The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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24 THE WOLVERINE DECEMBER 2021 "It was literally families on the football team, screaming at Cade," Gary McNa- mara recalled. "'Get him off the field! You suck!' Even the mother of the other quarterback made it clear to me that her son was way better than Cade. "The difficult part for us was that I was coaching baseball at that school, so we couldn't react. There were fights that broke out, kind of in our defense. It got to the point where the school had to bring us into the school. "They sat my wife and I down and said, 'Are you guys doing OK? What's going on?' I was pretty upset, because I thought the school wasn't doing the greatest job of protecting him. The rest of it, so be it." As a coach, Gary McNamara knew why his son was starting. He couldn't share it, because everyone has an opinion on their own offspring. "It was a difficult time, because you really want to stick up," he said. "I really wanted to fight back, but I just couldn't, based on that situation." Gary and Nicole only understood how far it went beyond the football field and into school when Cade wrote an essay — going into his senior year — for the Elite 11 quarterback camp. He asked his parents to read and edit his essay, which incorporated the experience in the hall- ways at school. "I was in tears," Gary McNamara said. "I had no idea the magnitude. I'm sitting next to the kid who is going to break ev- ery single record in the state of Nevada, who is the king of the whole area, getting recruited by everybody. "I didn't know it got that deep into the hallways. Guys were going out of their way trying to pick on him. It morphed into baseball a little bit, and I saw some of that. After that season was over, I wanted him out of that school." It didn't happen, in part because of the words of Jordan Palmer, the quarter- backs coach at Damonte Ranch. "He said, 'Hey, this adversity will be the best thing for him,'" Gary McNa- mara recalled. "I can promise you, col- lege football is not going to be easy." In the end, the younger McNamara merely rewrote the Damonte Ranch re- cord books, not to mention the state of Nevada's marks. He threw for a state- record 12,804 yards and 146 touchdowns over four years. Along the way, he made more than a few friends and admirers, and the wa- ters calmed. But he's not forgotten the lessons learned, and applies the mental toughness garnered from those days. "Cade, when he went to college, prob- ably had the mentality of a 28-year-old," Gary McNamara said. "He's always had that leadership, tough skin, I-believe- what-I-believe nature. "That elevated it. Anything he's going through now? Been there, done that." PRIDE IN PHYSICAL PLAY The toughness doesn't end from the neck down. McNamara absorbed some devastating hits over the course of the season, despite taking only a few sacks. A shot at Michigan State left him "working through some things" as Har- baugh likes to say. The blindside blast at Penn State required immediate recovery, at least in terms of a response. "He's done nothing but be outstanding as the starting quarterback," Harbaugh assured. "The [Penn State] game, it was just another step in his evolution as a football player. A fourth-quarter come- back — those are special. "The physical play, you talk about be- ing knocked down. Us knocking them down, them knocking us down. That was our quarterback, getting right back up." It's a point of emphasis for McNa- mara — getting right back up. Others see it in him, including QB punishers like Hutchinson. They know what they dish out, and admire those who can take it. So it meant a lot to McNamara, receiv- ing Hutchinson's very public stamp of approval, in three unequivocal words: "THAT'S MY QUARTERBACK!" He's learned his lessons well, as a quarterback, one that Brady absorbed at Michigan more than two decades earlier. Don't stay down, despite the scars. "Physical toughness is something I pride myself on," McNamara said. "Some of the guys know some of the injuries I've dealt with, and how much it means to me to make sure I don't miss a game. It's something I take really personally. "There's some stuff that's really vis- ible, when I take my shirt off, which is kind of crazy. When guys see me get hit, or I take a big blow, me not showing any weakness is very important. Being physi- cally tough and mentally tough at the quarterback position is something I take extremely seriously." The respect flows freely, from those In high school at Damonte Ranch in Reno, Nev., McNamara threw for a state-record 12,804 yards and 146 touchdowns over four years. PHOTO BY LON HORWEDEL