Nobody can say for sure which quarterback the Chicago Bears will end up with when the dust settles on the NFL offseason a few months from now. Will it be Carson Wentz? Derek Carr? Sam Darnold? The running belief is head coach Matt Nagy and GM Ryan Pace would prefer a proven veteran, but the possibility remains they could shift their focus to the NFL draft. That is where Trey Lance enters the chat.
While one can’t call the 2021 crop of quarterbacks the “best” anybody has seen in a long time. It is certainly one of the most interesting. Lance epitomizes that more than anybody. His background is something to behold. In 318 career passing attempts for North Dakota State, the kid threw 30 touchdowns and just one interception. He also went undefeated and won an FCS national championship. That’s as close to perfection as it gets.
Yet Lance remains the 4th-best quarterback in his class on many big boards. Why? It’s an easy answer. Inexperience. Lance started just one full season and it was against second-tier competition. There is no doubting his physical upside with the big arm, good size, and great mobility. Teams just can’t trust he is prepared for just how giant a step up the NFL will be for him.
Not that the kid is a stranger to being doubted.
It is what has guided the bulk of his football career to this point. Where did it all start? There are some options but according to Chase Goodbread of NFL.com, it truly began on a rainy day in Chicago at Halas Hall in 2017. He was attending the Elite 11 regional quarterback camp. After arriving with hope the event could help him get noticed on a national stage, he left realizing he was dead on arrival.
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“Elite 11 organizers are transparent about the fact that regional camps aren’t really an open competition to advance as a finalist; high school tape evaluation plays a much larger role in the selections. That wasn’t altogether clear to the Lance family, however, as they drove the nine hours from Minnesota to Chicago thinking this camp could finally be the springboard for recognition that an unheralded kid from a small Minnesota town of 13,500 had been waiting for.
Instead, he felt more anonymous walking out than he did walking in.
Lance lost reps to quarterbacks who skipped the line for extra throws, but it wouldn’t have been like him to do the same. He would later hear that some Elite 11 coaches not only don’t mind the skippers, it’s one way they identify the alphas in the group. Lance threw around 20-to-30 balls in live reps, more than a few campers but fewer than most.”
Trey Lance was a late bloomer and it cost him
He only threw 113 total passes in high school. While his talent may have stood out, it wasn’t enough to convince the organizers he deserved to advance more than others. Either way, that lack of an opportunity became a chip on his shoulder that only grew over time. Lance was about to join Minnesota University but soon realized their new head coach had plans to have him change positions from quarterback to safety. So he backed out and searched out another opportunity.
That is what landed him at North Dakota State where he became a star. Now ironically he’s once again chasing the same quarterbacks who got the opportunities he did. Both Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields were finalists for the Elite 11 challenge. They got to play at the big schools like Clemson and Ohio State. Both are expected to get drafted ahead of him. That is fine. Wherever he ends up landing, it’ll just add fuel to his already raging inner fire.
He’ll go wherever he’s wanted.
How ironic would it be if that place ends up being Chicago? The place where it all began. It would be a fascinating story. A who’s been doubted his entire life comes to a city ravaged by quarterback failure and finds success. Hollywood would reject scripts for sounding that fake. Something to keep in mind as the offseason develops.