it's been one of the fastest and weirdest falls by a quarterback in NFL history. Twelve months ago, Byron Leftwich was the starting quarterback for a Jacksonville Jaguars team many pegged as a 2007 playoff team.
Today he is looking for a job, with nothing in the works. He is an NFL hobo, searching for a place to call home.
It's so bad that Quinn Gray, the man who was third team behind Leftwich in Jacksonville, is visiting teams, while Leftwich just hopes for a shot.
How can that be? There's a reason Gray was listed third on that Jaguars depth chart. Gray simply isn't as good as Leftwich.
Yet as Gray visited with the Oakland Raiders last week, and has drawn interest from the Green Bay Packers, Leftwich is in South Florida working out, no job in sight.
"I know I'll get on somewhere," Leftwich said. "As long as it's not football season, I'm not going to worry that much. I want to get somewhere before the draft so I can have time to learn a new system."
The Atlanta Falcons released him last month for cap reasons. He was scheduled to make $3.4 million, and the Falcons didn't want to pay him that on a rebuilding team. They even told Leftwich that their so-so line was not suited for his style, which is a pocket passer who doesn't move that well.
But a month after being let go, as teams sign backup quarterbacks to $3 million a year deals, Leftwich is still without a team.
How has this happened? Is somebody killing him around the league? Is his reputation being smeared?
"I'm not sure why he hasn't signed," one personnel director said. "Maybe he's pricing himself too high. Maybe it's the injury history. Maybe it's because he doesn't run that well. It's still hard to believe he isn't signed."
In 2006, before suffering an ankle injury, Leftwich threw 15 touchdowns and five interceptions for the Jaguars, throwing for 2,123 yards in 11 games. Projected over 16 games, he would have finished with 3,088 yards, 22 TDs and seven interceptions.
When David Garrard came in to finish the season, he struggled. So even though coach Jack Del Rio had a personality clash with Leftwich -- they didn't like each other at all -- Del Rio, on the advice of new offensive coordinator Dirk Koetter, made Leftwich the starter last February.
Both Koetter and quarterbacks coach Mike Shula were said to be firmly in Leftwich's corner. Two weeks before the Jaguars cut Leftwich, Koetter raved about him after a scrimmage.
Two days before Leftwich was let go, Leftwich said Del Rio told him to get ready for the Tennessee Titans, only to be stunned by his release a couple days later, nine days before the regular-season opener. Del Rio was the one who made the decision; their personality clash obviously had something to do with it.
Leftwich, who didn't want to get into specifics of his Jacksonville release, signed with the Falcons two weeks later. He would get two starts. In the first one, he took a beating by the New Orleans Saints defense and was forced out with an ankle injury. He was sacked seven times, so even though he completed 15 of 23 passes for 145 yards and one touchdown the game was a disaster.
"It was sad watching that," said an NFC coach who watched the tape closely.
There would be one more Atlanta start for Leftwich, but he wasn't really healthy enough and he struggled. He eventually had screws put into his right ankle to help the healing.
Leftwich calls the right ankle the "other" ankle, since the left one he injured in 2006 was the same leg he hurt during his college career at Marshall. The screws from the right ankle came out in January and he's running again. There are no screws now in either ankle.
The injury stuff, though, has to be turning off teams. They have to wonder if he can stay healthy.
There is also some misinformation out there that Leftwich isn't a hard worker. According to coaches who have worked with him, that's simply not true. He loves the film room and he understands passing-game concepts. One has to wonder how that information is being spread. Leftwich wasn't sure.
Seeing Leftwich, who is only 28 and five years removed from being the No. 7 overall pick in the draft, without a team while Trent Green gets a $3 million a year deal from the St. Louis Rams makes no sense. Leftwich deserves another chance. He isn't asking for a big contract.
"I just want to get back in, get a chance to show what I can do," Leftwich said.
I really like Leftwich as a person. They don't come much better. He is fun, enjoys playing and is a fan of the game. There was never any of the I'm-too-big-for-you stuff at any point during his career.
People who worked with him in Jacksonville still have him on speed dial. I'm talking public relations people, video men and the training room staff. That's a sign that a player is a good guy. And Leftwich is that.
He's also shown that he can be a good quarterback. Why somebody hasn't given him a deal is one of the great mysteries of this offseason.
Leftwich recently took a trip to the Turks and Caicos. I asked him if he did any snorkeling, but he said no.
Why? He said the way his luck has been going a shark might have taken a chunk out of one his ankles.
At least he still has his sense of humor. But what's happening to his career right now isn't anything to laugh about. Somebody needs to sign him.
If Green and Joey Harrington and David Carr and Cleo Lemon and Gray all get action, why the heck isn't Leftwich? That's a hard one to figure.