Trevor Siemian was only selected after being passed on 249 times in the 2015 NFL draft, and yet it was still somewhat of a surprise to some that the Northwestern product was drafted at all. So naturally, he sat out virtually his entire rookie season with the Super Bowl champion Denver Broncos.
And yet now, amazingly, it appears there’s a real chance the second-year seventh-round pick will begin the 2016 season as the starting quarterback for a reigning Super Bowl winner.
“Trevor and Mark [Sanchez] have looked each other in the eyes the whole offseason,” Broncos head coach Gary Kubiak said of the neck-and-neck competition between those two, via the Denver Post. “When I sit there and watch them practice, I think they’re right there banging on each other.”
How much of an anomaly would it be if Siemian were to earn the Week 1 starting job despite the fact he was a seventh-round selection only a year ago? Well, not once this century has a seventh-round pick or an undrafted quarterback started 12 or more games under center. And not since Jeff Garcia started for the San Francisco 49ers on Sept. 3, 2000 has a seventh-round or undrafted quarterback started in Week 1 of his first or second NFL season.
Even Garcia was a bit of an exception to that rule, since he was 30 and had played extensively in the CFL. Siemian is only 23. Oh, and Garcia’s 2000 49ers team was coming off a 4-12 season, while Siemian’s 2016 Broncos team is coming off a Super Bowl victory.
Undrafted quarterback Kurt Warner was a Week 1 starter for the 1999 St. Louis Rams, but Warner had also been around pro football for some time and was 28. In fact, Siemian is looking to become the first quarterback drafted beyond the sixth round to start Week 1 in his first or second year out of college since eighth-round pick David Woodley did so for the Miami Dolphins in 1980.
Hard to imagine that happening this day and age and with a contender like the Broncos, especially with talented first-round picks Sanchez and Paxton Lynch on the roster. But right now, it does seem as though Siemian has a shot.
