‘Stats are for losers’: Haynes King’s parents are a lot like Haynes King
John King doesn’t remember which game it was. But he was sitting by himself at Bobby Dodd Stadium, happily unrecognized as the father of Georgia Tech quarterback Haynes King.
Around him, he heard Yellow Jackets fans talking about his son as a Heisman Trophy candidate.
“I was like, ‘What in the hell are these people talking about?’” King told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Two takeaways — one, it might be best for his son’s Heisman candidacy that John King does not have his own ballot. Two, it makes a world of sense to hear Tech coach Brent Key call John and Jodie King “the most unbelievable quarterback parents,” which is to say, they’re the polar opposite of moms and dads who are infatuated with their son’s ability and badger coaches for playing time, more passing in the game plan or a bigger name, image and likeness check.
“It’s, ‘I don’t care about my son playing,’” Key told the AJC, echoing John’s side of their conversations. “’He’d better be tough. He’d better establish some toughness.’”
Make no doubt — King’s parents are delighting in their son’s final college football season. John surmised that he’ll be more emotional than Haynes for the Senior Night ceremony that will take place before No. 16 Tech plays Pitt at 7 p.m. Saturday at Bobby Dodd Stadium.
“It’s been a hell of a ride,” John King said.
But what they have found happiness in surely speaks to how they shaped their son’s team-first orientation, a rugged, selfless style that Tech fans have thrilled over the past three seasons. It has nothing to do with the individual accolades that he has amassed or the glowing attention that has been showered on him by fans and media.
“We don’t put much stock in that,” John King said. “Like I’ve told him, (if) you’re winning ballgames, everything else will take care of itself. We’ve always believed stats are for losers.”
Instead, their fulfillment stems from seeing their football-obsessed son live out his dream, the one that he clutched as the son of a high school football coach in Longview, Texas. The toddler who attended his father’s games in his own full uniform (including pads), the young boy who asked for Longview Lobos highlight videos for Christmas, the ball boy who organized pickup games on his father’s field before and after the Lobos played, the high schooler who led Longview to its first state championship in 81 years — that youth did not aspire to fame or personal glory.
“His focus is one thing — winning the game each week,” John King said. “That’s all he ever cares about, all he wants.”
So to see their son lead the Yellow Jackets to a 9-1 record and into the conversation for their first College Football Playoff berth, and to share an obviously close connection with his teammates and coaches — what more could a parent want?
“It’s like we’re living a dream watching his success and him play quarterback for a Division-I program like Georgia Tech,” John King said. “They come running out of the tunnel to the fight song, and the smoke and the cannons and the pageantry of college football.
“Then you see them storm the field and hug your son, hugging his head coach, beating top teams — it’s unbelievable. It is.”
And what makes it all the more fulfilling is knowing the depths that their son has emerged from.
In January 2023, the Kings arrived in Atlanta from Texas to deliver him to Tech.
It was a “9 ½-, 10-hour trip out there, and God almighty, when I hit (Interstate highways) 75 and 85, I started to turn around and go home,” John King said.
King had enrolled at Texas A&M in January 2020 as the Aggies’ highly-touted quarterback of the future. He twice earned the starting job in the preseason, but a series of injuries and his failure to meet expectations led him to leave as a graduate transfer after three seasons.
“He was broken when he got to Georgia Tech,” John King said. “It wasn’t necessarily anything that any individual did at A&M. It was just the whole experience. He was broken.”
The Kings entrusted him to Key and Tech quarterbacks coach Chris Weinke, who had recruited King while Weinke was at Tennessee and had developed a close relationship with him. Promised nothing more than a chance at the starting job, King accepted a spot on the Tech roster. After living in a fishbowl in College Station, Texas, and playing under immense pressure, this was a fresh start.
“He was excited because nobody knew who he was,” Jodie King said. “I was kind of like, ‘Oh, wow, dropping this country boy off in the city with no city skills.’”
Tech fans know the rest of the story. He won the job in the 2023 preseason and has held onto it since. He led the Jackets to a bowl game in 2023, their first since 2018. In 2024, he gritted through a torn labrum in his throwing shoulder to lead an upset of then-No. 4 Miami and the near stunner of eventual SEC champion Georgia.
This season has been magic. The Jackets won their first eight games — Tech’s first undefeated start of that length since 1966 — and King has been the undisputed driver, leading FBS teams in total offense as the team has done the same. He has been the embodiment of the toughness and physicality that Key has made Tech’s identity.
He is a long way from the broken young man who arrived in Atlanta almost three years ago. John King recalled not being sure that his son wanted to keep playing the game he loved so much. But Haynes King told his father that he did and, not only did he have something to prove, but that he would do it.
“To go from that to this now, it’s unbelievable,” John King said. “But it’s the same kid we used to go watch play peewee football.”
Unbelievable sounds about right.
About the Author
Ken Sugiura is a sports columnist at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Formerly the Georgia Tech beat reporter, Sugiura started at the AJC in 1998 and has covered a variety of beats, mostly within sports.
