Just over a week into UNC football’s preseason training camp for 2016, new starting quarterback Mitch Trubisky and star wide receiver Ryan Switzer have been training hard to perfect their craft for the 2016 season.
The same applies off the field as well, however, as the longtime roommates have developed a relationship that extends far beyond football.
With Switzer coming from West Virginia and Trubisky hailing from Ohio, neither player had any North Carolina ties before committing to join UNC’s 2013 recruiting class.
They spent time together on visits to Penn State and West Virginia before Switzer ultimately chose to become a Tar Heel. Trubisky pledged his allegiance to head coach Larry Fedora soon after—which then earned him a call from his new buddy.
Mitch Trubisky has shown he’s very talented on the football field. His biggest struggle comes at home, where he often finds that the trash “disappears” once every two days or so. (Photo via Avery Trendel)
The pair continued to grow closer, and have now lived together—along with tailback Khris Francis—for the last three seasons.
Despite how tight they are, though, Switzer acknowledges they deal with normal household issues just like anyone else.
“He’s gonna be the best man at my wedding,” Switzer said of Trubisky. “He’s meant a lot to me these past four years.
“Certainly, living with him has been an experience–he doesn’t like when I don’t do the dishes and I don’t like when he doesn’t take the trash out,” he continued, with a chuckle. “But it’s been fun though.”
Trubisky has received high praise since becoming the starter for his arm talent and ability to read and recognize different defenses. He also proved on multiple occasions last year that he can hit the deep route with ease when he notices single coverage downfield.
But as Switzer noted, if there’s one route Trubisky struggles with most, it’s the one from the trash can inside to the trash can outside—especially when he fails to read that the bag is completely covered.
Switzer’s skills as a wide receiver have come a long way after he originally made his name as one of the nation’s best punt returners during his freshman season. (Jeffrey A. Camarati/ UNC Athletics)
“I would say nobody in our house is good at taking the trash out,” a happily defiant Trubisky said when confronted about his friend’s remarks. “It seems like after two days it fills up. I don’t even know where we get all that stuff.
“Eventually someone will get sick of it and take it out,” he continued. “Sometimes it just disappears and I don’t know what happened to it–but it definitely is a problem.”
Asking Fedora about the similarities between two of his top offensive stars is a sure way to put a small grin on the grizzled coach’s face.
Sure, he doesn’t really care one way or the other about who cleans up around the house. But he does appreciate the irony of a friendship between a wide receiver who dances at practice and never shies from the spotlight and a quarterback who typically leads by example on the field.
“They’re two different people,” Fedora said after Friday’s practice. “They’re like—what was that old show?—the odd couple.
“That’s a perfect example of those two when they’re together. They’re the odd couple.”
The realities of life, however, have started to shift those roles ever so slightly.
Trubisky (right) has been working on all of the coaches’ different schemes during training camp. With Switzer, though, he’s been hearing for three years just to throw him the darn ball. (Jeffrey A. Camarati/ UNC Athletics)
Trubisky’s role as the head of the offense has required him to become more vocal in a way that’s more similar to how he is around his friends off the field. Switzer, meanwhile, got engaged this past offseason to UNC cheerleader Gabie Dinsbeer—which of course means less time to horse around with the guys.
“Anytime you get a special someone of the opposite sex, you kind of tend to gravitate to them a little bit more than your boys,” Switzer said. “But I think I’ve handled the balance well between my fiancée and my friends. Mitch and them have been happy for me.”
What hasn’t changed is that Switzer still goes over his own personal gameplan with Trubisky and will continue to do so even as the Tar Heels’ schedule heats up this season.
It’s the same one they’ve been going over since arriving on campus together as wide-eyed freshmen—regardless of whether Trubisky has actually been on the field or not.
“He hasn’t even been on the field the past three years, but I’ve always been asking him for throws,” Switzer said. “So that was all leading up to this year.
“Mitch knows I’ll be open, and ultimately he’ll put the ball where it needs to be.”
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