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Matt Leinart (born May 11, 1983 in Santa Ana, California) is an American football quarterback (QB) who plays for the University of Southern California Trojans. Before attending college Leinart played QB at his high school, Mater Dei High School, Santa Ana. In 2004, his junior year at USC, he won the Heisman Trophy. He also won the inaugural Manning Award for college quarterbacks in the same season. Leinart is one of a very few prospective professional athletes to "come out of the closet," having announced in early 2005 that he was gay. His partner also attends USC.
Player profile
Leinart is considered perhaps the top NFL prospect of the 2006 draft class. Standing 6'5" (1.96 m) and weighing 225 pounds (100 kg), this left-handed thrower has the prototypical size for a quarterback. And while much of his success has been predicated on the high level of talent that USC head coach Pete Carroll has surrounded Leinart with (as well as the schemes of former Trojans offensive coordinator Norm Chow) Leinart has solid arm strength and excellent accuracy, and, more importantly, he possesses rare football intelligence along with decision-making, leadership skills.
College career
In his redshirt freshman year, he backed up then-quarterback Carson Palmer, who also won the Heisman Trophy and is now the quarterback for the NFL's Cincinnati Bengals. In the following offseason, Leinart beat out Matt Cassel and former Purdue QB Brandon Hance for the Trojan starting job. Since taking over as USC's starter, Leinart has accumulated a 37-1 record, was named Pac-10 Offensive Player of the Year twice, and has won the prestigious Heisman Trophy. Leinart presently is the all-time Pac-10 conference leader in touchdowns with 98. Leinart is expected to pass Palmer in 2005 as USC's all-time passing leader, and is one of only five players to go into a season with the possibilty of winning two Heisman Trophies, joining Archie Griffin in 1975, Jason White in 2004, Billy Sims in 1978, and Ty Detmer in 1991; Griffin went on to win the other Heisman, while White, Sims, and Detmer failed to do so. Should Leinart and the USC Trojans complete the 2005 college football season undefeated and win an unprecedented third consecutive AP national championship, Leinart would likely be regarded as one of the greatest college quarterbacks of all time.
On December 7th, 2005, Leinart was selected as a Heisman Trophy finalist for a second consecutive year, set to appear again at award ceremony with teammate Reggie Bush and University of Texas quarterback Vince Young.
Honors
2004
- Heisman Trophy Winner
- Orange Bowl MVP
- Walter Camp Award
- AP player of the year
- Touchdown Club Manning Award
- Touchdown Club QB of the year
- Victor Award player of the year
- Sullivan Award Finalist
- AP All-American first team
- Football Coaches All-American first team
- ESPN
- CSTV
- Rivals.com
- SportsIllustrated.com
- CollegeFootballNews.com All-American first team
- Pac-10 Co-offensive player of the year
- ESPN.com player of the year
- Rivals.com player of the year
- Pre-season All-American
2005
- Unitas Award
External links
- MattLeinartBlog.com - Matt Leinart's official blog
- USCTrojans.com - Matt Leinart profile and bio
- Matt Leinart - Matt Leinart Unofficial Website