How Cowboys’ QB Will Grier built a legendary NC high school career, lasting NFL role

Before he became a quarterback with the Dallas Cowboys and a trusted friend of Cowboys’ star Dak Prescott, Will Grier was at the same time one of the best high school football players ever from North Carolina — and possibly the least famous person in his household.

His brothers, Nash and Hayes, were becoming seriously internet famous using the social media app Vine. At one point, the brothers had nearly 20 million followers combined. In 2015, when he was 15, Hayes Grier became the youngest competitor ever on ABC’s “Dancing With The Stars.”

“That was a wild time,” Will Grier said this month. “I was popular on social media because of recruiting and just being a good football player or whatever. But they started going crazy. People would stop me and be like, ‘Aren’t you Nash and Hayes’ brother?’ Man, that was awesome, but I was really just trying to stay focused on football.”

While his brothers were making movies, signing book deals, and eventually heading to live and work in California full-time, Grier was building one of the best resumes in national high school history.

Private school players generally aren’t included in state or national records, but Grier led Davidson Day to three straight state titles. The Patriots didn’t have a team before Grier arrived. He was named a national player of the year as a senior, and Grier would rank among the top five in the nation in several historical categories — if his name were included in the record books.

Grier seemed to be on the fast track to the pros.

But after transferring from Florida to West Virginia after a suspension for a positive PED test, and then being cut by the Carolina Panthers, Grier said he’s found a way to stick around in the NFL, and get a Super Bowl ring: by being a good person, by staying ready and never really panicking too much when things got tough.

He’s made lemonade out of his life’s lemons and figured out a way to thrive.

“My thing now is, I try to help everybody,” Grier said in a phone interview from Texas. “I want to help raise the level of play of everyone around me. I want to be a positive guy people can trust. And I’m pretty happy now.”

A young prodigy, and an odd choice

The son of a former college quarterback, Grier was beginning to dominate youth sports around Davidson when he was growing up.

“Anything with a ball or a bat,” his father said, “Will was good at.”

Chad Grier, now head coach at Providence Day School in Charlotte, thought his son needed to get away from the Davidson-area, where the talent was slight, in order to find out just how good his son was. The Griers tried travel basketball, and Will Grier was often one of the best players on the court, playing in Charlotte and Myrtle Beach and throughout the Carolinas.

“I mean, he’s dunking in middle school and he can shoot the lights out,” Chad Grier said. “I mean, just crazy stuff. He’s a really gifted athlete. He could dunk in middle school. He could do things that aren’t normal.”

In football, Will Grier made an All-American team in eighth grade. But his dad kept trying to put him against better competition, still not quite convinced how good Will was.

Chad Grier played for Mark Richt at East Carolina and was invited to coach quarterbacks during a three-day overnight summer football camp when Richt was head coach at Georgia. Will was throwing balls with the other campers who are older and in high school.

Grier said Richt walked over to Chad Grier’s area.

“I’m thinking he’s watching me coach,” Chad Grier said. “I’m coaching these kids hard now. I’m putting everything I had into it. But a (Georgia assistant) walks up and goes, ‘Hey, man your boy’s got a chance. We don’t offer kids at Georgia in eighth grade, but I’m telling you, he could play here.’”

Finally, Grier had the answer he was looking for about his son. He also had to soon make a decision: Where was Will going to play in high school?

Starting a new program and winning big

Will Grier was at SouthLake Christian in middle school, and the Grier family knew that Will was going to have to leave for high school. But where?

His parents had recently divorced and his mom lived in Lake Norman’s district. Chad Grier lived in North Meck’s district.

Around that time, Chad Grier got a call from an old college teammate, Chuck King, asking for a recommendation for the head job at Davidson Day, which was starting a new football program. His friend got the job and Grier promised to send Will to play for him.

“A week later,” Chad Grier said, “he calls and says, ‘I can’t move. My father-in-law passed away, and we’ve got to stay here.’”

Over the next three weeks, Davidson Day offered Grier the job. They offered it to him eight times.

Finally, he said yes.

So in 2010, the Griers and Davidson Day started a junior varsity team. It went undefeated. The next three years, with Will as QB, Davidson Day won three straight state championships as a varsity team, including a state semifinal in Will’s junior year when he threw for a national-record 837 yards and a modern-day national record 10 touchdowns.

Davidson Day beat Harrell’s Christian, 104-80.

“I just remember it was really cold, and both teams were scoring immediately almost every time they had the ball,” Will Grier said. “It was just one of those days where, like, we were hitting crazy explosive plays. Everything was just kind of clicking. Everything was working. And I knew it was adding up, but I had no idea it was as crazy as it was.”

The highest and lowest moments of a career come fast

As a junior at Davidson Day, Will Grier threw for an N.C. record 5,785 yards. As a senior, he threw 77 touchdown passes, topping the state record of 69 he set as a junior.

He ended his career with 14,565 yards, 195 touchdown passes, 2,955 rushing yards and 31 rushing touchdowns.

In January 2014, Parade Magazine named Grier the nation’s schoolboy player of the year. After redshirting as a true freshman at Florida, Grier was named the starter in the 2015 season. He became the first Gator since Tim Tebow in 2009 to pass for more than 200 yards in three straight games.

Florida was 6-0, and Grier was leading the SEC in completion percentage and scramble yards. He was also still the Davidson kid his father was constantly trying to find better competition to play against, constantly trying to find out where his son ranked among the best.

But then everything changed.

Grier bought a supplement from a local nutritional store that turned out to be banned by the NCAA. He admits he didn’t check with the team’s athletic staff before taking it. And shortly after testing positive, the NCAA suspended Grier for one year, and he was ultimately released from the team.

“I still don’t feel like I did anything wrong,” Grier said, “just kind of young and ignorant, in a lot of ways, to the seriousness of the rules and all the things out there that are contaminated. I just didn’t know. I was with somebody else on the team that was taking the same thing. A few guys were. I was playing well, so they came and tested me. But, yeah, I was just kind of following along. And the lesson in that was like, ‘I’ve got to take things more seriously.’ I can’t just do what everybody else is doing or just assume everything is good. Like, this is serious and this is big-time football, and I’m responsible for myself.”

Growing up fast and a fresh start

After considering a transfer to Ohio State, Will Grier ultimately transferred to West Virginia. He went nearly two years without playing but quickly became a star in Morgantown.

He finished fourth in the Heisman Trophy voting in 2018. He got married to a former NFL cheerleader named Jeanne O’Neil. He had a child. He had learned his lessons from Florida.

“I was truly a college kid in Gainesville,” Will Grier said. “Now, it was like, ‘What can I do to provide for my family.’ Now football was a job. I did my schoolwork and graduated and did everything I could to make it to the NFL. That was the only money I could get. There was no NIL. I had to make it to the NFL for my family.”

Grier’s hometown Carolina Panthers drafted him in 2019 with the 100th pick overall. He was the fifth quarterback drafted behind Kyler Murray, former Charlotte Latin and Duke star Daniel Jones, Dwayne Haskins and Drew Lock. Grier was the first QB the Panthers had taken in the draft since Cam Newton in 2011.

“We like Will,” then Panthers GM Marty Hurney said after the pick was made. “I think he’s got an ‘it’ factor. ... I think he’s a very talented quarterback who we had a chance to get with the 100th pick in the draft.”

Newton got hurt in the 2019 season and backup Kyle Allen — then a second-year undrafted free agent — took over the team. Allen beat out Grier for the backup job in preseason and went 4-0 in his first four starts after Newton went out.

But Allen then went 1-7 over his next eight games. The Panthers fell to 5-9 and, along the way, longtime coach Ron Rivera was fired.

Grier came in and got the start, during all of this, and he didn’t play well. In the Panthers’ final two games of the 2019 season, Grier went 28-of-52 for 228 yards with no touchdowns and four interceptions. He was also sacked six times and fumbled once.

He said the experience was humbling and instructive.

“If you’re not a first-round quarterback and given a chance to play and kind of develop and get reps and build a team around you, it’s tough sledding for you,” Grier said. “That’s just the reality of the NFL. You’re either the guy that they buy in early on and will let you develop and build a team around you, or you’re not. Unfortunately for me, I was drafted in the third round by a team that had an NFL MVP on it. I was not in the plans to play, moreso to just develop to be a long-term backup. And the guys that drafted me and believed in me all got fired.

“So they’re cleaning house and doing all this stuff and they kind of throw me in there when the season’s over and we played two good teams in the Colts and the Saints and I got my butt kicked early on in my career. It was very eye-opening, kind of like, ‘Alright, now I’ve got to fight.’”

Six years later, Grier is still fighting, still in the league. But the final two games of the 2019 season were the last times he’s taken a snap in a real game.

Finding his footing, and a home

Grier was released from the Panthers in August 2021. The Cowboys claimed him off waivers the next day.

“They had a first round grade on me,” Grier said of the Cowboys. “They saw that I was available and came and got me. That was really kind of the turning point of my NFL career. When I came to Dallas, the organization was much different than in Carolina. I learned from a guy like Dak (Prescott) and basically the reason I’ve been able to stay in (the league) is that I learned to play quarterback from Dak and playing under (former Cowboys’ offensive coordinator) Kellen (Moore) and being with (former Cowboys coach) Mike McCarthy.”

Grier had some good preseason games and said he worked to master the playbook and learned to be helpful in the quarterback room.

“I helped (Eagles QB) Jalen (Hurts) a lot last year, and these guys in Dallas, they love me, the guys in the front office, Dak,” Grier said. “They want me around. No. 1, because they know I can play if I need to play, but also just the value and experience I bring into the room. That’s what’s kept me in.”

Since his first stint in Dallas, Grier has been with the Bengals, Patriots, Chargers, Eagles and back with the Cowboys.

In fact, Grier was with the Eagles until early November of last season, where he reunited with Moore, his former OC in Dallas. He said he developed a good relationship with Hurts, the eventual Super Bowl MVP, and when the Eagles did their ring ceremony this season, they invited Grier — who was then back with the Cowboys — to come get one, too.

“They appreciated how much I helped the offense and helped Jalen,” Grier said, “and felt I was a part of what made that team great and felt I deserved a ring. That’s an awesome thing to have.”

It’s not just the Eagles who celebrate Grier.

In October, when the Cowboys were in town to play the Panthers in Charlotte, Dallas coaches invited Grier’s dad to come into one of the pregame quarterback meetings at the team hotel near Concord. Chad Grier was impressed but pretty speechless when the coaches asked him for his thoughts at the end of the meeting.

“People really like Will,” he said. “That’s why he’s able to stick around so long. Most careers are about 2 1/2 years. Will is still going.”

So through a career that’s really been like a roller coaster, Will Grier — still married and with two kids now — has found a life he loves. He recently sold his house in South Carolina to buy one in Prosper, Texas, a suburb about 40 minutes north of Dallas.

He said he’s really happy.

And more than anything, Will Grier said he’s ready whenever the Cowboys need him.

“I love this job. I love this game,” Grier said. “I’ll probably end up coaching when I’m done playing. It’s just been great to be able to stay in it this long. I wake up every morning and try to be the best version of myself I can be. I go into work like I’m the starter. I help the starter prepare, and it’s a great, great life, and I’ve hit all of my goals and dreams, some of which I didn’t even know I had. When I was kid, it was just, ‘Play in the NFL.’ Now I have a Super Bowl ring, and I’m seven years in and just really enjoying every day and trying to soak up each moment and figuring out a way to keep doing this as long as I can.”

This story was originally published November 26, 2025 at 5:30 AM.