The Privilege of Mitch Trubisky
The third-year quarterback’s career hasn’t been nearly as fruitful as it should be
While the title might suggest otherwise, this isn’t *exactly* one of those kinds of articles, if you know what I mean. Nay, this has to do with his career as a football player. But let me tell you, true believers, I got some beef. I often like to joke around with my friends about how, some years, I just don’t understand at all what NFL teams — and, more importantly, the various media analysts — are thinking when it comes to the draft. Most of the time, I’m wrong, but in the case of sir Mitchell David Trubisky, I may have been right!
You see, Trubisky was selected by the Chicago Bears with the 2nd overall pick in the 2017 NFL Draft, which is obviously quite high because it means only one other player was selected before him. At the time, I found it perplexing that Trubisky — who started all of 13 games for North Carolina—was almost universally believed to be the first QB that should come off the board. Me, being the person I am, had trouble understanding why quarterback Deshaun Watson — who started more than double the number of games and did so for Clemson—wasn’t being viewed in the same respect. On top of playing, well, not for North Carolina (look, let’s be honest, they’re more of a basketball school), Watson even beat Alabama (look, let’s be honest, is a football school) in the 2017 National Championship game.
Nope, instead, Watson fell to the Houston Texans at the 12th pick. And what a wonderful development for the Texans that turned out to be, as Watson’s young career has been nothing short of spectacular despite one of the worst offense-lines in the league and a team that loves to let him down. Meanwhile, Mitch Trubisky has been a super inconsistent and mediocre signal-caller despite some fine coaching, solid skill position players around him (e.g. Allen Robinson, Tarik Cohen, Trey Burton, and rookie running back David Montgomery for this season), and an offensive line that allowed the second-fewest hits on its quarterback last year — a beautiful antithesis of what Watson has had to deal with.
(Side Note: Let’s also, for the sake of the Bears fans, ignore the fact that they also missed out on Patrick Mahomes, who went 10th to the Kansas City Chiefs. Yikes.)
Look, football nerds, before you freak out, remember that 1) I’m new to the whole, you know, writing-about-sports thing and 2) I’m aware that there is still time for Trubisky to turn things around and live up to whatever peripherals he showcased in college that made him so highly touted. But on top of all the things mentioned before, the Bears also have one of the best defenses in the league, so quite literally everything is set up for greatness, but it hasn’t! My aforementioned beef has to do with the fact that he has had nearly every opportunity to succeed and hasn’t, which I find incredibly funny because it lines up with what it means to be, well, privileged.
He can have a comparatively less successful college career. He can have all the offensive schemes and weapons that a young quarterback needs, but fail to use them. He can have a defense behind him that’s so good he only needs to score, like, twice in order to lead them to victory, but doesn’t. He can start the 2019 season with nary a passing or rushing touchdown to his name, yet he’ll keep being forgiven by analysts like this guy if he achieves the bare minimum:
And that’s why I will refer to him as Mitch “white privilege” Trubisky until further notice.
