"Matt Cassel embodies the path not traveled for Pete Carroll.

He is the quarterback Carroll didn't choose as the starter at USC back in 2003, the one who backed up two Heisman Trophy winners for the Trojans and never got the chance to start a single game at the school.

Cassel will start against his college coach on Sunday at Qwest Field, Cassel in his second year as the Chiefs starter and Carroll bubbling with enthusiasm for the guy who persevered even after he was passed over as USC's starter.

"To me it's an amazing story," Carroll said.

It is a story that spans eight years between starts for Cassel and includes one incredible workout on his college campus that got NFL scouts buzzing. Now Cassel has one of the most difficult jobs to attain in all of sports, a minted multimillionaire member of the elite fraternity of NFL starting quarterbacks.

It is the kind of story that you'd expect from Hollywood, and Cassel did graduate from the same high school as Val Kilmer and Kirk Cameron. Just one problem in putting Cassel's story on the silver screen: There'd be too much standing around. Cassel held a clipboard for years, first behind Carson Palmer, then Matt Leinart and finally Tom Brady.

A perpetual backup and a seventh-round draft pick, Cassel stepped in for New England after a season-ending knee injury to Brady and spun gold out of that opportunity. Now in his second year as Kansas City's starting quarterback, his Chiefs are 6-4 and he has thrown 18 touchdown passes compared to just four interceptions."