PITTSBURGH — When the Mentor High School football program booted up the inaugural Mitchell Trubisky Youth Camp a few years ago, longtime coach Steve Trivisonno was just glad that his most successful player agreed to put his name on the event.
What impressed "Coach Triv" even more was the way Trubisky lived it.
"He was there all 12 hours, running around, playing with the kids, taking pictures, and that's special," Trivisonno was saying last week. "He has great pride in what he does. It showed he loved his school and where he's from, and obviously, it was important to him."
Trubisky is the favorite son of Mentor, a suburb just 25 miles outside of Cleveland, off the shore of Lake Erie. As with many who lived or grew up in "Menner" — as the locals pronounce it — Trivisonno has long been a Cleveland Browns fan. All the not-so-fond memories of the late-80s roll off his tongue, from "The Drive" to "The Fumble," both of which brought heartbreak to the lake in AFC championships.
But even the most ardent Browns backers in Mentor have reason to relish a rival now. Trubisky has gone from Ohio boy to presumed starting quarterback in Pittsburgh, where the Steelers need to replace another high-profile passer from the Buckeye State.
"I guess I'm going to have to buy a Steelers jersey," Trivisonno said with a laugh. "It'll be '10.'"
From Ben to 10, Trubisky's number at every stop in his career dating to his high school days. It was on his back when he was winning Ohio's Mr. Football Award, sitting on the bench at North Carolina, and eventually starring for the Tar Heels as a redshirt junior.
Then it followed him to Chicago as the No. 2 overall pick for the Bears in the 2017 draft, where he went from hopeful franchise savior to falling off the roster and into free agency. Trubisky grabbed it again last season in Buffalo, where he had an opportunity to reset and set the stage to rekindle his NFL career in Western Pennsylvania.
"I'm excited to be a Pittsburgh Steeler," Trubisky said on his first Zoom call with local media. "I watched Ben growing up. Obviously, he's a legend. ... I'm from Northeast Ohio, which isn't too far from here, so I know all about Heinz Field, the Terrible Towel. I'm still learning a lot about the city of Pittsburgh, as well."
And while Trubisky isn't exactly a no-doubt Week 1 starter — Mason Rudolph has designs on finally winning the job, and there's still the possibility of a rookie being added — he's already taking a page out of Roethlisberger's book. This weekend, Trubisky will host a slew of Steelers offensive players at his home in Florida for football and fellowship ahead of official offseason workouts beginning April 18.
That's a nice first impression to make on new teammates, but for Trubisky's old teammates, it's no surprise. In fact, he's had that club in his bag for a long time.
"It was unbelievable to have him as our quarterback," said Conner Krizancic, who was a year behind Trubisky in high school and is still one of his best friends. "I'll tell you what, we always knew he was going to be in the NFL. I tell people that and they're like, 'No, you're just saying that because he's there now,' but no. He would drag us to the football field, a summer night at 10 o'clock, and we'd get the lights on. The dude's work ethic rubbed off on all of us."
Krizancic was one of Trubisky's top receivers his senior season, then succeeded him as Mentor's starting quarterback a year later. Needless to say, he was a bit nervous making that position switch and trying to fill the shoes of a four-star recruit with scholarship offers from Alabama, Ohio State and Tennessee, among others.
But Krizancic remembers calling Trubisky, who was trying to figure out his own transition on campus at North Carolina, before the season. He told him he was uneasy about going from wideout to quarterback, and that he was even having some arm troubles in the summer that gave him pause.
"I'm no Mitch, but we turned out to be pretty successful, and Mitch was a big part of that," said Krizancic, who now lives in Los Angeles. "He talked me through all of the challenges and really got my head right going into that season."
Eight years later, Trubisky had to take a season to get his head right. He stepped into the spotlight with high expectations and relentless pressure as the first quarterback drafted, followed by a four-year span in Chicago in which he won more than he lost but didn't always click with the coaching staff.
John Fox drafted him but was replaced by Matt Nagy after Trubisky's rookie season. Early returns were good, with Trubisky throwing for 3,223 yards and 24 touchdowns to 12 interceptions, plus 421 rushing yards — all career highs. The Bears went 12-4, won the NFC North and would've beaten the Eagles in the wild-card round if not for a botched field-goal attempt.
After the famous "double doink" miss, things went south. In 2019, Trubisky didn't take the next step. His numbers dropped across the board, except for sacks, which skyrocketed from 24 to 38 as the Bears finished 8-8 and missed the playoffs. That led to Nagy staging an open competition the next year in training camp between Trubisky and newly acquired veteran Nick Foles. Trubisky won the job, but Nagy pulled him in Week 3 and kept him on the bench until an injury to Foles in Week 12.
"He's seen the highest of highs — being the franchise quarterback of the Chicago Bears in one of the biggest sports cities in America — then he's seen people trying to call him the biggest bust or whatever," said Kade McClure, Trubisky's high school backup and another longtime pal. "But I think he's found peace in the fact that he's human. Things are going to go different ways at different times, and he's just trying to look at the brighter situation."
McClure can relate, to an extent. He's a pitcher in the White Sox organization, though he hasn't made it past Class AAA Charlotte just yet. After a stellar career at Louisville, McClure was a sixth-round pick in Chicago the same year Trubisky was drafted, so naturally, the two had to dream. Would Trubisky still be the star in town by the time McClure made it to the majors? Two kids from the same hometown taking on the big city together?
Even after Trubisky replaced Foles as the starter and helped lead the Bears to the playoffs in 2020, that never came to pass, but it's funny how the universe can unfold. Like Trubisky, McClure is now married, and his wife is a Penn-Trafford High School graduate. Those two live here now, as does Brandon Fritts, a classmate of Krizancic and McClure who also was one of Trubisky's tight ends at North Carolina.
"Us being from Cleveland, we're not really taught to be Steelers fans," McClure said. "But I was in his ear about it from Day 1. I don't know if he really thought that was realistic, but then free agency started, and I think I just kind of willed it into existence. It's going to be fun to have him right down the street. ... I never cared for the Browns too much, but now I'll basically be a fan of wherever he goes to. My wife and her whole family are all big Steelers fans, so they've been trying to convert me, anyway."
Before they left for spring training in Arizona, McClure and his wife spent a weekend with Mitch and Hillary Trubisky in Florida. In between McClure trying to sell all the positives about the Steelers, the two pro athletes discussed how 2021 was almost like a college redshirt year for Trubisky, who got out from under the NFL microscope for one season and played the backup to Bills star Josh Allen.
His body had a chance to recover from four years of hits in the pocket and head-down scrambles. He sat in a quarterback room where everyone's role was defined and where they had success, with Allen's profile rising by the week and offensive coordinator Brian Daboll ready to ascend to the head-coaching job he now has with the Giants.
Trubisky settled for a one-year contract worth just $2.5 million to regroup in Buffalo. Now he'll try to bounce back on a two-year deal that could pay him more than $20 million in total if he reaches certain incentives based on playing time, according to a Tuesday report from Sports Illustrated. He's betting on himself to be a good fit for Matt Canada's scheme, and vice versa.
"If you watch the really, really good offenses now, you look at what they do with Deebo Samuel, with Tyreek Hill, they're moving them and they're moving the quarterback," said Trivisonno, who retired after 23 seasons of running a fast-paced spread offense at Mentor. "I think you're beginning to see a little bit more of the quarterback has to be able to move around, and Mitch is going to do that. He throws as well on the run as he does in the pocket. He's going to be able to do different things, and with Canada's motion and misdirection going on, I think you're going to see a completely different style of offense."
Of course, Trivisonno admits, he's biased. So are Krizancic and McClure, given how far back they go with Trubisky and everything they've seen him do. They all insist he's as nice a guy as you'll ever meet when he's not playing ball, but they've seen him be a killer on the field.
Trivisonno recalls that Trubisky didn't have any problem yelling at teammates to play harder, or firing them up when it was time for a big drive. McClure thinks back to just a couple months ago when Trubisky quickly morphed into that ultra-competitor who never wants to lose in anything.
"Even in a friendly situation, we were playing Spikeball on the beach, and you can just see that look in his eye," McClure said. "He flips a switch, and you can't even mess with him because he'll just go at your throat."
Surely, Trubisky must be motivated. Soon to be 28, he's ready to show that the Steelers can compete in the ever-intensifying AFC with him at the helm.
Over in Cleveland, where Trubisky and his friends were always more Ohio State fans than NFL watchers, the Browns have made their own move at quarterback. They'll take a different kind of chance on Deshaun Watson, whose legal issues loom over a record-breaking $230 million contract. Trubisky and Watson were in the same draft class, both coming out of the ACC, picked second and 12th, with Patrick Mahomes in between.
Comparisons are inevitable, with two of those passers putting up huge numbers while Trubisky struggled at times to find his footing. Was he in a bad situation, or was he his own undoing? Perhaps the truth is somewhere in the middle. Now he comes to Pittsburgh with his wife and a baby boy on the way in May, everything going right in life, but with much to prove in the NFL.
"He's the most politically correct person on the face of this earth, so he'll never throw anyone under the bus," McClure said. "But the second he senses that you doubt him, he's a different person."
