SEC’s Woodson, Ainge Adjust To Different Roles In New York
By Jon Wagner for Football reporters online
May 21, 2008

In their final meeting at the college level, they combined for 827 passing yards and 13 touchdown passes in one of the most exciting games of the entire 2007 college football season.

Quarterback Erik Ainge led his Tennessee Volunteers that day (November 24th, 2007) to a thrilling 52-50 triple-overtime comeback win over the Kentucky Wildcats and fellow SEC quarterback Andre Woodson, before a national television audience.

Once star quarterbacks in the college football’s best conference, the New York Jets’ Ainge and the New York Giants’ Woodson must now adjust, for the foreseeable future, to life as backups in NFL’s biggest market.

The earlier similarities between Ainge and Woodson were evident throughout their college careers.

Each played in the SEC from 2004-2007, with each starting slowly during their first two years, each taking drastic steps forward in their development during their junior years, and each enjoying tremendous seniors seasons.

Even their frames and styles were nearly identical. Both pocket passers, neither the 6-foot-5, 220-pound Ainge nor the 6-foot-5, 230-pound Woodson ran much at all in college.

Their SEC career numbers weren’t drastically different, either. In 43 games at Tennessee, Ainge completed 59.1 percent of his passes, for 8,700 yards, while throwing 72 touchdown passes and 35 interceptions. Woodson meanwhile, was a 61.5 percent passer, throwing for 9,360 yards, 79 touchdowns, and 25 interceptions in 44 games at Kentucky.

The similar progression of their college careers makes it in some ways, fitting that each were drafted around the same time (Ainge in Round 5, Woodson in Round 6) in last month’s NFL draft, and that each are headed to the same town (the same home stadium even) to fulfill (for now) primarily the same roles.

Those roles of course, consist of being understudies to already-established starting NFL quarterbacks. Although, as we’ve seen before, the success demonstrated by these two former SEC standouts has the possibility of translating to the NFL much more rapidly than expected, if the unexpected happens to those in front of them (look no further than the well-chronicled former sixth-round understudy himself, Tom Brady, replacing the once expected star-of-the-future, Drew Bledsoe, for good).

Barring a situation like Bledsoe’s injury paving the way for Brady however, such an opportunity for Ainge or Woodson may be where their similarities could end.

Though both figure to have a considerable wait to get a decent shot with the New York teams who drafted them, Ainge may be a lot closer to getting his chance.

Ainge will wait behind the winner of this summer’s Jets’ starting quarterback battle between Chad Pennington and Kellen Clemens. However, even without an injury to either, if both falter (as they have in the past), early in the 2008 season, Ainge might get his opportunity to be an NFL starter faster than he had realistically hoped.

Woodson’s chances with the Giants meanwhile, look to be a lot slimmer for now. Yet another former SEC star mentioned here, the once maligned and criticized Eli Manning, has certainly turned his professional career around with his Super Bowl XLII MVP in February. The Giants with a seemingly more stable situation at the starting quarterback position likely means considerably more waiting time for Woodson to become and NFL starter than for Ainge. Adding further to that timetable for now, Woodson is currently missing some practice time due to a strained left quadriceps muscle which he injured in a morning practice on Saturday, May 10th.

At least in terms of waiting for a shot with the Giants, Woodson can lean on fellow University Of Kentucky quarterback, Jared Lorenzen, who has thrown all of eight passes, playing just in two games in two full seasons with the Giants.

Saturday will mark an even full half-year since the game in which Ainge and Woodson both shined as their SEC careers wound down prior to being drafted in the NFL.

Now, after sharing many headlines in the same college conference, each must play the waiting game in the same pro media market which produces the most headlines.