After three solid years at North Texas, Eric Morris is now Oklahoma State’s head coach. He has been in the coaching world since 2010 and has taken several ‘elite’ QBs under his wing. Right from Baker Mayfield to Cam Ward to John Mateer, each QB has Morris to thank for their development. But Kansas City Chiefs’ star Patrick Mahomes was an anomaly for Morris, but he didn’t quite recognize Mahomes’ brilliance right away.

Eric Morris started as Texas Tech’s co-offensive coordinator and WRs coach in 2013. At the same time, Patrick Mahomes was tiptoeing his way into college football. Morris appeared on David Pollack’s 5 February podcast and said that teams didn’t “really recruit” Mahomes. The Red Raiders legend was focusing on several sports in high school, right from basketball to baseball, and just three colleges offered him football scholarships, including Texas Tech.

Initially, the buzz was low around Mahomes’ talent, and coaches viewed him as ‘just another prospect.’ That changed when Mahomes defied physics in Texas Tech’s first scrimmage of the 2014 season. “He kind of got out of the pocket, and he was rolling left, running away from our best defensive end and running as fast as he could,” Morris said. “He didn’t turn his hips, and he threw a backside dig at probably 15 yards without retapping the ball, running left, just on a dot to this guy running, when he was running full speed to his left.

“And it was the first time (head) coach Kliff Kingsbury sat on the mic, and he was like, ‘Guys, we got something really special to work with here.’ Throwing a dot like that for a touchdown, a backside dig was the first time you’re like, ‘Holy smokes.’ Not many humans in America could make that throw.”

It’s not that Mahomes wasn’t making those jaw-dropping plays at the high school level. But many didn’t think he could do it against college defenses.

As a senior, Patrick Mahomes threw for 4,619 yards and 50 touchdowns in high school, yet recruiters showed surprisingly limited interest. Although he was a three-star recruit, most schools considered him a “raw” talent or a more “baseball-focused” player. Mahomes’ baseball talent made many programs think that he would eventually pursue the sport. But with some help from Eric Morris and Kliff Kingsbury, Mahomes became the NFL’s all-time great.

“He’s one of the first people who truly believed in me playing the quarterback position. He gave me a ton of advice on refining me but let me still just be me and play to my strength,” Mahomes said about Kingsbury. “He didn’t put me in a box and tell me how to play quarterback this way. And he would obviously help with my footwork and stuff like that and going through progressions, but he would just let me play when it came to playing.”

Mahomes quickly started torching defenses at Texas Tech and passed 11,252 yards in just three years for a whopping 93 touchdowns. The 6’2″ and 225 lbs QB was also effective in making plays with his legs and notched 845 rushing yards. Eventually, his heroics made him a 10th overall pick in the 2017 NFL draft, going to the Chiefs. The rest is, of course, history.

Eric Morris has a knack for developing under-the-radar QBs

Morris’ most recent QB development came with North Texas. His protege, Drew Mestemaker, became one of the better QBs in college football in 2025. Mestemaker, too, was a raw discovery and came in as a walk-on after being a high school backup. But in 2025, the 6’4″ and 211 lbs QB finally became a starter and passed for 4,379 yards at an impressive 68.9% efficiency. Now at Oklahoma State, Eric Morris will likely continue his elite QB development.

“He has a good feel for making you comfortable; that’s the biggest thing,” Mahomes said about Morris after his former OC was made Oklahoma State head coach. “He gives you confidence to play the game the way you are supposed to, and he’ll change the offense for that. It’s not surprising to me that he has had so much success at North Texas and will in the future.”

In truth, Morris is a legit QB whisperer and has developed QBs from scratch. Early at Texas Tech, he took Baker Mayfield under his wing, and just like Mahomes, he wasn’t a legacy prospect. Instead, Mayfield came in as a walk-on, learned and showed promise before transferring to Oklahoma, where he won the Heisman. A similar case is for former Washington State and Miami QB Cam Ward, who came in as a zero-star recruit but became the 1st overall pick in the 2025 NFL draft.