Doug Flutie

Douglas Richard Flutie (born October 23, 1962) is an American former football quarterback who played professionally for 21 seasons.

He played 12 seasons in the National Football League (NFL), eight seasons in the Canadian Football League (CFL), and one season in the United States Football League (USFL).

After the dramatic slow-down of the space program in the mid-1970s, the Flutie family again moved in 1976 to Natick, Massachusetts, 20 miles west of Boston.

Flutie graduated from Natick High School, where he was an All-League performer in football, basketball, and baseball.

Flutie became the first quarterback to win the Heisman since Pat Sullivan in 1971.

Flutie left school as the NCAA's all-time passing yardage leader with 10,579 yards and was a unanimous All-American as a senior.

He earned Player of the Year awards from UPI, Kodak, The Sporting News, and the Maxwell Football Club.

Flutie played football at Boston College, the only Division I-A school to recruit him, from 1981 to 1984, and won the Heisman Trophy, Maxwell Award, and the Davey O'Brien National Quarterback Award in his senior year (1984).

The quarterback coach for Boston College from 1981 to 1983 was Tom Coughlin.

Flutie played college football for the Boston College Eagles, winning the Heisman Trophy in 1984 amid a season that saw him throw the game-winning touchdown pass in the final seconds against the Miami Hurricanes.

Flutie gained national attention in 1984 when he led the Eagles to victory in a high-scoring, back-and-forth game against the Miami Hurricanes (led by QB Bernie Kosar).

The game was nationally televised on CBS the day after Thanksgiving and thus had a huge audience.

Miami staged a dramatic drive to take the lead, 45–41, in the closing minute of the game.

Boston College then took possession at its own 22-yard line with 28 seconds to go.

After two passes moved the ball another 30 yards, only 6 seconds remained.

On the last play of the game, Flutie scrambled away from the defense and threw a "Hail Mary pass" that was caught in the end zone by Gerard Phelan, giving BC a 47–45 win.

Flutie won the Heisman trophy a week later, but the voting had finished before the game; Flutie said, however, that "without the Hail Mary pass I think I could have been very, very easily forgotten".

The subsequent rise in applications for admission to Boston College after Flutie's "Hail Mary" gave rise to the admissions phenomenon known as the "Flutie Effect".

This idea essentially states that a winning sports team can increase the recognition value of a school enough to make it more attractive to potential applicants.

In addition to his collegiate athletic achievement, Flutie maintained a distinguished academic record at Boston College, where he majored in communication and computer science.

Flutie was a candidate for the Rhodes Scholarship, for which he was named a finalist in 1984.

Upon graduating, Flutie won the National Football Foundation post-graduate scholarship.

He chose to begin his professional career with the USFL's New Jersey Generals; his unavailability to NFL teams resulted in him being selected 285th overall by the Los Angeles Rams in the 11th round of the 1985 NFL Draft, the lowest drafting of a Heisman winner.

After the USFL folded, Flutie spent his first four NFL seasons with the Chicago Bears and the New England Patriots.

Flutie left the NFL in 1990 for the CFL, where he became regarded as one of the league's greatest players.

As a member of the BC Lions, the Calgary Stampeders, and the Toronto Argonauts, he was named the CFL's Most Outstanding Player a record six times and won three Grey Cups.

In all three of his championship victories, two with the Argonauts and one with the Stampeders, he was named Grey Cup MVP.

Following his CFL success, Flutie returned to the NFL in 1998 with the Buffalo Bills, earning Pro Bowl and NFL Comeback Player of the Year honors for leading Buffalo to the playoffs.

He again helped the Bills obtain a playoff berth the following season, but was controversially benched in their subsequent Wild Card defeat; Flutie would be the last quarterback to bring the Bills to the postseason over the next 17 years.

Flutie held his last starting role with the San Diego Chargers in 2001 and spent his final professional season as a backup for the Patriots.

He was inducted to the College Football Hall of Fame in 2007 and the Canadian Football Hall of Fame in 2008.

Flutie was also inducted to Canada's Sports Hall of Fame in 2007, becoming the first non-Canadian inductee.

He is a former WWE 24/7 Champion.

Flutie was born in Manchester, Maryland, to Dick and Joan Flutie.

His paternal great-grandparents were Lebanese immigrants.

His family moved to Melbourne Beach, Florida, when he was six, where his father worked as a quality engineer in the aerospace industry.

While there, Flutie led Hoover Junior High School's football team to two Brevard County Championships.

In November 2008, Flutie was honored by Boston College with a statue of him throwing his famous "Hail Mary" pass outside of Alumni Stadium.

His number, 22, has been retired by the Boston College football program.

Despite his successful college achievements, whether Flutie was too small to play professional football was uncertain.