Getty San Francisco 49ers rookie minicamp invitee Clayton Thorson handing off the ball at Northwestern.
After failing to select a quarterback in the 2023 NFL draft or come to terms with an undrafted player immediately after, the San Francisco 49ers have invited a pair of players to rookie minicamp in Steven Montez, a 2020 undrafted free agent who most recently played for the Seattle Sea Dragons of the XFL, and Clayton Thorson, a fifth-round pick of the Philadelphia Eagles from 2019.
Initially reported by Matt Barrows of The Athletic, Thorson most recently played for the Houston Gamblers of the USFL before suffering a UCL injury – the same injury Brock Purdy suffered against the Eagles – that cost him any spring league opportunities in 2023 but has been cleared to play since January.
Though Thorson has yet to appear in a professional game in the NFL, he has been an in-demand prospect around the NFC East, signing with the Dallas Cowboys’ practice squad in 2019 after failing to make the Eagles’ roster as a rookie and then signing a pair of contracts with the New York Giants in 2020 and 2021. While he wasn’t extended a new deal in 2022 when his contract expired in January, Thorson was instead drafted into the USFL by the Gamblers, where he played in seven games before injuring his UCL.
Now fully healthy, Thorson will be afforded to show that he’s healthy enough to play professional football once more while also giving the 49ers’ rookies a reliable quarterback to catch passes from.
Clayton Thorson Was Once Considered a Promising Prospect
Though Thorson failed to latch on with the Eagles as a rookie, ultimately bypassing their practice squad for the Cowboys after being waived in favor of eventual 49er Nate Sudfeld and a then-40-year-old Josh McCown, Howie Roseman’s decision to select him with the 167th overall pick in the 2019 NFL draft wasn’t considered a bad idea at the time, as Lance Zierlein actually gave the Northwestern product a fourth-round grade in his NFL.com draft profile.
“Four-year starter with good size and fundamentals who never really improved after his breakout 2016 season,” Zierlein wrote. “Thorson was hamstrung by below-average talent at the skill positions but never showed an ability to work beyond his offense’s limitations. His limited field vision combined with plus physical traits gives him a chance to become an average backup in a pro-style offense.”
Drafted to serve as a developmental arm behind Carson Wentz, who saw his long-term backup, Super Bowl MVP Nick Foles, leave the team to sign with the Jacksonville Jaguars, the selection of Thorson was considered a good move by fans and experts alike, with Chris Trapasso of CBS Sports and Chad Reuter of NFL.com giving the pick an A- and an A respectively.
The San Francisco 49ers Can Thank Thorson for Jalen Hurts
There’s a common belief among Philadelphia fans that, had Thorson shown more promise, the team would have never drafted Jalen Hurts with the 53rd pick in the 2020 NFL draft to serve as a developmental QB2 behind former second overall pick Wentz.
Discussing why the team decided to pick Hurts in the second round mere weeks after handing Wentz a contract worth well over $100 million, Roseman noted that, in his opinion, the Eagles are a quarterback factory, and they needed a new player to develop after saying goodbye to Thorson the summer prior.
“For better or worse, we are quarterback developers,” Roseman said after drafting Hurts via Jeff McLane of The Philadelphia Inquirer. “We want to be a quarterback factory. We have the right people in place to do that. No team in the NFL has benefited more from developing quarterbacks than the Eagles.”
Now granted, had Thorson worked out, maybe fans online are right; maybe the Eagles wouldn’t have signed McCown in August of 2019 and would have instead used the Northwestern quarterback as their QB2 once Sudfeld went down with a broken wrist in the preseason. Maybe the team then wouldn’t have then drafted Hurts, and he would instead now be a member of a team like the Pittsburgh Steelers, who were linked to the Oklahoma product coming out of college. Either way, the fact that Thorson and Hurts were drafted in subsequent years by the Eagles, and one went on to not only defeat the 49ers in the NFC Championship game but briefly become the highest-paid player in NFL history is a fun fact nonetheless.