CHICAGO — Trestan Ebner’s draft party last Saturday could have gone in a different direction had it not been for his quick-acting agent.
Ebner was with about 40 family members and friends at his mother’s house in Henderson, Texas, a small town of 13,000 in the northeast corner of the state. The Baylor running back felt pretty good about his chances of being drafted, but midway through the sixth round, he hadn’t been chosen.
Ron Slavin, Ebner’s Dallas-based agent, had been trying to reach his client multiple times. Every time he called, it went straight to voicemail. Cellphone reception in Henderson can be spotty on a good day.
The Green Bay Packers and Tampa Bay Buccaneers had reached out to Slavin to see if he had an idea where Ebner might go. That’s common policy as the end of the draft draws near. Teams want to know if they need to use a draft pick or have a shot at signing a player as an undrafted free agent. It’s how the Bears determined they needed to use a seventh-round pick on Boise State left tackle Charles Leno in 2014, as Slavin had a lucrative UDFA deal all but done with another team.
Slavin finally reached Ebner on his fourth try. That was just before Chicago Bears general manager Ryan Poles called Slavin.
“We can’t pick him if we can’t talk to him,” Poles told Slavin, explaining the Bears had been trying to reach Ebner and their calls also were going straight to voicemail with time becoming critical.
Talk about a rough way to fall out of the draft or fall multiple spots.
NFL teams have a long-standing practice of talking to players on the phone before submitting their names to the league office to ensure they’re not choosing a player who encountered recent misfortune.
Former Bears college scouting director Greg Gabriel said his mentor, Norm Pollom, a chief scout for the Buffalo Bills, warned Gabriel of what happened to the Los Angeles Raiders in 1983. They selected USC All-America offensive lineman Don Mosebar with the 26th pick in the first round without realizing he underwent back surgery eight days earlier. Owner Al Davis was reportedly furious.
If the Raiders had known and gone in a different direction, they might have wound up with quarterback Dan Marino or cornerback Darrell Green — Hall of Famers selected immediately after Mosebar, who did go on to have a solid career.
It can turn out worse. Two Canadian Football League teams in the mid-1990s drafted players who were dead.
The point is, as a general rule NFL teams want to hear the player’s voice on the other line and make sure everything’s good before finalizing a pick.
With Poles still on the line, Slavin quickly called Ebner’s sister Tiana Boone and she answered. He asked her to put Ebner on.
“I’m sitting outside and my sister ran up to me and that’s how I knew her phone worked and mine didn’t,” Ebner said Friday morning before the first rookie minicamp practice.
Ebner took the phone and Slavin and Poles were on the line. The Bears went ahead and made it official with the 203rd pick.
“Thank God, right?” Ebner said. “(Boone) told my agent: ‘They might as well have picked me. At least my phone worked.’”
Maybe Slavin can negotiate a phone endorsement deal for Ebner, who hopes to connect quickly in the Bears backfield. He was up late Thursday trying to digest the first parts of the playbook and looked fluid Friday in the Walter Payton Center.
“The coaching staff and everybody around has been so welcoming,” Ebner said, “making me feel comfortable and at home because it’s a new environment and I’ve never been this far away from home, to tell you the truth. It’s just nice to get to see some friendly faces. Everybody is smiling, laughing, having a good time, so I’m comfortable here now.”
Ebner, who was timed in the 40-yard dash in 4.43 seconds, believes his experience in the Baylor offense will help him fit in quickly in the outside zone running scheme. The Bears believe he has good hands out of the backfield and he was the Big 12 special teams player of the year, so he has value in those areas as well.
“It’s been great, you know, your dream has come true,” Ebner said of his first 24 hours or so at Halas Hall. “You know, it kind of hit me (Thursday). I’m sitting here, I had some Bears gear on, I’m like, ‘I’m in the NFL now,’ and it’s even more of a job now. You kind of see it.”
