Josh Dobbs: The QB With the Rocket Science Who May Be the Next NFL Draft Pick
Before the NFL draft, Josh Dobbs will fly hockey pucks around the desert for the weekend.
No, Dobbs did not go to another sport. He’s not taking part in an implausible smuggling operation, nor is he performing intense cross-training. The quarterback attempting to record his school’s final comeback victory is the one who revived Tennessee football, defeated Florida for the first time in twelve years, and guided the Volunteers to victory in three bowl games.
Dobbs is competing in the Tucson, Arizona, Design/Build/Fly competition organized by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics as a member of an eight-student team. The task assigned to the Tennessee engineers is to create a model aircraft that is lightweight, has foldable wings, and can transport three hockey pucks across a 3,000-foot flying course in three laps.
Dobbs stated to B/R in late March, “We just got one of our prototypes to fly,” a week before his pro-day workout caused a stir with NFL scouts. “That was a really good step forward.
“We’re finalizing our next prototype, then building our final plane from the data that we get.”
Excellent, Josh. However, in late April, don’t you have more important things to take care of?
“I’ll be flying this aircraft in Tucson and attempting to win this tournament. The next weekend, I receive the draft.”
For America’s top aeronautical engineer and quarterback, all in a week’s work.
Add engineer/quarterback to it.
Or just the old quarterback, following the draft and flight test.
During an official house visit, Dobbs did something to Butch Jones that no football recruit had ever done before: he left the Tennessee coach and his staff. Jones laughed and said, “I remember it like it was yesterday.”
The next morning Dobbs had a high school exam. The visit from recruitment took a long time. Thus, Dobbs took a risk that no other highly sought-after SEC recruit would have taken: he went upstairs to study.
“I warned them fairly,” Dobbs clarified. “I didn’t feel as though they had been sitting there for an hour when I decided to go. I gave myself an excuse and made sure I was ready for the next day’s physics exam.”
Jones took no offense at all. He was aware of the kind of prospect he needed to help revive the Tennessee program. Jones stated, “We wanted a CEO quarterback.” “We wanted an individual who was very consistent, who was very stable in their life.”
Dobbs’s academic dedication was well-established, and he had previously committed to Arizona State. Therefore, Jones had to take a seldom-used reserve—the aerospace engineering department—off the bench in order to entice Dobbs to Knoxville.
“The athletics department called and said, ‘We would like to recruit this guy.'” Would someone kindly come chat to him and meet him? Robert Bond, a Tennessee aerospace engineering instructor and Dobbs’ eventual academic adviser, stated.
Although Bond had previously offered tours to potential students, this occasion was unique. “To genuinely exhibit a recruit, to have a large production? I had never been immersed in it before, until that moment.”
“They made it a point of emphasis to get me around what I wanted to study,” Dobbs said. “I got to pick [Bond’s] brain and see what it was going to be like doing engineering while managing a successful football career.”
Dobbs was supposed to redshirt as a freshman in 2013, build up a little, and finish most of his foundational curriculum. However, starting quarterback Justin Worley suffered an injury in the middle of the 2013 and 2014 seasons, and both years, Dobbs was chosen to replace Worley rather than Nathan Peterman.
