Randy Peterson
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June 20, 2025
I don’t get the blowback about Jett Thomalla accepting, then dis-accepting an Iowa State scholarship offer -- after suddenly things looked better in Alabama than Ames. I mean . . .
Iowa State lost a generational quarterback, read the posting from someone I’d never heard of.
Traitor, read another, and . . .
Really folks, how can you lose something – that you actually never had?
These days, a kid’s verbal commitment to someplace, can be about as ingenuous as the commissioner of the SEC Conference saying he’s looking out for the good of college football.
Unless you’ve got something in writing – something as official as a legal document can get in big-time sports. Otherwise, always assume that handshake agreements include one person crossing fingers behind backs.
Believe it only when you see the recruit actually play in game -- and then don’t get too attached, because there’s a darn good chance they’ll end up breaking your heart and ending up somewhere else at season’s end.
Iowa State coaches figured Thomalla, a four-star recruit from Omaha’s Millard South High School, could be very good – eventually maybe even lead the Cyclones to high places. A high school junior last season, he passed for 3,664 yards and 47 touchdowns.
The 6-foot-4, 190-pounder said in April he accepted Iowa State’s scholarship invitation to be part of what is a very good 2026 recruiting class. Then came the Elite 11 camp in May – followed by an offer from Alabama.
Sound sort of familiar?
Campbell offered a scholarship to a quarterback a while ago. Let’s call him Brock, whose only other power school offers at that time were from Boise State and Central Florida.
Eventually, a power coach – let’s call him Nick Saban – started sniffing around, and even lured Brock to visit campus in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. During that weekend visit, the coach offered a walk-on opportunity to the recruit from Gilbert, Arizona.
“I want to go someplace where I can develop and get ready for the NFL," the quarterback told me (in my previous professional life) when I caught up with him in the airport on his way back home from the Bama visit.
Texas A&M offered, too, but by then, it was too late. Brock Purdy’s handshake with Campbell was his word – and the rest is history.
Winsome, losesome (that you actually never really officially had.)
Most coaches, Campbell included, subscribe to the quarterback-a-year plan for roster management. Most coaches, Campbell included, offers many scholarships. The Cyclones’ 2026 quarterback offer class, of which Thomalla was a member, includes eight others.
Alabama, for what it’s worth, has offered 12 quarterback scholarships for 2026 – some of whom also with Iowa State offers.
Commitments are fair game. Every coach poaches. Even coaches we revere and look up to. They all do it.
“My goal is to play in college football, obviously, and my dream is to go to the NFL,” Thomalla told Alabama’s 247sports.com web site. “That is what was kind of their main thing. Alabama can really develop you. If you come here, you will have a higher chance to go to the NFL. That was one of the big things they would say to me."
Let’s revisit what Purdy told me during our phone conversation while awaiting a plane at the Alabama airport in 2018. Just 15 words of that chat will suffice:
“I want to go someplace where I can develop and get ready for the NFL."
If you know anything about Brock Purdy, well, you’ve come to realize that Iowa State can prepare quarterbacks for the NFL, too.
(Columnist Randy Peterson can be, and has been, reached at randypete4846@gmail.com or at any Okoboji-area beverage/food establishment between the hours of open and close.)