Lincoln Kienholz, maybe the most qualified backup QB in the nation, nailed his gut instinct to pick Ohio State over Washington

The third-year quarterback will travel with the Buckeyes this week to face the Huskies, the team he originally was committed to.

Ohio State backup quarterback Lincoln Kienholz is a rarity as a third-year player who has been in one program his whole career and earned the No. 2 QB job. (Photo by Doug Lesmerises)

COLUMBUS — Does Lincoln Kienholz know who Kenny Guiton is?

“I don’t.”

Does he know who Cardale Jones is?

“I do.”

That’s the life of a backup quarterback. You’d better be a deep-ball-throwing, safety-crushing playoff hero who vanquishes Nick Saban to go down in history. If you’re just a team-leading, coach-on-the-field who beats Purdue, San Diego State, Cal and Florida A&M when called upon … well, cult hero in the moment will have to suffice.

If called upon by Ohio State this season, Kienholz maybe could be Jones. As it stands, he already offers reminders of Guiton.

That means Kienholz is Ohio State’s best actual backup quarterback plan since Guiton took over for an injured Braxton Miller for most of three games during the 2013 season.

You could argue Kienholz is the best actual backup quarterback plan in either the Big Ten or the SEC. Because he’s not a kid, and he’s not a transfer. And he wasn’t looking for his next home the moment Julian Sayin won Ohio State’s starting quarterback job in August.

Because Kienholz won something that day, too. He won Ohio State’s No. 2 quarterback job.

Many times, players fall into that job. Other times, that job is seized by someone old enough, familiar enough, talented enough and respected enough to put the whole building at ease.

“I think it's important,” Kienholz told me last week as we sat on the indoor field at the Woody Hayes Athletic Center. “I think it’s a job a lot of people maybe take for granted sometimes, but it's also a spot where you can kind of go in and learn a bunch of information from the starter, learn from his successes and his mistakes, and kind of use that to get ready for your chance.”

Kienholz offers Ohio State something that, by my calculation, just 14 percent of teams in the Big Ten and SEC have in this type of backup quarterback.

He’s doing that when there was a chance he could be facing Ohio State this weekend as the starting quarterback at Washington. Unless he’d be at Alabama right now.