Toronto quarterback McLeod Bethel-Thompson looks for a receiver during first quarter CFL action between the Argonauts and the Hamilton Tiger-Cats in Hamilton, Ontario on Monday, October 11, 2021. (CFL PHOTO - Geoff Robins )
His journey across North American would make Jack Kerouac proud. Five leagues and 10 cities, with multiple stops in four of those towns. For the first time in his circuitous football odyssey McLeod Bethel-Thompson has been anointed as his team’s undisputed first-string quarterback.
The Toronto Argonauts are now M B-T’s team.
On Tuesday the Argos dealt Nick Arbuckle to Edmonton, meaning that there is no longer a question which of the two would be the starter down the stretch. Predictably, when he sat down for a casual conversation with Argonauts.ca, the 33-year old San Francisco native didn’t want to talk about the big picture of his journey to this day.
“To be honest I’m keeping it at a distance right now,” said the QB of the news. “We need this win this week. Since I’ve been here, we’ve never been in as good a position to win a Grey Cup as we are this year. We’ve lined ourselves up for a Grey Cup run better than any other year, including the year that we won it. I’m concentrating on this game and this week. We need this win. We need to climb our way out and we need our offence to start moving the ball, so I’m not thinking big picture, I’m not thinking next year. I’m thinking that I have to fight and scratch to find a way to move this offence into the end zone any way I possibly can. My focus is nowhere beyond that.”
To those that know Bethel-Thompson this is anything but groundbreaking news. His attention to detail, ability to focus and his dedication to his craft are – along with his obvious physical abilities – the things that have defined him as a pro.
They’ve also been the traits that have allowed him to get this far.
Considering his many travels as a pro, it should be of no surprise that the quarterback split his NCAA days between two schools in his home state, UCLA and Sacramento State, the latter being the school that also produced his future Argo mentor Ricky Ray.
From there the travel itinerary became even more frantic. He started with the AFL’s San Jose SaberCats before signing with his hometown NFL 49ers. A return to Sacramento in the UFL preceded an NFL run with stops in Miami, Minnesota, San Francisco again, New England, Minnesota again, Miami again, San Francisco for a third time, and finally Philadelphia.
From there it was north to Winnipeg in the CFL before heading east to Toronto. With no CFL season in 2020 he played in The Spring League in San Antonio before re-signing with the Argos in late May.
Needless to say, the QB really likes football, though it hasn’t always liked him.
“I think this game has challenged me to be my best self,” he admitted, prompted by your humble typist to momentarily step away from his focus on Saturday’s B.C. game. “It has broken me down and it has chiseled away flaws and insecurities and bad habits with a brutal force and a crushing force. It’s a game that introduces me to myself and it makes me be my best self in order to win on Saturdays. It makes me be my best self so I can prove to my teammates that I’m worthy of that role, so it’s more than a game to me. It’s learning life lessons through a game; it’s building brotherhood through a game.”
It’s been a humbling process at times, especially early on when the kid, straight out of college and with no bonus money in his jeans, pulled up to his first NFL training camp in a car that wasn’t exactly on par with those of his wealthier teammates.
“It was in San Francisco,” he recalled with a huge smile. “I signed with the Niners and I pulled up to the facility and I wouldn’t park in the players parking lot. It was an old Oldsmobile 88. The trunk had a big dent in it, and it looked like there were bullet holes in the side of the car. The front seat was dangling, so if I hit the gas the passenger seat would basically fall back into the back seat. They marked it for towing and the way I found out was that they announced in the team meeting that there was a car parked across the street that’s marked to be towed, so I had to move it.”
Football doesn’t necessarily define McLeod John Baltazar Bethel-Thompson, but it has certainly consumed much of his life. It is literally the case of a boy fulfilling a life-long dream to play a sport that he still loves deeply.
“It’s what I’ve wanted to do since I was six years old and I get to do it for a living and it’s still kind of unbelievable when you step back and think about that. Why me? Why not the unbelievably more talented people that were around, the ones that weren’t given the breaks that I was given.”
At this stage the QB was being modest as throughout his career he’s created his own breaks. If people didn’t respect his talent, his high football IQ, his strong work ethic and his drive to succeed, he wouldn’t have been brought in by, or brought back by so many NFL teams. He would have been a one-team wonder that never got a second chance.
He’s had many opportunities and there’s been more than one occasion where he thought his career was finished.
“A lot of times,” he confessed. “2019 (with the Argos) was a really hard season. In the NFL I felt I gave that one away, I wasn’t emotionally prepared to deal with professional football. I forced myself out of the NFL, no one ever told me I couldn’t play in the NFL.”
Then came an admission that was a bit surprising.
“This year was hard. After Game One (a 354-yard, 2 TD, 0 INT performance in a win in Calgary) I felt I could be the M.O.P. of this league, I’m the best quarterback in this league, I can lead this team to a championship. Putting that weight on my shoulders and crushing myself in Week Two (when he was pulled early in the second half in a loss in Winnipeg), paralyzing myself; those three weeks made me think that it was over.”
It wasn’t. After a mid-September loss in Regina the decision was made to go back to Bethel-Thompson. He responded by leading the team to consecutive wins over Montreal, Ottawa and Hamilton, where he posted a ridiculous 304 passing yards in the second half.
Then came the loss last week in Montreal where the QB and the entire offence, to be kind, struggled.
But now when he returns home after a tough loss, things are different than they were for the majority of his career. He’s now greeted by his partner Chinaka and their daughter Aziza, who will turn 10-months old this Saturday.
“It helps a lot because I do believe in the game that much. Sometimes I put too much weight on it and when you lose it crushes you and when you win it takes you too high. I’m at my best when I’m able to separate myself a little bit from the game and know that it is a game and smile and enjoy the process, and that’s something I’ve learned in the last couple weeks; that it is a game, that you have to play carefree, you have to play like you did when you were a kid. So now, whether you win or lose, the kid is going to smile at you for a reason that has nothing to do with the game.”
The loss in Montreal stung, but if there’s any quarterback qualified to deal with adversity it’s Bethel-Thompson, who’s long, at times bumpy journey has prepared him for days like this.