Less than two months have passed since a devastating night in Edmonton, but for McLeod Bethel-Thompson it must feel like a lifetime ago.
The Double Blue had been shut out by the Eskimos at Commonwealth Stadium. It was the first time an Argo team had been blanked in a decade.
His stats line? He completed just six of 18 passes for a mere 90 yards, throwing one interception in the process.
Many fans threw in the towel on the 31-year old that night, and who could blame them?
“That was a very traumatic experience,” said the QB, “It felt like a death on the football field.”
The San Francisco native can laugh about it now, sort of. At the time it was a painful experience to go through. One couldn’t help but believe that his professional future was, at best, in doubt. So, who better to turn to in a time of emotional distress than a Canadian comedic legend?
“Jim Carrey said something once,” recalled the quarterback. “His father worked really hard and then got laid off. They were in big financial trouble and what he took from it was that you can fail doing what you don’t want to do, so you may as well do what you love.”
There is zero doubt that McLeod Bethel-Thompson loves football. He’d have to, going through the highs, and mostly lows of a football career that has taken him to UCLA, Sacramento State, the San Jose SaberCats, the San Francisco 49ers, the Sacramento Mountain Lions, the Miami Dolphins, the Minnesota Vikings, the 49ers again, the New England Patriots, the Vikings again, the Dolphins again, the 49ers again, the Philadelphia Eagles, the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and the Toronto Argonauts.
All that in ten years, and that includes his time in college.
But a funny thing happened on the way to the memorial service for his career. He got better – no, he really got better. Since that forgettable, yet unforgettable night in Northern Alberta, M B-T has been A-OK.
In the five subsequent games he’s thrown for at least 337 yards in four of the five, averaging 351 yards per outing. He’s passed for a dozen touchdowns against just a pair of picks, and the Argos are 2-3, and would/could/should be 4-1, save for a couple of traumatic fourth-quarter collapses.
He’s now leading the CFL with 19 touchdown passes, and second in the league in passing yards with 3,004.
So why the 180 from No. 4?
“I think I was failing, trying to be somebody else,” he confessed to Argonauts.ca. “I was failing trying to be perfect. I was failing trying to be a different quarterback than myself. It really felt like a death on the field.”
Cue the resurrection.
“I had to come back and just be myself, and be the best me possible, and accept myself for the imperfections I have,” he explained. “The way I play the game, and the way I see it is the way I see it, and being okay with that and loving myself for that. It was a transformative experience, and now my goal each week is to bring my best self onto the field for each play for sixty minutes.”
That realization is not just something M B-T has seen for himself. Others are noticing it too, like for instance his offensive coordinator, who has seen the improvement in his pupil’s confidence as a player and as a person.
“Certainly, there has been a progression for him,” said Jacques Chapdelaine. “He probably felt that he not only had some things to learn, but some things that he wanted to prove to himself. As a human being that makes you perform in a certain way. I think as the year has gone on, maybe the chip on his shoulder has turned more into a positive asset than being overbearing.”
The coach continued.
“He’s a lot more comfortable with what he’s doing, and more comfortable with some of the mistakes that he may make at times, which is normal. That’s why we practice. Mistakes will happen, but opposed to seeing it as a negative thing, he sees it as a positive building block.”
His teammates are also thrilled about Bethel-Thompson’s emergence. Throughout his personal on-field struggles he maintained his leadership ability, something not lost on receiver Armanti Edwards, a former quarterback himself at Appalachian State.
“He’s great, he’s a leader vocally,” explained the third-year Argo. “He owns up to his mistakes and he expects everybody to be great. He owns up to what he’s supposed to, and even if it’s not his fault, he takes the blame.”
The mental aspect of his game has come full circle, and perhaps for the first time since arriving in Toronto, Bethel-Thompson looks comfortable in the pocket.
He says there are three elements as to why.
“One is learning the offence, which is better and better each week,” said the Northern Californian. “It’s a very complex and innovative offence, so learning how it works and how it develops is one thing. Two is learning the Canadian game. I feel much more comfortable in the Canadian game every throw. You have to re-learn each throw. In the NFL the throws are very different, so there’s a learning comfortability as to where to place the ball. Where’s a safe place to put the ball? Where’s a dangerous place to put the ball? And three is the pre- and post-snap process, which is much smoother and much more decisive.”
Edwards agrees that a little knowledge has gone a long way as to why the offence has seen a significant improvement.
“I think he’s just understanding the offence, the concepts that Coach Jacques wants him to make with his reads,” said the native of Greenwood, South Carolina. “That’s been the hardest part for all of us collectively, just piecing the offence together. I think the lightbulb went off with everybody. We’re all on the same page now.”
Part of the reason the team struggled out of the gate was that while James Franklin was the presumed starter, Bethel-Thompson’s play was as good, if not better than Franklin’s. The two QBs split the main reps in camp, which doesn’t really help either when trying to grasp a new system.
“We went into training camp not necessarily with a decided starter,” confessed Chapdelaine, though Franklin was the presumed starter. “Those guys were really competing, so from that point of view they were really sharing reps which means that the emphasis is not just on one guy.”
And the duo that was competing for the job as QB1 approach the game in different ways.
“When I coached Mike Reilly and Travis Lulay, a checkdown for Mike Reilly was a 68-yard throw,” explained the coach, “A checkdown for Travis Lulay was a six-to-eight-yard throw. That’s not right or wrong, it’s just different. James and Mac see things a little bit differently. It’s not that they read totally differently, but they feel things differently, and what gives them confidence and traction in a game is a little bit different. So, I had to adjust to that, and the receivers had to adjust to that as well.”
You would think with the improvement the Argos have shown over the last few games that football would be fun again, but for the QB, it’s not. Not yet, anyway.
“It’s all about winning,” he said succinctly. “I’m a 2-9 quarterback. We’re a 2-9 football team. Until we start winning, and once we get this win streak going, and we start rolling, and racking them up week after week, that’s when football is going to be fun. Right now, I feel like we’re on the brink of fighting back. We had a bunch of adversity, and each time we think we’re over it, something else hits us in the face. Hopefully we can come off this bye week and get this ball rolling and start the new season with a win and take these last seven.”
McLeod Bethel-Thompson is in the zone right now, and will have to remain there if the Argos playoff hopes are to stay alive. With his confidence and the Boatmen’s uber-talented receiving corps, there’s little reason to doubt the offensive production will continue.