Former Falcons Wide Receiver to Pursue Professional Lacrosse Career

Jared Bernhardt won the Tewaaraton Award in 2021.

Bernhardt runs the ball against the Jets. | Ed Mulholland-Imagn Images

Sometimes, even professional athletes need to make a career change—and it appears one is on the horizon for Jared Bernhardt.

After spending some of the 2022 season with the Atlanta Falcons as a wide receiver, Jared Bernhardt is pursuing a different job, as a lacrosse player in the Premier Lacrosse League. The news was reported by ESPN's Field Yates.

Though this move might sound crazy, Bernhardt is no stranger to the game of lacrosse. In fact, he played five years of it at the University of Maryland from 2017 to '21 and won the Tewaarton Award in the process as the nation's top player. He then went on to play one year of football at Ferris State—as a quarterback—and scored 37 total touchdowns while leading the Bulldogs to an undefeated record and a Division II title.

Bernhardt went undrafted in the '22 NFL draft before signing with the Falcons as a free agent and making their initial 53-man roster out of training camp. He never appeared in a game, however, and after a stint with the BC Lions in the CFL, is pivoting to lacrosse as he chases a different path towards being a pro athlete.

A pretty cool story.

Yates added to his reporting that Bernhardt is scheduled to meet with several PLL teams over the next week in hopes of making his professional lacrosse debut this coming June.

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