Trevor Lawrence simply isn’t who we thought he was

Trevor Lawrence has run out of excuses. Throughout his five years in the NFL there have been myriad justifications why Lawrence has struggled to live up to the unbelievable hype he entered the league with. Bad coaching, questionable weapons, mediocre blocking — all have been factors in why Lawrence hasn’t met expectations since being the No. 1 overall pick in 2021. The Jaguars have slowly but surely addressed these problems, but they’re still losing, and the constant has been Trevor Lawrence.

There’s too much binary analysis of NFL quarterbacks in football discourse. Everyone is either “garbage” or “GOAT” with no room for nuance in the middle. It’s this grey area which Lawrence finds himself. He’s not a bad quarterback, but he isn’t a special one either. Much like the team he’s on: Trevor Lawrence is a JAG.

The “generational talent”

The most over-used phrase when it comes to the NFL Draft is “generational talent.” We can’t go two years now without three different players being “generational.” It’s almost as dumb as the term “prototypical quarterback” being used synonymously with “the ideal of the position,” when by definition a prototype is something we’ve never seen before, with the correct term being “archetype.” Grammar nerding aside, in the last 25 years of the NFL Draft there have truly been three players who were universally accepted as “generational talents.”

Eli Manning (2004)

Andrew Luck (2012)

Trevor Lawrence (2021)

The shared DNA of all three quarterbacks was the notion that there was absolutely no way they could fail in the NFL. They had ideal size for the position, excellent arm strength, great football IQ, and had proven themselves in pro-style college offenses that made it easy to translate their game to the pros. The only way you could really find fault is by nit-picking the smallest minutia of their games, and the amount of safety they conveyed to a team picking No. 1 overall is what differentiated them as “generational talents.”

We don’t need to go back and litigate Eli Manning’s career. Do I personally think he’s a Hall of Fame quarterback? No, but I understand why he got the nod. We’ll never know how good Andrew Luck could have been if injuries didn’t derail his career. Trevor Lawrence is still writing his story.

As it pertains to Lawrence he absolutely deserved that “generational” tag coming out of Clemson. Here was a 22-year-old quarterback who won a national championship as a freshman, took his game to another level as a sophomore, and completed almost 70 percent of his passes as a true junior. In all three years he was running a Dabo Swinney offense, praised for how well it prepared players for the NFL — and in all three years Lawrence barely turned the ball over.

Where did things go off track?

Hindsight is 20/20, but Lawrence had a “too big to fail” element to his draft stock. It caused everyone to overlook one thing truly lacking from his skillset as a quarterback: Lawrence has no unicorn traits. This is a player who is very good at everything, but doesn’t have a single aspect to his game that makes you say “that’s the unique quality he brings to the table.”

Trait-based scouting has become the norm in the NFL in recent years. Teams are rarely looking for the ideal all-around prospect, but instead someone with a signature ability they can leverage. At the quarterback position this is fairly easy to see. Patrick Mahomes has a ludicrous ability to make throws in and out of structure, Josh Allen is a master at making clutch plays with both his arms and legs, Lamar Jackson’s out-of-this world athleticism and accuracy make him a dual-threat unlike anything else in football.

Even when we hit the next tier there are things that stand out with the quarterbacks: Joe Burrow has masterful touch on deep routes, Jared Goff is excellent at hitting players in stride, Jordan Love has incredible pocket presence and a feeling for pressure.

What does Trevor Lawrence have that separates him from other NFL quarterbacks? Nothing. Not really.

It’s this lack of an elite fallback trait which has ensured Lawrence isn’t that special as a quarterback. His game is very highly dependent on the external factors around him, with a fundamental inability to rise above adversity. You’re getting a Trevor Lawrence game week-in, week-out. Reliable as clockwork, boring as watching the second hand move.

This is a player who rises and sinks with the water around him.

What’s happening with Lawrence right now?

It’s more or less been a continuation of the same. Lawrence will make some really good plays, and then do something like this which makes absolutely no sense.

Pressure off the edge from Trey Hendrickson was definitely a factor, but Lawrence had room to climb the pocket to avoid the rush and he didn’t. Instead he makes a back-footed pass that’s all arm, and it softly falls to the defense. This should have been one of the easiest passes of the game, with Travis Hunter having a ludicrous amount of room to work in the end zone. If Lawrence throws back shoulder property it’s an easy touchdown. Instead he flips the field.

Now there’s drama creeping in about Brian Thomas Jr. becoming shy about catching balls over the middle. That’s definitely an issue, but there’s also a reality here that BTJ doesn’t have a lot of chemistry with Trevor Lawrence. During his 1,282 yard receiving season as a rookie, Brian Thomas Jr. did the majority of his work with Mac Jones under center.

In 2024 BTJ had six games where he finished with over 90 receiving yards. Two of these came in the 10 starts he made with Lawrence, and four of them came in Jones’ seven starts. When your top receiver plays better with the backup than you, it’s a problem.

When your coach is growing weary of your accuracy, it’s a problem.

What is Trevor Lawrence?

We’re in the midst of year five now. The odds that Lawrence will magically put it all together and become the player people hoped for have evaporated. He is not a bad quarterback, and certainly one Jacksonville can win games with — but he’s never going to be a Top 5 quarterback or potentially even Top 10.

There’s just too much inconsistency when the throws matter. While he’ll make the majority of passes an NFL quarterback should make, he doesn’t make the plays on the great ones are capable of. This puts a hard ceiling on what the Jaguars can achieve with Lawrence at QB. At this point he’s much closer to Blake Bortles than Patrick Mahomes.

The part of this pill that’s hard to swallow is the contract. Jacksonville was so intent on the belief that he was “the guy” that they signed him to a 5-year, $275M extension in 2024 — with $200M of his contract guaranteed. Lawrence is tied for second among NFL quarterbacks in yearly average, but he’s surrounded by guys who are infinitely better than him: Josh Allen, Joe Burrow, and Jordan Love.

The bright spot if you’re a Jaguars fan: At least you’re playing him $5M less per year than Dak Prescott.

So it’s become time to accept that Lawrence isn’t the generational QB who is going to become the next great one. He’s a solid guy, and nothing more. That’s a hard pill to swallow, but at this point there’s no evidence that Trevor Lawrence can be transcendent.

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