As reported by our own Jonathan Clink, there’s a story making the rounds, that Caleb Williams and his father explored avenues to avoid him being drafted by the Chicago Bears in the 2024 NFL Draft. Among these options? Signing with the UFL in hopes of tanking his draft stock, with the possibility of playing here in 2024, then signing in the NFL as a free agent. This isn’t the first time we’ve heard of things like this, most notably with Archie Manning helping his son, Eli avoid playing for the Chargers by forcing a trade to the New York Giants.
These post-draft antics were enacted by top QB prospects who wanted to set themselves up for success, and when you look at certain franchises and their track record of passer development, it’s understandable. The Bears, (among others) have not shown a great history of surrounding young QB’s with the coaching and on-field support they need to thrive.
In the NIL era, I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw more of this. The landscape is certainly changing. Despite the shellacking to Shedeur Sanders’ draft stock, and the case of Tennessee’s Nico Iamaleava’s rocky negotiation that saw him exit the SEC for (checks notes…UCLA), players are increasingly vouching for their own bargaining power in and out of the college level.
As these trends rise again, we can look backwards to see how certain QB’s in the past successfully opted out of the NFL to further their careers. Surprisingly, some did very well for themselves as a result.
Jim Kelly: Houston Gambler
While Jim Kelly is enshrined as a Buffalo Bills legend in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, it’s easy to forget that his football journey started with a sidestep to the USFL. Other great passers like Steve Young, Doug Flutie, Warren Moon and Jeff Garcia began their football careers outside the NFL, but they did so to chase big USFL contracts and avoid low draft valuations. Kelly was unique in that he opted to play for the Houston Gamblers after being drafted in the first round of the legendary 1983 class.
Coming out of Miami, he didn’t want to play in the cold, the frozen north up in Buffalo. In the offseason, before training camp he negotiated with the USFL and CFL, eventually finding his way to Houston. After two highly productive seasons, the USFL folded and he acquiesced to play with the Bills.
The landscape was different back then, and the USFL was seen as a rival upstart competitor to the NFL, paying big ticket contracts to stars. The same might not be true of spring football today, but there is historical precedent for star QB’s leveraging leagues against each other.
John Elway: New York Yankee
In the 1983 QB class that was rife with drama, John Elway answered the Baltimore Colts’ 1st overall selection with a resounding “no”. He and his father, former coach Jack Elway had communicated ahead of the draft that he would not play for the Colts, which had launched a flurry of trade offers. The Dallas Cowboys and Los Angeles Raiders nearly completed trades for his rights ahead of the draft, but nothing materialized.
The Colts were “forced” to draft and trade Elway, who stated that he would be playing baseball for the New York Yankees, who had drafted him in the second round in 1981. He’d played summer ball in the minors in ’82, and it wasn’t an entirely empty threat. Baltimore worked out a deal with Denver, in which the Broncos selected OL Chris Hinton, trading him to the Colts alongside their backup QB and a 1984 1st Rounder for Elway.
This saga, while less reported on in recent memory than the Eli Manning trade, held high stakes implications for the NFL, and proved that top QB’s have some negotiating power outside of the collective bargaining agreement.
Joe Namath: New York Jet
The chaos of the competitive AFL/NFL drafts of the 1960s crystalized in the case of star Alabama prospect Joe Namath. While the NFL had the most leverage, and signed an overwhelming majority of players they valued in the higher rounds, Namath vouched for himself to end up in the situation best suiting him. And it all worked out for Broadway Joe.
Projected as a top draft pick, and the star of his class ahead of Craig Morton, he entered negotiations with both leagues. The Houston Oilers held the top pick in the AFL, and Namath told the team he wasn’t willing to play there. To help the league, they traded their spot to the Jets, who selected him alongside the St. Louis Cardinals in the NFL. The New York Giants held the top pick in the NFL draft, and were trying to replace YA Tittle, but opted to pass over Namath for worry he would sign with the Jets over them.
Now, with two draft selections, he leveraged the Cardinals and Jets against each other to gain the largest contract in football history at the time ($427,000/3 years). The rest is written in Canton.
Is the UFL a Viable Option?
While the objective of the UFL is not to be a bidding competitor to the NFL, nor a developmental league, it is extremely noteworthy that quarterback dads are looking this way when it comes to their sons’ futures. While there has been a steady enough pipeline of talent from the recent spring football world to the NFL, big-ticket names have not entered the discussion, until now.
Had Caleb Williams turned to the UFL in practice rather than theory, how much would he have asked for in a contract? After preseason holdout saga that saw 24 UFL passers skip a QB training camp over salary concerns, one wonders if the 5 figure salaries offered would be enough to play a 10 game season and enter free agency the following year. It’s certainly some kind of a calculated risk, but as we’ve seen, top QB’s haven’t hesitated to pull out stops when they don’t want to play somewhere.
In the NIL era, and in times where even 1st round NFL QB’s are given short windows to succeed, anything is possible. We’ve seen guys like A.J. McCarron opt for the UFL over NFL contracts in order to get playing time, and prospects like Kenny Robinson join the XFL to boost their draft stock. While college passers would likely choose to stay at their program or enter the portal to get more snaps, they could well come to see the UFL as more than an option if doomed to a non-starter franchise with a first overall pick.
