New York Yankees legend and Hall of Famer Mariano Rivera really only needed one pitch to succeed. His devastating cutter baffled hitters, broke their bats and dominated the opposition en route to perhaps the greatest closing career that the game has ever seen. He was a one-trick pony, but his lone trick was good enough to make him darn-near untouchable on the mound, and we didn't need to see any breaking balls or changeups for us to know that he was the best of the best.
But that doesn't translate to all pitchers, let alone all sports. Someone can be an incredible three-point sniper and not hold his own on the defensive end or in the paint, making him unplayable in the NBA. Perhaps a soccer star is a goal-scoring machine but, like "Ted Lasso" egomaniac Jamie Tartt, can't seem to find a teammate to save his life. Or maybe a quarterback has an absolute cannon of an arm but doesn't quite have the touch required to make short, crisp passes.
This might not be the case with 49ers rookie Trey Lance throughout his NFL career, but in his first sample of preseason action, that was the primary cause for concern in analyst Chris Simms' eyes. The former QB discussed what he saw from Lance on the latest episode of the "Chris Simms Unbuttoned" podcast, available on Audacy.
"The way the ball pops out of his hand, I mean, he's got a flamethrower. He can break the side of a building with how hard he can throw it, there's no doubt about it," Simms said. "I mean, his ability to just put pure mustard on the ball and drive it is up there with anybody in football, there's no doubt about it.
"Now, is it the most catchable ball in the world? No, it's not. It does not spin with great spirals, and he throws what I would call a little bit of a knuckle-wobbler. And he had some drops in the game... he had one drop on the sideline out route which should have been caught, was a really nice throw, perfect."
But that wasn't the case with every pass Lance threw that was dropped, and one of them from early in the game was one that Simms didn't think any receiver "on planet earth" would have been able to haul in.
"He was running at him full speed, the guy was eight yards away from him, and he threw it as hard as he could," Simms remarked. "...Josh Allen and Aaron Rodgers can throw it that hard, too. They wouldn't have made that throw in that spot."
A lot of that will come with experience and improving his decision-making as an NFL quarterback, and those developments will be areas of focus for Simms and many others throughout the remainder of the preseason and beyond. But for now, it looks to Simms like Lance is a one-trick pony, and that's not going to work out well in the NFL like it did for Mariano in the majors.
"As wowing as some of those throws and things were, [he went] 5-14. There's a reason for that, too. And again, it goes back to the uncatchable ball," Simms said. "[He] throws the ball too hard every throw. Every throw is exactly the same. That's what bothers me about Trey Lance a little bit. I don't ever see a lofted softball, a touch ball over the linebacker that gets down in front of the safety or, like I said, here he is on the run — just flick a nice little changeup ball and hit the guy in the facemask.
"We don't have to throw it a thousand miles per hour to where he can't even catch it or it bounces off his face and gets intercepted."
Simms' co-host compared that aspect of his game to former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, to which Simms agreed.
"I'm not gonna say he (Kaepernick) was a one-club thrower, because that's what I call Trey Lance. He's a one-club thrower — it's a driver every time. I'm gonna hit it as hard as I can, 500 yards down the middle of the fairway," Simms said. "Kaepernick at least had the driver and maybe a nine iron or an eight iron. That might have been about it, but at least he had that.
"I've got to see that from Trey Lance."
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