Brent Schaeffer

Schaeffer began his college career at the University of Tennessee, where he became the first true freshman quarterback to start a season opener for an SEC team since freshman eligibility was restored in 1973[3] and the first in 59 years.[4][5] In the season opener against UNLV, he was 7 for 10 for 123 passing yards and one passing touchdown to go along with 29 rushing yards and a rushing touchdown.[6] However, he was then replaced as the starter by Erik Ainge a few weeks later, then he broke his collarbone and missed the rest of the season.[4] In April 2005, Schaeffer and another Tennessee player were involved in a fight in a dorm lobby. According to Sports Illustrated, Schaeffer was charged with misdemeanor assault and pleaded guilty to a lesser charge with a sentence of six months of judicial diversion. Head coach Phillip Fulmer then asked Schaeffer to be transferred to another school due to the unnecessary length of his "punishment".

Schaeffer then transferred to the College of the Sequoias in 2005 and spent one year there.[7] Where he was named First-team All-American and Co-Offensive Player of the Year by the California Community College Coaches Association as well as First-team All-America by J.C Gridwire. He was also a finalist for the Junior College National Player of the Year Award. He was rated the No. 1 JUCO Quarterback in the nations by Scout.com and CollegeFootballNews.com. He was rated the No. 1 JUCO Quarterback and No. 3 Overall JUCO player in the nation by Rivals.com. He was also rated the No. 1 JUCO player in the nation by SuperPrep and No. 2 JUCO player in the nation by CollegeFootballNews.com. For his season at College of the Sequoias, he passed for 2,970 yards and 40 touchdowns. He also rushed for 860 yards and 10 touchdowns.[8]

Schaeffer, a five-star Quarterback, received offers from Ole Miss, NC State, Virginia Tech, Wisconsin, Auburn, and Florida.[9] He first visited NC State on December 2, 2005.[9] Then a week later on December 9, he visited Wisconsin.[9] He ended his visits by visiting Ole Miss on January 13, 2006.[9] He signed his letter of intent on January 20.[9] That same day, he announced at a press conference that he was transferring to Ole Miss.[10]

Schaeffer then transferred to Ole Miss prior to the 2006 season and was named the team's starting quarterback, even before arriving to campus or being ruled academically qualified to play.[4] He was expected, by head coach Ed Orgeron, to graduate from College of the Sequoias in June, which Schaeffer failed to do. So he returned to his home in Florida and enrolled in correspondence courses to complete the six academic hours he needed for admission to Ole Miss. However, the correspondence courses were taking too long due to their open ended dates, which Coach Orgeron said. "When you take correspondence courses, there's an open-ended date. Some of the courses were taking too long to complete. I didn't know if he could complete them by the time camp started." [4] Schaeffer eventually did arrive and started all 12 games and completed 115-of-244 passes (47.1%) for 1,442 yards, nine touchdowns, 10 interceptions and a passer rating of 100.75.[11] Then in 2007, he completed 35-of-93 passes (37.6%) for 578 yards, five touchdowns, four interceptions and a passer rating of 98.98.[12] In the preseason, he was selected as the SEC's best Scrambler by Athlon.

Schaeffer was projected as a wide receiver in the National Football League by NFLDraftScout.com, rated the 94th best out of 334 and was projected to go unselected in the draft.[13] He went unselected in the 2008 NFL Draft.

Schaeffer joined the af2 in 2008 and on December 16, 2008, he was assigned to the Central Valley Coyotes.[14] However, on March 1, 2009, he was placed on the teams' Refused to Report list along with WR/DB Steve Gonzalez and OL/DL Earl Stephens.[15]