Why Kurt Warner isn't a Bear
So, to make good on my promise to provide a little more detail about the "could've been" Bears quarterback Kurt Warner - including why he never became a Bear...
Some of this you may know, but bear with me, and I swear that this is not a combination of NFL highlight films mixed with several Lifetime movies...
Kurt Warner did not receive a football scholarship out of high school. He did not start at QB until his 5th year at Northern Iowa. He was not drafted in 1994. He signed as a free agent with the Green Bay Packers, but did not make the team. He was turned down by 12 NFL teams and every team in the Canadian Football League. He turned to Arena football, playing three years with the Iowa Barnstormers, going to two championship games and lighting up 183 touchdowns. He played on NFL Europe's Amsterdam Admirals. And in 1997, he had a tryout scheduled with the Chicago Bears.
Let's back this up 5 years.
Kurt had met his future wife, Brenda, in 1992 during college. She was an ex-marine, four years older than 21 year old Kurt, was divorced and has two children from that marriage. One of whom has brain damage caused when his natural father accidently dropped him. Brenda was getting by with help from her parents and food stamps. Kurt, because of collegiate rules about these things, couldn't hold a job during his starting QB tenure. So they ordered pizza and watched videos with the kids through their early dating life.
Skip back up to 1997 (which means we're skipping the tornado that kills Brenda's parents at the home they retire to in Arkansas right before Kurt starts his Arena League career).
Kurt and Brenda get married and Kurt gets an invitation to tryout with the Chicago Bears. Things are looking up. The tryout is scheduled for when Kurt and Brenda get back from their honeymoon. The honeymoon is in Jamaica, and while they are there, Kurt gets bitten by a spider on his elbow. His throwing elbow. Which proceeds to swell up and make his arm useless. He can't throw. And it takes more than a month to heal. He has to cancel his tryout with the Bears, and our Bears move on without Kurt.
So that's what happened. In a cruel irony, Kurt finally lands on an NFL team a year later when the Rams cut ex-Bear QB Will Furrer to give him the 3rd-string spot on the roster.
The rest, somehow, some remarkable way, is history.
CHILI DAN
