Austin Simmons brings more than a new arm to Mizzou’s offense. He brings a different angle, literally.
The Tigers are set to lean on the Ole Miss transfer for a full season at quarterback, assuming he stays healthy, and the gamble is clear. Mizzou already rolled the dice on an inexperienced passer in Beau Pribula last season, and now it’s doing something similar in 2026 with Simmons, who played 259 snaps across two seasons with the Rebels. In that stretch, he completed 64 of 107 passes for 1,026 yards, six touchdowns and five interceptions.
What makes Simmons stand out even more is the hand he throws with. He’s left-handed, which is rare enough in football to still create real adjustments across an offense.
John Stollenwerck was the only other left-handed quarterback to play meaningful snaps in Mizzou history, and the difference between that era and now is obvious. Football has long been built around right-handed quarterbacks, right-handed protections and the usual rhythms that come with them.
For the Tigers’ receivers, the adjustment has been a talking point throughout fall camp. The room itself is still sorting through plenty of new faces, but the top group appears to be Donovan Olugbode at X, Caleb Goodie at Z and Cayden Lee in the slot. Jaden Lewis gave a full breakdown of that group earlier this week.
Olugbode and Goodie have both had to get comfortable with Simmons’ release and spin, while Lee already has a built-in edge from his time with Simmons at Ole Miss.
“Just the way it spins and how it drops over the shoulder, it becomes more about the stance towards the sideline, so that’s probably the biggest difference,” Olugbode said after practice Friday.
Goodie, the Cincinnati transfer, has felt the learning curve too.
“It’s definitely challenging, but I’d say I’ve become accustomed to it. It’s just playing faster and playing with a left-handed quarterback; it’s just getting used to that,” Goodie said.
Olugbode and Lee both come in with SEC experience, but Goodie has had to make the biggest transition in his move to Columbia. Still, the issue doesn’t sound like one that should define Simmons’ season. Lee gives the offense a reliable outlet if the rest of the receiving corps needs more time to settle in, and the expectation is that high-level college players will adapt.
Olugbode said he sped up that process by putting in work on the jugs machine.
“It took probably two or three days. I got on the jugs machine every day, put it to left-handed quarterback, and then just caught passes like that every day after practice,” Olugbode said.
The ripple effect goes beyond the wideouts. Left-handed quarterbacks change the mechanics everywhere else, from how handoffs are delivered to how protection is set up.
The backfield flips. The blind side flips.
The right tackle, not the left tackle, becomes the one responsible for protecting the quarterback’s back.
That’s a lot of moving parts, but Simmons has already made an impression in one area that matters just as much: leadership. Olugbode pointed to how quickly he’s taken charge.
“He’s not afraid to speak up when something’s going bad, or something like that. He stepped into that leader role fast and knew what he wanted to accomplish from this team and knew what he wanted,” Olugbode said.
That leaves Chip Lindsey and Garrett Riley with the task of adjusting the offense around him. The offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach both have more than 10 years of experience in their roles, and while neither has coached a left-handed starter in that span, both have worked with accomplished quarterbacks.
Lindsey’s group includes Drake Maye, Bryce Underwood and John Rhys Plumlee. Riley has coached Cade Klubnik, Max Duggan and Tanner Mordecai, and he also helped TCU reach the national championship game in 2022.
There’s another side to all of this, too. Left-handed quarterbacks can give defenses headaches by changing angles, flipping coverages and forcing pass rushers and linebackers to process things a little differently than they usually do.
For Mizzou, that makes Simmons one of the quieter but still meaningful storylines to track this season. In a program that has found itself in close games under Eli Drinkwitz, even a small edge can matter.
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