Rodney Peete

Peete was the first player ever from USC to win the Johnny Unitas Award as the nation's best senior quarterback. (He has since been joined by Carson Palmer and Matt Leinart). In that senior year, he also finished second to Barry Sanders in the voting for the Heisman Trophy. His USC teams would win both head-to-head matchups in the UCLA-USC rivalry against Troy Aikman's UCLA teams. The 1988 UCLA-USC game was notable in that Peete was stricken with measles the week before the game and had been to the hospital. He led USC to the 1988 and 1989 Rose Bowl games. Peete was also a star third baseman on USC's baseball team. He was named to the all-Pac-10 team. He was also drafted by the Toronto Blue Jays out of high school, and the Oakland Athletics and Detroit Tigers while in college.

Professional career
Peete was drafted with the 141st pick of the 1989 NFL Draft by the Detroit Lions, and end up played in the NFL 16 seasons. He played with the Detroit Lions from 1989 to 1993. With the Lions he started all 47 games he played in threw for 8,164 yards and 38 touchdowns. He also rushed for 884 yards and 13 touchdowns as a Lion. After spending time with Dallas, Washington, Philadelphia, and Oakland, he became the starter for the Panthers in 2002. Peete led the Panthers to a record of 8-7 as starter from 2002 to the beginning of 2003 before retiring at the end of the 2004 season.

For his career Peete started 87 games and threw for 16,338 yards and 76 touchdowns and rushed for 1,139 yards and 16 touchdowns.

Entertainment career
After his retirement from the NFL, Peete became one of the hosts the Fox Sports Net sports talk show The Best Damn Sports Show Period alongside John Salley, Chris Rose and Rob Dibble.