Texas Football: Who’s Sam Ehlinger’s backup QB?

What would one of the incoming freshmen Texas football quarterbacks have to do to win the backup job behind Sam Ehlinger this year?

The Texas football program is trying to explore its options heading into spring camp for what to do with a different looking quarterback room than it had this past season. Texas football lost two key quarterbacks from the 2018 roster heading into the 2019 off-season.

Moreover, Texas football had three quarterbacks altogether put their names into the NCAA Transfer Portal this off-season. Two of them have transferred elsewhere while one is returning to the Texas football program for the 2019 campaign. Second-year former four-star dual-threat quarterback Casey Thompson is returning, while the other two transfer candidates are out of the picture.

The two former Texas quarterbacks that are set to depart the Forty Acres include Shane Buechele (transferring to the SMU Mustangs) and Cameron Rising (transferring to the Utah Utes). Rising and Buechele could be big losses for Texas football since both were key parts of the quarterback room this past season, and were figured to be for the 2019 campaign.

For the past year and a half or so, Buechele was the set in stone backup for Texas football when he wasn’t the starter. Buechele got a good amount of game action of all the quarterbacks that rolled through the Forty Acres the past few years, though.

However, Texas offensive coordinator Tim Beck will be hoping that his starting quarterback’s health holds up just fine throughout the 2019 season. If not, he’ll be left searching for answers he needs to already have found during this off-season.

Here’s a look at the breakdown of the candidates that could backup rising junior Texas Longhorns quarterback Sam Ehlinger and who is the best option to win the job for this coming fall.