Blind longsnapper Jake Olson enters USC QB competition with passing highlight video

Blind longsnapper Jake Olson entered his name into USC Football’s 2018 quarterback competition with a video of his passing highlights.

Jake Olson’s ambitions just cannot be contained. After making his first live longsnap at the Coliseum this past season for USC Football, the blind super-athlete has set his sights on a new job: quarterback.

“Officially entering my name into the 2018 QB competition,” Olson wrote on Twitter on Monday, posting a highlight video of his skills as a passer.

His release may worry some scouts, but Olson proves he can hit the deep ball, scramble, throw on the run and take a hit while still finding his mark.

Tagging USC head coach Clay Helton, redshirt sophomore quarterback Matt Fink and incoming freshman JT Daniels, Olson laid down a clear challenge to his teammates.

This is just more proof of how Olson’s vibrant personality and thirst for life remain among the brightest parts of the USC Football program these days.

Olson’s story has gone viral more than once already. Battling cancer as a child, he spent his final days with sight hanging out with Pete Carroll’s USC team in 2009.

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Losing his sight didn’t slow him down. He learned to golf and figured out in high school that longsnapper was one position on the football field which didn’t necessarily require vision. So he learned how to do that too, earning the starting longsnapping job fair-and-square at Orange Lutheran.

When the time came to go to college, Olson got into USC and joined the football team as a walk on. After a couple of years practicing with the team, Helton put him in a live game situation, snapping on an extra point against Western Michigan in September. He got in again a few weeks later against Oregon State. Both snaps were perfect.

His quarterbacking audition tape may be tongue in cheek, but it’s also another way Olson has become an inspirational figure for both the blind community and football fans at large. He doesn’t let his lack of sight stand as a barrier to athletic pursuits.

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Still, the true star of the video might actually be his guide dog Quebec. Showing off his pass rushing skills and top-end pursuit, has USC discovered the next Air Bud?