Nate Longshore never asked 'what if?’

His dream didn’t shatter with his ankle, it just changed shape.

Nate Longshore and Marshawn Lynch celebrate with the 2006 Pacific Life Holiday Bowl trophy. Cal routed Texas A&M 45-10 in that game to cap off a 10-3 season. Photo courtesy of Nate Longshore.

Nate Longshore had to wait for his turn as Cal’s starting quarterback.

Even as a freshman in 2004, Longshore expected to fight for the starting job. A certain Aaron Rodgers had something to say about that. “Aaron (was) on his way to becoming what he is — a Hall of Famer — and (his backup) Reggie (Robertson) was a great player in his own right,” Longshore said. “I settled into my role as QB3.”

He described Rodgers as “more of a role model” than a mentor. Watching someone of Rodgers’ caliber was “a learning experience,” both on the practice field and off of it. Longshore was already tough mentally. From Rodgers, he learned to be bulletproof: to accept coaches’ criticism but quickly move on, or to keep his receivers’ spirits up if they ever dropped a pass.

Once Rodgers left for the NFL, the quarterback job was wide open. After beating out future paper plane ace Joe Ayoob in camp, Longshore was named the starter for 2005. That lasted less than a game. He broke his leg in the opener against Sacramento State and missed the whole season.

Longshore’s long-awaited second debut would come in 2006. He got off to a shaky start: Cal crumbled at Rocky Top, with Longshore only passing for 85 yards and a pick. The Bears ended up losing to Tennessee 35-18, and Longshore was pulled before his team got on the scoreboard.

As soon as the team touched down in Berkeley, Longshore beelined for the film room. “(On tape), your wins are never as good as they feel, and the losses are never as bad,” Longshore said. “We played badly — I played badly — but with better execution in a few moments, that’s a whole different game.”

Shaking off the loss, Cal stormed to a 10-3 record. In his first season as a starter, Longshore passed for 3,021 yards and 24 touchdowns to 14 picks. He singled out the Bears’ Holiday Bowl win as a particular highlight: The blue and gold routed Texas A&M, 45-10. Longshore passed for a workmanlike 235 yards and a touchdown at a 79% clip, while also adding a rare rushing score.

But Longshore doesn’t remember that game for his own performance. In the final minutes, the Bears were three yards away from the end zone, with a 28-point lead. Tedford told backup quarterback Steve Levy to take a knee and end the game. Instead, tailback Bryan Schutte took a handoff in for six.

Tedford was incensed, yanking Levy by the facemask as he dressed him down. Longshore understood why Tedford was so furious. Coaches never want to be on the receiving end of a beatdown, and running up the score feels like “bad karma” for the winner.

Still, he agreed that Schutte deserved a moment in the sun. He described him as a “great player” who “would’ve started at a lot of other programs” that didn’t feature Marshawn Lynch, JJ Arrington and Justin Forsett. Having waited years before getting his own chance at Cal, Longshore could empathize.

He stopped short of outright endorsing Levy’s little act of rebellion, but made his feelings clear. “Everyone in the program knew what Schutte meant to the team,” he said. “Giving him that moment was a pretty special gesture.”

Longshore shot up draft boards after his standout campaign and some in the media anointed him Rodgers’ successor. The following season was supposed to be a breakout — for both Longshore and Cal. “With the talent we had,” Longshore said, recalling a players-only meeting. “It (felt like) national championship or bust.”

That wasn’t just bluster from the signal caller: Strawberry Canyon was brimming with weapons on both sides of the ball. DeSean Jackson and Forsett headlined the offense, with the likes of Syd’Quan Thompson and Tyson Alualu anchoring the defense.

Things went exactly as planned for the first four weeks. The Bears went 4-0, avenging the drubbing by Tennessee, as well as the Murphy’s Law loss to Arizona that denied them a Rose Bowl berth.

Longshore was central to this fine run of form. Redemption wasn’t on his mind when the Volunteers came to Berkeley; he was more focused on beating a “highly touted” SEC team. But he certainly exorcised the demons of Rocky Top. He carved up the stalwart Volunteers’ defense for 241 yards and two scores, providing a deep passing threat that let Cal’s running backs feast.

Week five brought No. 6 Cal — and ESPN College Gameday — to Autzen Stadium. No. 11 Oregon proved a stern test, but the Bears eked out a 31-24 win. Marcus Ezeff’s forced fumble at the goal line sent the blue and gold faithful into raptures.

However, the victory proved pyrrhic. Longshore was knocked out of the game in the fourth quarter with a lower-leg injury. He had “complete trust” in his defense to seal the win, but the injury loomed large once the team hit the locker room.

“I knew it was bad,” Longshore said. “But I didn’t know how bad until the adrenaline wore off.”

The scans confirmed that Cal’s QB1 didn’t merely have a high-ankle sprain. There were also bone fragments floating around in his ankle. It would’ve been agony to plant his foot and throw.

At a minimum, he would miss Cal’s next game against Oregon State. No. 1 LSU lost to Kentucky during Cal’s game. If the Bears could dispatch the Beavers, that No. 1 ranking would be theirs.

Deep in the fourth quarter, the trailing Bears were yards away from the end zone. They could’ve even kicked a short field goal to send the game to overtime. Then Kevin Riley got tackled inbounds, Tedford’s clipboard died an untimely death and Cal’s perfect season was over.

“He was just trying to make a play. It wasn’t all his fault,” Longshore said in Riley’s defense. “We could’ve gotten the field goal unit out there faster. It was a learning experience for everyone involved.”

Riley’s mistake only further complicated Tedford’s next decision. Who would start at quarterback the rest of the way? Longshore was hobbled, but painkillers could help him get through games. Riley was an unseasoned freshman — he’d just proven it.

Longshore, for his part, was desperate to play. Bowing out and letting Riley take the reins was out of the question. “As a competitor, you want to play games,” he said. “It didn’t matter if it meant playing through pain. I was gonna do it.”

Tedford stuck with the incumbent, and the rest is history. 5-1 quickly became 6-6 as the Bears won just one of their final six games. Longshore’s play unraveled down the stretch: He threw 11 picks to nine touchdown passes and completed less than 60 percent of his attempts, with many of the turnovers coming late in the fourth quarters of close games. His output would often stall out in the second half — as if the painkillers were wearing off.

Longshore was reluctant to blame his struggles on the injury. He stressed personal responsibility for his own mistakes and flatly criticized his own play as “terrible.” But even he admitted that his ankle held him back.

He remembered throwing a wheel route for a big gain in the first half against USC. When he attempted the same throw in the fourth quarter, Longshore thought it felt “even better” than it did the first time.

The ball ended up in the hands of a Trojan cornerback.

“It felt like there were two Nate Longshores,” he said. “One in the first half who was playing well, and in the second half things would just fall apart.”

The signal caller became a scapegoat for Cal’s derailing season. Fans clamored for Kevin Riley to see the field, but Longshore didn’t begrudge their anger.

“You get all the credit when things are going well, and all the blame when they aren’t,” Longshore said. “Those are the highs and lows of playing quarterback. It’s what I signed up for.”

Tedford also came under fire for perceived “loyalty” towards Longshore, which the signal caller dismissed. He insisted that nothing factored into Tedford’s decision-making besides performances in practice, and who the coaching staff felt could best command the offense.

“I wasn’t starting because Jeff Tedford loved me,” Longshore said.

Riley did eventually sub in for Longshore in the second quarter of the 2007 Armed Forces Bowl. With Cal down 21-0, Riley led the Bears to a 42-36 win over Air Force. Longshore was sure that Tedford had considered starting Riley before the bowl game. But he understood why his head coach held firm through the season.

“He made his choice based on what he thought would give us the best chance to win games,” Longshore said. “It just didn’t work out.”

With his NFL stock damaged, Longshore returned to Cal for his senior year. He split time with Riley throughout 2008, although he got the nod for Cal’s bowl game. He led the Bears to a narrow 24-17 win over Miami in the Emerald Bowl, which he called a “bittersweet” end to his time in Berkeley. Longshore ultimately went undrafted, spending a few seasons in the Arena League before calling time on his professional career.

“What if?” has become Bear Territory’s collective lament, especially when it comes to quarterback hits. What if Chase Garbers hadn’t hurt his shoulder against Arizona State? What if Wesley Bissainthe had been penalized for manhandling Fernando Mendoza? What if Dave Barr hadn’t broken his collarbone in 1993?

None of these hypotheticals are as tantalizing as 2007 with a healthy Nate Longshore. With him fit and firing, the Bears rose as close as Cal has ever been to the summit of the modern game. One would expect Longshore to mourn what might’ve been, as many fans do.

But Nate Longshore has never bothered with “what ifs.”

“I don’t dwell on (the injury), because it wasn’t something I could control,” Longshore said. “All that I could control was how I played.”

Ever the self-critic, Longshore said his play wasn’t “good enough for Cal — let alone the NFL.”

He only left Cal with one real regret: When Longshore tore his pectoral muscle during spring ball in 2008, Tedford offered him a fast track onto the coaching staff.

“Jeff saw that my biggest strength wasn’t my arm or my running ability,” Longshore said. “It was how I saw the game.” At the time, the 22-year-old was simply too focused on playing to consider holding a clipboard.

He cites Lane Kiffin as an example of what he turned down. In 1997, Kiffin was a backup quarterback at Fresno State while Tedford was offensive coordinator. Standing little chance at taking snaps from David Carr, he hung up his cleats and became the assistant wide receivers coach under Tedford. “Lane parlayed [coaching under Jeff] into [eventually] becoming the youngest head coach in NFL history,” Longshore said.

Instead, the Cal alum would have to start from the ground up. He moved through the high school ranks before becoming an offensive analyst and tight ends coach at UNLV from 2021 to 2024, where a short but speedy receiver caught his eye. That mini DeSean Jackson was Jacob De Jesus. Longshore recommended him glowingly to his connections at Cal, who signed him out of the transfer portal.

Longshore cites Tedford as his coaching inspiration, taking after his mentor’s measured, candid approach. The two remain close friends to this day.

Tedford was the reason Longshore chose Cal in the first place. As a prospect out of Canyon High in Santa Clarita, he wasn’t short on offers. Canyon’s crosstown rivals, Hart, had recently sent a signal-caller to Berkeley: Kyle Boller, who was selected in the first round of the 2003 NFL Draft.

When Boller found out that Tedford wanted Longshore at Cal, local rivalries no longer mattered. He implored the younger passer to commit. “Kyle told me, ‘This is a guy who can change your life,’” Longshore said. “He got me really considering Cal, and the academics and everything all lined up.”

Longshore fell short of NFL stardom, but Tedford still delivered on Boller’s promise. Longshore says he is who he is today — as a man and as a coach — because he played at Cal for Jeff Tedford.

Currently, Longshore owns and operates The QB Method, a quarterback development program “focused on football IQ and maximizing throwing mechanics.” He essentially freelances as a quarterbacks coach, providing subscribers with an archive of playbooks and drills, as well as live film review sessions among other resources. The QB Method is the culmination of all his learnings from Cal and beyond.

Although Tedford is no longer on the sideline, Longshore remains linked to his alma mater. He’s especially eager to watch Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele, who he says has “huge potential.”

For now, Longshore doesn’t have any plans to reenter college coaching. He still hasn’t ruled out a return to Berkeley — he and Tosh Lupoi were teammates under Tedford, after all — but he emphasized that it would have to be “the right situation.”

Nate Longshore’s dream didn’t shatter with his ankle, it just changed shape. He didn’t become a legend on the gridiron, but could write a different story from the sideline.

And a piece of his heart remains in Strawberry Canyon.

“Whatever happens,” Longshore said. “I’ll always support the Bears.”