Team USA Quarterback Darrell Doucette Says He’s ‘Better Than Mahomes’ at Flag Football

Kristen Wong | Aug 21, 2024

Fighting Cancer quarterback Darrell Doucette (7) prepares to hand the ball to Fighting Cancer wide receiver Darius Davis (4) during the American Flag Football League Ultimate Final game between the Fighting Cancer and Godspeed on July 19, 2018 at BBVA Compass Stadium in Houston, Texas. / Photo by Leslie Plaza Johnson/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

Amid bubbling excitement over flag football’s Olympic debut at the 2028 Games, Team USA quarterback Darrell Doucette is standing on business.

Doucette recently doubled down on his previous criticism of NFL players who assume they will play for the U.S. men’s Olympic flag football team in four years’ time. 

The 35-year-old spoke with TMZ Sports on Wednesday about why he’s an ideal fit to lead Team USA in flag football given his IQ and experience playing the sport. 

“I’m not hiding from the competition, none of my teammates nor anybody else in the flag football world are hiding from the competition,” Doucette said. “But at the end of the day, I feel like I’m better than Patrick Mahomes because of my IQ of the game. I know he’s right now the best in the league, I know he’s more accurate, I know he has all these intangibles, but when it comes to flag football, I feel like I know more than him.”

Doucette added that if Mahomes put in the time to learn and train for flag football, then he “should be better than me.” 

There would, nonetheless, be a transition period. Doucette went into depth about how tactics in flag football contrasted to those in the NFL, noting the physical and defensive aspects as the biggest differences. 

He also said he thought the skills of “elite” NFL wideouts like Tyreek Hill and Justin Jefferson could potentially translate to flag football, but that he didn’t want current flag football athletes to be overlooked. 

“I love the fact that [NFL players] want to play and that they want to come out and compete, but at the end of the day, we want the same process,” continued Doucette. “We have to try out, and so do they. I don’t want [it] to be like, they’re entitled because of their names to be able to just automatically be on the team, and that’s what it sounds like from the flag football world… We don’t want to be forgotten about because we are the ones that helped this game get to where it’s at.”

Doucette has played a key role on Team USA’s flag football team since 2020, helping the U.S. clinch a gold medal at the 2022 World Games as well as win the 2023 IFAF Americas Continental Flag Football Championship.

Mahomes, Hill, Joe Burrow and Jalen Hurts are some of the NFL stars who have already expressed an interest in competing in flag football at the Olympics.

“I think it’s disrespectful that they just automatically assume that they’re able to just join the Olympic team because of the person that they are—they didn’t help grow this game to get to the Olympics,” Doucette said in response to an NFL video promoting flag football at the 2028 Los Angeles Games.

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