Carson Palmer, Larry Fitzgerald, Desmond Howard, Reggie Bush and . . .Jared Zabransky?  Really?  

Z joined some pretty exclusive company when EA Sports made him the cover boy for NCAA Football 2008.  

 In case you’re not from Idaho, Zabransky is that goofy looking quarterback from Boise State with the Zorro tattoo on his arm and a tribal armband on the other.   He’s currently on the Houston Texans roster, although he’s not listed on the depth chart at quarterback.  But that’s only because the Texans are so deep at that position, with guys like Matt Schaub, Sage Rosenfels, Bradlee Van Pelt and Quinton Porter ahead of him.   

So how does a not-even-fourth-stringer make the cover of one of the biggest sports video games out there?  I’m still not sure about this one, but maybe EA was trying to avoid “the curse of the cover” by giving it to somebody who won’t get any PT.  Or maybe it has something to do with their ad campaign, which features a commercial where Ian Johnson’s game winning Statue of Liberty run on Boise State’s two-point conversion to win the Fiesta Bowl against Oklahoma was stopped short.  Or maybe, now hear me out on this one, maybe Jared Zabransky is the next Carson Palmer.  Really?