Ducking into Canada

We all know the story about Vernon Adams leaving Eastern Washington for Oregon as a graduate transfer. We all know his trials and tribulations of needing to pass a math class before he would be eligible to make the move to Oregon.

Not getting a chance to play spring ball or even work out with new teammates over the summer because of the commitment to pass “the class.”

It could not have been easy but having seen Vernon for three years and his growth as a QB and a leader I thought he had a good chance of being the person to take over for Marcus Mariota who left a year early for the NFL.

The main reason for leaving EWU was simply to get more exposure for NFL scouts and get drafted. At Oregon, Adams led the nation in passing efficiency and when he was playing there was a pretty high probability that the Ducks would be victorious.

The biggest problem that Adams had last year was that he was injured for a few games and when he was out the Ducks were 2-3 including a loss to WSU.

I’ve heard several Cougar fans say they were happy Adams was hurt because the Ducks were a much different team when Adams was playing.

With Adams the Ducks were 7-1 beating USC and Stanford. They had a big lead against TCU in the Alamo Bowl game and Adams seemed like a shoo-in for the Most Outstanding Player award, until he got hurt. He wouldn’t return to the field except as a spectator.

The Ducks offense became non-existent and the Horned Frogs took over eventually winning the game in three overtimes.

Oregon’s defense spent too much time on the field and couldn’t stop the energized TCU offense. Since they didn’t need to contain Adams the Horned Frogs’ defense raised havoc with the UO offense.

It’s still amazing to me that a team like Oregon could not put a QB on the field other than Adams and still have the opportunity to win the game but that is what happened.

Adams finished the season hurt but healed enough to play in the East West Shrine game. He threw three touchdown passes and 191 total yards on only nine pass attempts. And he only played in the first half leading the West club to a 29-9 victory.

Adams went to the NFL combine and the biggest disappointment was that the scouts thought he was a bit slow. And at 5’11” the NFL folks thought that was a problem even though two other ‘short’ QBs led their teams to Super Bowl victories.

That would be Drew Brees for the New Orleans Saints and Russell Wilson for the Seattle Seahawks.

Adams name wasn’t called at the NFL draft and he would go to Seattle for a tryout. Adams had a good tryout but not good enough to stick with the Seahawks. His next stop was to Washington and the results were the same.

This last weekend Adams signed a three-year contract with the Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League.

There is a good chance that Adams will need to get his feet wet before being the main signal caller for Montreal.

But having seen Adams play and the type of competitor he is there is a good chance he will have a solid career in Canada.

But there is also a good chance that his talent could lead him to the NFL but that will take a lot of hard work with some outstanding results.

So what went wrong for Vernon Adams? Did he make a mistake by going to Oregon?

My personal opinion was that as good as his senior season was there is a good chance that the NFL scouts worried about the injuries he endured while playing for the Ducks.

He also had a broken foot his junior year at Eastern, missed several games but still came in second in the Walter Payton award voting.

I’m not sure what his senior season would have been like had he stayed at the Cheney campus. I don’t know if he would have been able to get the Eagles another Big Sky championship had he stayed.

I do know that Adams is a winner and had he not gone to Oregon there is a good chance that the Ducks would have had a miserable season.

I’ll keep my eye on the CFL and if Montreal is playing on TV I’ll take a look and hope Vernon gets a shot to play. But it isn’t easy ducking into Canada.