday night Monday morning and wound up starting a game because we were in St. Louis. I was on the team there.

I was on a practice squad. get a call from the Texans on Monday, and I start a game for them that Sunday against Baltimore, and then the next week against Jacksonville. So I basically was like, babe, Texas call, I'm going to start against Baltimore this week. I'll see you later. And so I left.

She basically packed up the whole apartment, shifted back to Houston, because that's where we had started the year, had a house there, and, you know, still had our lease there. And so that was probably one of the crazier times because I had literally no time to help her do anything. I was trying to get ready to beat Baltimore.

And she's a logistical ninja. And how do you, when you arrive in Houston, you know, you had been there previously, but I believe it was a new coaching staff when you come back. How do you, in, you know, five days' time, know enough to be ready to start a game? Well, it was tough. I mean, I'd spent training camp there,

so I knew kind of the base of the offense. But, I mean, it's, it's, you know, you do the best you can. You know, you do everything you can one day. You try to get some rest that night and wake up the next morning and do it all again. And then you're confident in your abilities and the training and the mechanics and, you know, the years of quarterbacking that you'd worked, you know, worked your craft, but trying to apply it as best you can. And the coaches did a great job of putting together a game plan.

that week that fit me and uh you know luckily andre johnson was uh you know being his usual self that sunday and doing some pretty cool things uh arian foster i think helped he threw a touchdown that day too so uh we had a lot of things going our way and do you trick plays and things went our way and it was fun um i want to ask you since you've been in a lot of situations where you have either you know been promoted or demoted what has been, you know, the strangest or weirdest handled benching or promotion that you've been a part of? And is there a way to do it properly or is it just always going to be weird? Yeah, I mean, I don't know if weird is the best term for it.

It's just, it's hard. There's only one quarterback that plays at a time. You know, I'd say generally for the most part. And that's, you know, it's hard. It's a tough position. I think it's the hardest position of any sport, you know, in the world. I think that there's not another position that relies more on their teammates for their success, and there's not another, you know, team sport that relies as much on that one position.

And that's, you know, that's quarterback, and there's a lot of ways of doing it. And there's a lot of people out there that judge, and there's different ways that, you know, people grade or critique quarterback. So, you know, I'd say one of the, I guess an interesting way was when I was with St. Louis with the Rams and then again in L.A. I remember Coach Fisher had benched Nick Foles. I remember being in the same room when he came in and told me I was starting.

And then again, the next year when Jared Gough was going to replace me, he came in and told us like the exact same way. It was like it was almost kind of a deja vu, but I was in the other seat on the same team. You know, we were in St. Louis one year, Ellie the next, but it was it was kind of strange. The way he came in and said, well, we're going to go with Case. And then, all right, well, we're going to go with Jared. And who's in the room when he does that? Like, is it just you two or is it the whole team or the whole offense or quarterback coach?

No, it was just quarterbacks. Okay, okay. nice that's so funny um so he just really was just straightforward like this is it moving on yep i want to ask you i'm gonna kind of like lump two situations in your career together to ask you this question so i read your book actually uh for research this weekend it was it was a nice read good work with that i appreciate that and you get to the last chapter uh yeah read the whole thing yeah well it's Kimberly's chapter is why it's the best yeah she wrote it i was like I was like, that's awesome that she got to be part of it.

I thought that was really cool. Yeah, it was great. Yeah. So you mentioned that Bill O'Brien when he was hired in Houston, he told you, you'll never be more than a third string quarterback. And obviously, you did end up being more than that, even for his own team. And then when you're in Minnesota, Coach Zimmer famously, like, did not name you as a starter that year until I think maybe the postseason he finally did.

But he took a long time to do that. And, you know, he has a history of kind of criticizing quarterbacks in public. And so I guess what I'm asking is how do you navigate a coaching staff that may be unenthusiastic towards you in your role? Does it affect you or do you just blinders push forward? Like, how does that affect you? I think it affects you. It's impossible for it to not. You know, the O'Brien, the quote you said there was that I would never be more.

I think, I don't know if that was the exact quote. It was he, that was just kind of his evaluation of me that I, that I'm a third string quarterback. I don't know if you actually said never be, uh, more than. But yeah, so that's, it's tough to hear that. But either way, it's tough to hear that. Um, you know, it's, it's tough. You get a lot of defensive head coaches, um, you know, sometimes NFL and, um, their experience

with their, you know, they're playing. that they're used to coaching, it's different sometimes, you know, than that relationship with a quarterback. And Coach Zimmer was one of those that, you know, that's kind of who he is and how he treated that situation. And that's, you know, him being the head coach, he was, you know, that's his right to do. However, he wanted, you know, if he wasn't going to announce the starter officially moving forward, he was going to wait until that week. I showed up. up on Monday and just, you know, kind of tuned everything out. It was a good practice for me, actually, like, in every season, whatever team you're on, there's going to be some sort,

I call it like this buzz of just externals, these things that are going on outside of the building, outside of the team, and, you know, the things that, you know, great journalists might be saying, you know, all these things that, that honestly, like, they, they don't matter for the team. You know, it don't matter for that 53 guys and the coaching staff or whatever your team is. And the best teams I've been on, the best players that I know the best, you know, I've ever played, is when I literally just ignore those things or learn to focus my attention on other things that aren't, you know, that do matter, focus on the things that do matter and being able to just let all the things that don't matter just kind of slide off your back. And so that's that's kind of those, you know, those lessons I've had to learn throughout my career, part of, you know, what's in the book.

And, yeah, it was actually kind of fun. It was like your introduction to me. Like the book was fun to go back through all my years of playing and just different lessons I've learned and kind of relearn them. Yeah. As, you know, as you're talking about them with friends and family. So a fun fact about you that I learned in researching for this, which I, I'm a little. I need to still figure out a way to really verify this, but you've been traded three times in your career,

and I believe that is the most for a quarterback ever. Although I only have the data since like 1994, so if somebody before 94 was traded three times, it's possible that it's not you, but you are at the top for sure. We can say you're one of the most traded quarterbacks. I've always said, so when I got traded this past year, because I was undrafted as coming out of college.

Now you're worth how many seventh round picks. Exactly. I'm like, yeah, I'm worth a fifth and two sevenths and a six and a half. So, yeah, that's my draft now. I've been drafted. That's so good. You definitely increased your value. That is for sure.

I was going to ask you, in being traded that many times, I don't know if you ever have a say over where you go or if you're ever included in the conversations or if you're ever even given a heads up. But in any of those three situations, like, did you get to approve? I don't know, you know, or get consulted. How does that work? earlier in my career I did not and then later as you're vested and you know you're kind of you're at the point where you know it's either a team's going to go another direction and this is your options you know most of the time being traded is a good thing I've always said being traded means a team wants you it's it's more than about you know you don't look at the team that's getting rid of you don't focus on that you're focusing on a team. team that really wants you enough to give something up to get you. So that's, that's kind of how I viewed those. Yeah. So with Buffalo, did you get to, did you get to pick them in any way? Because it seemed like you landed and it really gets that. We picked each other. You did. Okay. Yeah. What went into that?

Did you just look at the roster and be like, this team is going to, I mean, this team already was awesome and I want to go to an awesome team? Or what was the thought process? I think it was more like, Just, you know, the place in the country and the weather kind of later in the season, you know, like December, January. We love blistering cold and wind and snow. I first, I thought you were actually serious at the beginning of that answer. And then I was like, oh, no, he's totally, he's totally missing here. It's actually gorgeous right now. If you can see some trees out there.

Oh, yeah, nice. Very good. All colors coming in. We're getting the leaves changing. Yeah. So it's really pretty. now. That's amazing. I just have a couple more for you. I want to ask you something. So Doug Peterson, I read, it was a story in The Ringer, I believe, earlier this summer. And it was about Doug Peterson.

And obviously he was a backup in his NFL playing career and now was a great coach. And he said that when he was playing Mike Holmgren, his coach at the Packers at the time, he said, he asked him to do more off the field. And he said, even though you're a backup, like, you can still be a leader on this team. So I'm wondering now that you are in a backup role, how do you view that leadership role? Like, is it possible when you are not the starter to, to be a leader? Heck yeah. I think it's very important to be a leader. I think we're all leaders on any team, you know, in some sort of way. You know, if you're not a vocal person, you know, leading by example, I think is very important. And for me, I always say the backup quarterback, the quarterback room in general should be speaking the same language.

If Josh goes and talks to receiver about a route, it should be the same way. I should listen to that and be thinking the same thing. I think we all should talk and see the field as close to the same way as we can. I think there will be differences and you'll make decisions. We're going to play a little bit differently in different ways. But I think it's very important to be on the same page. And that, I think that carries over, not just on the field, but off the field, you know, different conversations you have, different interactions, different ways you can lead,

you know, not necessarily from the front or being a vocal. I think there's a lot of ways to lead. And I want to ask you one question about Denver, your time there. Obviously, that was your one season that you, I think it's the one season in your career where you enter as a starter and you end as a starter. Like you know like you are QB1 in that position. How different was that for you? You know, did it change the way you approached your job at all? What did it feel like that season to know you were the guy?

Yeah, it felt great. You know, that was coming off of the year, Minnesota, playing good football. You know, it was just, it was unfortunate in the situation in Denver and we weren't as successful as we needed to be. You know, it's a production business. and to not win as much as we, you know, we probably should have was tough. You know, it took a lot of things from that year, though, as far as being a franchise guy and the way to lead in that way.

You know, there's a lot of pressures from being a guy that's getting paid to be that guy. And, you know, so there's a lot of things to learn. That's a huge question we could. we could spend a whole other podcast unpacking. Yeah, absolutely. And I want to end it with this question for you. So is there a backup quarterback that you think is your favorite or should be on, you know, the top prototype when you think about what this role means?

Like, who would that be for you? You know, that's another tough question because I don't know of many good backup quarterbacks that see themselves as the backup. Yeah, yeah. You know, that's just, it's just hard. Like I said, there's only 32 guys who start every week. And, you know, it's a hard job to come by. And there's a lot of really good ones that aren't,

a lot of really good ones that are at home. And, you know, so I think the good ones know they can play. And, you know, I think, you know, guys I've been around, you know, there's so many good ones, but they've played too. So I don't, you know, throw anybody into the backup quarterback type realm. So, okay, let me rephrase it this way then. Who is a current one who needs an opportunity? Or like who could break out given the correct circumstance?

Yeah, I don't know that one. I mean, because it changes. Depends on when this is coming out too. Yeah, yeah. You know, a guy I've always looked up to and that was probably a backup more than he was a starter was Josh McCallon. I don't know we talked about him earlier. I think he, him and his brother Luke, I've gotten to know both of them. And just super, super guys. And I think you could talk to anyone around the NFL. And I would, I would willing to bet so much money that anybody you

talk to would just rant and rave about these guys and how they, you know, just how they live their life as family men, teammates, brothers, you know, just for examples of how to be a godly father, a good father, a godly husband, all these things that, you know, before you even talk about how they played. And when they, you know, their teams needed them, they came out and played really well. So he's, but I'd say Josh is one that stands out to me. Okay, awesome. That's been Case Keenham on QB2. Case, thank you so much. And I hope to see Josh Allen sliding feet first in the near future again.

I hope that happens as well, but let's leave that at that. It's been a pleasure. It's been fun talking. This was the Athletic Football Show.