Johnny Manziel Adds More Details To The Infamous Halloween Partying Story

By now, you've heard the Johnny Manziel 2012 Halloween story about how Johnny Football threw on a Scooby costume, went partying around College Station and transformed himself into one of the legendary figures in college football history. But, there's always more, and on a recent episode of the Ball Don't Lie podcast, Manziel added a couple of details that Kliff Kingsbury left out when he told the story on a 2018 podcast.

The story goes that Manziel, who was already taking the SEC by storm in 2012 by putting up massive numbers heading into Halloween, was coming off a road win against Auburn where he had 260 yards passing, two touchdowns and 90 yards rushing and another three touchdowns on the ground. Five touchdowns and 370 yards in a blowout of Auburn. Then comes Halloween. Manziel's buddy had the Scooby costume available, so he threw it on. John ends up at the bars. The rest is history.






Manziel, now 28, knew that then-Texas A&M offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury was "hip to the game" and what his quarterback needed to make it to practice. That's right, Kingsbury ordered an offensive assistant to be in charge of scooping Manziel out of bed and driving him to the practice facility where Johnny would either go about his business as a future Heisman winner or go over next to the building to puke his brains out.

"It's crazy that I thought this mindset that I played better the harder I partied," Manziel said.








Here's what Kingsbury had to say in 2018 about living through the Manziel era:

“The Scooby Doo picture — there’s a great story behind that one too because the next day we’re going to Mississippi State and Johnny is nowhere to be found in the offensive meeting,” Kingsbury said. “The picture has already come out. As a staff, I’m like, ‘That chick is hot. Good job, Johnny.’ I’m thinking, ‘He’s going to be on time.’ He doesn’t show at all for the meeting, so we’re trying to cover for his ass so he can at least show up for the walkthrough.

“Friday, before we leave to go to Starkville, here he comes. Johnny has some crazy excuse. His roommate pulled the plug on his alarm clocks — something with the electricity. But we already know what he’s been doing. So he misses the offensive meeting and trots out to walkthrough. Coach Sumlin doesn’t know, at this point, that he’s late. He goes through the walkthrough, probably still a little intoxicated at that point. We do our deal, he gets on the plane, goes to Starkville, and lays probably the best game I’ve ever seen. At that point, I’m like, ‘This kid is not human.’”

Two weeks after the Halloween partying, Manziel beat Alabama on the road in one of the classic games in NCAA history and entered his name in the history of the sport. Manziel's 2012 SEC total yards record of 5,116 yards stood until 2019 when Joe Burrow came along and dropped 6,039 yards on the conference.










Written by
Joe Kinsey is the Senior Director of Content of OutKick and the editor of the Morning Screencaps column that examines a variety of stories taking place in real America. Kinsey is also the founder of OutKick’s Thursday Night Mowing League, America’s largest virtual mowing league. Kinsey graduated from University of Toledo.