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Matthew Stephen Leinart (born May 11, 1983 in Santa Ana, California) is an American football quarterback (QB) for the Arizona Cardinals of the National Football League. more...

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He played college football for the University of Southern California Trojans, leading them to an AP national championship in 2003, a BCS national championship in 2004, and an appearance in the 2005 BCS national championship game. Leinart earlier played QB at Mater Dei High School, Santa Ana. In 2004, his junior year at USC, he won the Heisman Trophy. He also won the inaugural Manning Award for college quarterbacks in the same season. Anticipating his entry into the NFL, he signed with Creative Artists Agency to handle endorsements, and Leigh Steinberg to be his agent in January 2006 (although Leinart fired Steinberg three months later).

Early years

Leinart was born with strabismus (“crossed eyes”), as his left eye was not aligned correctly with his right. He underwent surgery when he was three years old and was fitted with special glasses to correct the problem, but the eyewear combined with Leinart's already-overweight frame to make him an easy target for ridicule at the hands of other children. “I used to get made fun of for being cross-eyed. It's just a terrible thing because kids are so cruel to the fat kid, to the kid with the glasses. So I turned to sports.,” he would later say. Leinart would finally come into his own at Mater Dei High School, where he graduated as one of the most decorated high school quarterbacks in Southern California prep history. Following his standout senior season in 2001, he accepted a scholarship to University of Southern California. Leinart's former back-up at Mater Dei, Colt Brennan, also went on to have a successful football career, winning the 2006 Sammy Baugh Trophy.

College career

Leinart redshirted his first year (2001) and saw no action. As a redshirt freshman the next year (2002), he was a backup to future Heisman Trophy winner and current Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Carson Palmer, who was in his senior season at USC (one which would conclude with Palmer's Heisman victory). While Leinart appeared in a few plays during his freshman year, he threw no passes.

In his sophomore season (2003), Leinart beat out Matt Cassel, a redshirt junior who backed Palmer in the 2002, and Purdue transfer Brandon Hance for the starting job at quarterback. Going into the 2003 season, Carroll and his coaching staff selected Leinart not because he had set himself significantly ahead of the pack in practice, but because they needed a starting quarterback. There was some thought in the press that Leinart would merely hold the starting position until highly-touted true freshman John David Booty, who had bypassed his senior year in high school to attend USC, could learn the offense.

Read more at Wikipedia.org