In Jared Curtis, Vanderbilt Football Is Getting Something Different Than Diego Pavia--That May Not Be a Bad Thing.
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NASHVILLE—By the time Jared Curtis exited his chair at the Pat McAfee show on Friday morning and headed for the exit, he’d been on camera alongside Nate Bargatze for over 14 minutes. Yet, nobody learned all that much about him.
Curtis talked and walked like a five-star quarterback as he worked through the McAfee show. He didn’t run from anything, but he already appears to have quarterback speak down. Curtis was in the spotlight on Friday, yet the buzz in regard to his appearance has all but died down already.
He had multiple opportunities to elevate his personal brand with polarizing statements, yet he never budged.
“I think it’s just mostly excitement. I don’t think there’s any pressure to it,” Curtis said in regard to playing in front of his hometown in perhaps his most substantial quote of the day, which wasn’t all that bombastic. ““When it came to making the decision, obviously it was hard. But it was good, though. Just talking to Coach Lea helped a lot. Coach Brothers [Curtis' high school head coach Jeff Brothers], he played at Vandy. He had no say in it, he was just there for me whenever he was. They helped me out the most.”
Oftentimes, when Pavia would sit down for a national television hit, clips of his appearances would generate some sort of virality on the internet as a result of his polarizing nature and his lack of a filter. Pavia’s summer Bussin With The Boys appearance–in which he laid it all out on the table made him a national name–and he followed that outing up with a showing at SEC Football Media Days, in which he continued his polarizing trends.
That’s part of what made Pavia the greatest player in Vanderbilt football history. It needed a spark and someone that would put it on the map. Pavia filled that role nearly seamlessly. He was a microcosm of what it took for Vanderbilt to find relevancy again. In the way of relevancy, Pavia is the gift that keeps on giving for this program.
Pavia followed up his polarizing nature off the field with a chaotic on-field style that allowed him to succeed in a way that prompted a number of evaluators to question how sustainable it was. Curtis’s style lends itself more to the traditional NFL profile, though. Vanderbilt had to have a Pavia before it could get to someone like Curtis, though.
Curtis almost certainly wouldn’t have ended up at Vanderbilt had Pavia not paved the way for Vanderbilt coach Clark Lea to get in the room with quarterbacks like Curtis. Before Pavia, Vanderbilt may not even be able to get a prospect of Curtis’ magnitude to pick up the phone. Now, though, he’s able to dream of what he can do at a place like Vanderbilt.
“I’m going to win the national championship you couldn’t win,” Pavia said Curtis told him in the days prior to the NFL Draft Combine.
That quote and Curtis’ dramatic flipped commitment on national signing day are the closest he’s got to polarizing, and each of those could have blown up significantly more than they did because of Curtis’ nature. Curtis kept a low profile throughout his entire recruitment despite the buzz that surrounded him, and he’s never publicly followed up on Pavia’s declaration.
Vanderbilt needed Pavia to be his bombastic self and to be its No. 1 advertiser in the public eye. It’s never needed that from Curtis, though, and it won't ever ask him to be what Pavia was. Lea says he doesn’t expect any Vanderbilt quarterback to be what Pavia was on the field immediately, and he’d likely say the same in regard to their performance on the podium.
Curtis has only met the media once since arriving on Vanderbilt’s campus and it was the most buttoned up presser that a Vanderbilt quarterback has put on since Ken Seals was its starter a few seasons ago. That’s neither a bad or a good thing, it’s just Curtis. It’s just the way this is going to work from now on.
“Going out there and being patient with the process. Being eager to learn and patient in the process is what he preaches to us, I just try to keep that in the back of my mind and move forward every day,” Curtis said in that press conference as if he’d been handed a script by Lea. “It’s been fun just coming in here and learning with the guys and spending every day with the freshmen. Every day, it’s something new. And you just come in here and learn what you can.”
Curtis hasn’t been boring in front of the mic, but he’s been understated and more traditional than Pavia is. As long as Curtis performs at a level anywhere near Pavia’s, his demeanor at the podium won’t mean much of anything.
Lea appears to believe that will be the case.
“He believes in himself, he has courage, he has the physical traits to get himself out of trouble,” Lea said. “I think from the physical trade standpoint, he's there. From the mental processing standpoint, that's where we got to cover ground, and that's where we focused.”
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Joey Dwyer is the lead writer on Vanderbilt Commodores On SI. He found his first love in college sports at nearby Lipscomb University and decided to make a career of telling its best stories. He got his start doing a Notre Dame basketball podcast from his basement as a 14-year-old during COVID and has since aimed to make that 14-year-old proud. Dwyer has covered Vanderbilt sports for three years and previously worked for 247 Sports and Rivals. He contributes to Seth Davis' Hoops HQ, Basket Under Review and Mainstreet Nashville.
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