Before Texas A&M 10-3 home defeat in Miami in the first round of the College Football Playoff, former Texas A&M Heisman-winning quarterback Johnny Manziel was scheduled to be the guest coach on ESPN’s “College GameDay” program that returned to College Station for the first time since the end of the 2024 regular season.
About an hour before the GameDay panel, consisting of Desmond Howard, Nick Saban, Pat McAfee, Reese Davis and Kirk Herbstreit, it was revealed that the former Texas A&M Guard Alex Caruso, who is also a two-time NBA champion with the Los Angeles Lakers and Oklahoma City Thunder last season, replaced Manziel at the last minute.
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The reason for Manziel’s sudden departure was not explained during the broadcast, but 24 hours after the Texas A&M loss, the former star quarterback posted on Instagram: offering a brief but slightly enigmatic explanation of his disappearance from the series:
“I will have a lot more to say about what happened yesterday. There is almost nothing on this earth that would have caused me to miss this game. To all the people who actually reached out to me and checked in with me, I can’t thank you enough. To ESPN, Pat, Coach, Desmond and the entire game day crew, apologize, it was out of my control. To the Aggies and A&M fans, I am sorry. I will continue to let everyone running with a false narrative and at the end of the day perception always trumps reality I love all of you who sincerely support me through good and bad as you all have for years I have no doubt that Texas A&M and the Aggie football program will be in this position again and I feel like a 3/10 who will rest and try to get back to normal.
Given the circumstances of Saturday’s game, we in the media didn’t put too much emphasis on this story, waiting for Manziel himself to explain why he quit at the last minute. All that matters is that he is stable and recovering from what happened the day before.
Manziel is a Texas A&M and college football legend, and in just two seasons, he finished his career with a record 7,820 passing yards and 63 touchdowns, along with 2,168 rushing yards and 30 rushing scores.
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This article was originally published on Aggies Wire: Johnny Manziel explains his missed appearance on ‘College GameDay’
