Shane Beamer shares Spencer Rattler's evolution as a person and quarterback
Shane Beamer has admittedly never watched “QB1: Beyond the Lights” on Netflix. And why should he?
The show’s third season perceived Spencer Rattler, a five-star high school quarterback at the time, as being a bad teammate and selfish player. Based on what many saw, the easy assumption was this is who he was. But that’s not the case at all, according to Beamer.
“If you did a show on me as a 16 or 17-year-old, I’d probably look like a complete idiot,” Beamer said on the Next Up With Adam Breneman podcast. “So I’ve never watched it, and if anybody’s basing an opinion of Spencer Rattler off that TV show then God help you because a show can make you look any way they want you to look.”
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Beamer has no reason to watch a show that came out almost four years ago. He’s been around Rattler enough to see who he really is, even before they linked up at South Carolina.
“I saw the kind of teammate and person Spencer was at Oklahoma,” Beamer said. “I talked to people at Oklahoma before we brought him out here, that were in the program, about Spencer. And no one had a negative thing to say. It was all positive about the way he handled things.”
Rattler’s potential to be a great player has always been there from the start. But how he’s dealt with any adversity thrown his way has stood out to Beamer.
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When he came to Oklahoma as a freshman, he was in the heap of a quarterback battle. It would be one that he would lose out to veteran Jalen Hurts. And instead of pouting about being a backup, he instead got to learn from someone who had been there and done that. And it translated when he eventually got his turn to start.
“People forget that early in Spencer’s career as the starting quarterback at Oklahoma he dealt with some adversity,” Beamer said. “We started out 0-2 in the Big 12 in 2020 with Spencer as our starting quarterback. And that doesn’t happen at Oklahoma. You’re not supposed to lose a conference game, much less back-to-back to start the year. We lost to Kansas State at home and then we lost to Iowa State on the road.”
“And then we play Texas in Dallas. Coach (Lincoln) Riley takes him out of the game in the first half because he wasn’t playing well. He puts him back in the second half, we beat Texas I think in four overtimes, don’t lose a game the rest of the year, win the Big 12, beat Florida in the Cotton Bowl.”
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Rattler was shaping up to be the Sooners’ signal caller for years to come. He was the preseason Heisman Trophy frontrunner the next year. All eyes were on him. But in the blink of an eye, all that went away. After beating Texas a year earlier, he lost his starting spot to Caleb Williams against those same Longhorns.
“I don’t know what went into the decision to bench him for Caleb Williams, but he was undefeated as a quarterback that season,” Beamer said. “And he didn’t play great and I get it. Lincoln put him in the game to kind of give the team a spark, and Caleb played great and they stayed with it and the rest is history with Caleb and whatnot. But it wasn’t like Spencer had gone out that day against Texas and they had a bad team going into the game. They were undefeated and ranked in the top-five and the team didn’t play that great that day.”
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Despite watching from the bench after that game, Rattler didn’t let it get the better of him. He stuck it out for the rest of the year and did what he could to help.
“I don’t think he necessarily became a bad teammate after he lost his job from what I saw. He continued to be supportive of Caleb and handle things with class,” Beamer said.
Even when Rattler got to South Carolina, he didn’t play great at the start last year. He was still trying to find his footing as a transfer quarterback. Beamer said he “took a lot of crap” when he wasn’t playing up to what many expected.
“When you don’t play well, the head coach, the offensive coordinator and the quarterback get the brunt of the criticism. And he’ll be the first to tell you he didn’t play great at all times last year,” he said. “He was ‘struggling’ while he was leading us to South Carolina’s first win over Texas A&M, South Carolina’s first win over Kentucky up in Lexington in like 10 years. So we accomplished a lot before all of a sudden he really started playing great there at the end of the season.”
Now in Rattler’s second year as a Gamecock, Beamer has watched him evolve into not only a great quarterback but a leader as well.
“I think the biggest thing I’ve seen with him that’s grown is just his comfort level here, his confidence in what we’re doing and confidence in himself has continued to grow,” Beamer said. “Now I think he’s very comfortable, he’s very confident, his leadership skills have grown. I’m very excited to see what he does in 2023.”
