It’s always awkward when you need to publicly correct someone’s mistake, but it can be even more bizarre when you choose to go along with it. That happened on Wednesday afternoon when President Trump praised Sen. Tommy Tuberville for finding and developing Patrick Mahomes, which is something that never, ever happened.
The weirdest part is that Tuberville was so afraid of correcting the President that he went along with it. The man actually acted like he coached Mahomes — which is a lie, plain and simple.
“And Tommy Tuberville, a great coach. You know, his quarterback was named Mahomes. He was a great college coach. I said ‘How good was he?’ and he said ‘he made me into a great coach.’ Pretty good quarterback, right?”
This is just stellar, because the timeline of all this is so wrong. Either Trump is lying about the exchange with Tuberville when he said Mahomes made him into a “great coach,” or Tuberville is lying about it all. Both are plausible.
Tuberville was the coach of Texas Tech from 2010-2012, more specifically he resigned as the head coach on Dec. 8, 2012. According to Mahomes’ recruiting profile on 247 Sports he didn’t have any contact with the school until January 11, 2013. He didn’t visit Texas Tech for the first time until Junior Day on February 9, and didn’t have a recruiting visit until April 13.
So not only did Tuberville never coach Patrick Mahomes, but the two never even crossed paths. Not once. This is astonishingly on-brand, because Tuberville has been lying about having a link to Mahomes for years. As recently as this morning he did a media blitz doubling down on his relationship with the Chiefs’ QB.
As a coach, you start recruiting and working with players years before they get to college.
Patrick Mahomes was one of the best players I ever had the opportunity to recruit and get to know.
Looking forward to cheering him on this weekend when I join President Trump at the… pic.twitter.com/vbX9bLs1nj
— Coach Tommy Tuberville (@SenTuberville) February 6, 2025
The best part: Mahomes is denying this ever happened, speaking to the media at the Super Bowl today saying:
“He did not recruit me at the time. I don’t remember if I ever got to meet him or not.”
Mahomes’ recollection is absolutely in line with history. There was never a time that Tuberville and Mahomes crossed paths at Texas Tech, because the coach had already left and set up at Cincinnati.
Never let a lie get in the way of a good story, right Tommy Tuberville?
