GREEN BAY — As Matt LaFleur made his way over to Taylor Elgersma, it was if he was going back in time.
Suddenly, if only temporarily, LaFleur was no longer the Green Bay Packers head coach. He was back to being the quarterbacks coach he’d been earlier in his NFL coaching career.
Elgersma — the lone quarterback taking part in the Packers post-draft rookie minicamp, and doing so on a tryout basis — was doing a footwork drill in which he would take a fast seven-step dropback, then quickly flip his hips and keep moving backward, switching sides every time he finished seven strides.
Even with quarterbacks coach Sean Mannion, senior offensive assistant Luke Getsy and pass-game specialist Connor Lewis all working with Elgersma, LaFleur saw a coaching point he needed to make, asking Elgersma to change directions more briskly and demonstrating it for him.
Elgersma took the lesson, restarted the drill and executed it as LaFleur instructed.
Whether Saturday’s practice, which was almost exclusively individual drill work and contained no competitive 1-on-1, 7-on-7 or 11-on-11 periods, was enough to convince LaFleur, the coaches and the personnel staff to bring Elgersma back for the rest of the offseason program was unclear as of Sunday — in part because the Packers weren’t the only team interested.
The Buffalo Bills also invited Elgersma to their rookie minicamp, which kicks off Friday. He also reportedly had other offers from other NFL teams.
The Winnipeg Blue Bombers took Elgersma in the second round of the CFL draft on Tuesday, so he’ll have an opportunity back home if he doesn’t get an NFL opportunity.
The Packers brought Elgersma in on one of their 30 allotted pre-draft visits, during which they put him on a grease board and talked through the offense with him. The personnel staff also scouted him in the Senior Bowl, where Packers offensive passing-game coordinator Jason Vrable was one of the coaches, as well as the College Gridiron Showcase and the Tropical Bowl.
“He’s got a very live arm. We could see that on tape,” LaFleur said on Friday after watching Elgersma throw to fellow tryout players earlier in the day. “Then just watching him throw (again on Friday) … there’s a lot to like about him.”
Playing for Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, Elgersma completed 73.5 percent of his passes for 4,011 yards with 34 touchdowns and 10 interceptions as a senior last season and winning the Hec Crighton Award, the Canadian equivalent of the Heisman Trophy.
The 6-foot-5, 227-pound Elgersma grew up playing hockey in Canada before taking up football in the 10th grade.
“A big thing for me is getting in the building and whether that comes through draft or free agency, you got to go win a job at the end of the day,” Elgersma told CTV News before either draft. “And so that’s what I’m focused on when I get an opportunity to go into a building, to go make the most of it.”
The Packers have three quarterbacks on their roster at the moment: Starter Jordan Love, backup Malik Willis and third-stringer Sean Clifford, a 2023 fifth-round draft pick.
Willis, acquired just before last season began for a seventh-round pick in a trade with the Tennessee Titans, is entering the final year of his rookie contract and will be an unrestricted free agent next spring. Clifford spent the 2023 season as Love’s primary backup but his inconsistent play in training camp last year led general manager Brian Gutekunst to make the trade for Willis.
LaFleur was noncommittal about the idea of adding a fourth quarterback for the team’s organized team activity practices later this month or for training camp, which begins in late July.
But, while LaFleur acknowledged that Elgersma has a steep hill to climb, especially considering Canadian college football resembles the Division III level stateside, the coach did express a modicum of confidence that he is capable of making the leap.
“Certainly, I think just coming from where he’s coming from to this level, I think there’s going to be a big learning curve,” LaFleur said. “But if there’s anybody that will attack it head on, Taylor will. That was so evident when he was here on the (top) 30 (pre-draft) visit.
“I know he’s been working really hard at it. Even just talking to Vrable, the strides he’s probably made from the Senior Bowl to now has been significant.”
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