The most important position in football is quarterback. And if you don’t have a good quarterback and do not have a 1985 Bears defense, or a 2000 Ravens defense, or even a 2015 Broncos defense – you are not going to win the Super Bowl. Period. And there’s a reason quarterbacks are the highest paid position in football and it’s not really close. The pressure to draft a quarterback and to have a franchise signal caller is high especially if you don’t have one. And every year there are quarterbacks pushed up the board because teams need good quarterback play and are willing to overdraft quarterbacks just to have a chance at getting their guy of the future.
NFL teams know the pre requisite for seriously competing and beating the Mahomes, the Allen’s, the Lamar’s, and the Burrow’s in the postseason starts with good quarterback play. But the NFL is also very cyclical and we heard this a lot throughout the mid to late 2010’s when the passing game took over and running backs were not as much as a priority as they were 15-20 years prior. And the NFL is going to go through another cycle soon. And it’s going to change in a big way. The league is going to have to change the way they develop quarterbacks. And in today’s video we’re going to break everything down. This goes back several years and there are a ton of examples of the good, the bad, and the ugly. This is a video I’ve been wanting to make for a while and I think now is the perfect time to do it. Now let’s begin
And we are starting today’s video by taking a look at some of the situations around the NFL – and specifically with younger quarterbacks. By younger quarterbacks – I mean guys in their first or second season and I would include the 2022 draft class – but that was a very bad quarterback class and we knew that heading into the draft – as there was only one quarterback taken in the first two rounds which was Kenny Pickett. The only quarterback to work out from that class is Brock Purdy – so I’m going to mostly exclude that draft class. So when you look at the 2023 class there were 4 main quarterbacks. And they were Bryce Young, CJ Stroud, Anthony Richardson, and Will Levis.
Also yes, Hendon Hooker was selected in the 3rd round, and Aidan O’Connell was taken in the 4th round. But we are now a year and a half into these guys careers and you can really start to get a feel for how these guys careers are going to play out. And sometimes it’s shorter than a year and a half. CJ Stroud is of course the best of the bunch and it’s not really close. CJ’s situation wasn’t ideal and there were a lot of quarterbacks who would have failed in this situation and he is without a doubt one of the best young quarterbacks we have in today’s NFL. But when you look at his situation – his offensive line was pretty bad during his rookie year and the Nico Collins we know now – was certainly not the Nico Collins we knew heading into CJ’s rookie year. They also had 3rd round rookie Tank Dell step up and everyone over achieved relative to what was expected from them heading into the 2023 season – but one thing I do want to highlight – is – this was not normal. Not even close. And if a team thinks they can repeat what the Texans did in 2023 – it’s a lot lot easier than done.
I would argue that the CJ Stroud development and situation is a bit out an outlier rather than the standard. But the other teams in the 2023 draft that selected quarterbacks are in much different situations. Will Levis was a second round pick and I hate to sound this negative – but if the NFL was high on him – he would have been a first round pick. And throughout the pre draft process I thought Levis was the definition of a hit or miss prospect and that’s how his career has went through the first 14 games of his career. Remember he didn’t get a chance until midway through his rookie year last year and had the great game against the Falcons – but it’s been largely downhill for him since. And I’m not going to focus too much on Levis and more so focus on Bryce Young and Anthony Richardson. The Bryce Young we’ve seen in the NFL is nowhere close to the Bryce Young we saw at Alabama.
And I know there’s some people that had CJ Stroud above Bryce Young in the draft process – but most people had Bryce over CJ – including the Texans. And it came out after the fact that had the Texans lost that week 18 game against the Colts in 2022 – they would have taken Bryce Young number one overall. Now as we know – Bryce hasn’t worked out in the NFL for several reasons – he hasn’t been good, he gets happy feet, he gets tossed around way too much in the pocket for NFL standards, and at times – plays scared. There is hope from some people now that if Bryce gets out of Carolina – that he can in fact turn his career around if given the right opportunity. And it is also worth noting that the Panthers failed Bryce in a lot of ways too and that the number of quarterbacks that would have worked out in this specific situation is low – and I mean low. It also doesn’t help that the Panthers have collectively been one of the worst franchises over the past few years and there could be an entire video dedicated to bad decisions they’ve made and how it’s hard to do worse than what they’ve done over the past few years.
This isn’t just a quarterback thing either and we went over how the Lions have rebuilt their team over the past few years and how they’ve become one of the best teams in football. What I think should be remembered within the Lions rebuild that people either don’t remember – or didn’t realize it was happening – was there was a point where people were calling for both Brad Holmes and Dan Campbell’s jobs. Two years ago right now – the Lions were 1-6 and had started the Dan Campbell era with a 4-19-1 record. Since then – the Lions are 27-8 and went to the NFC championship game last year, and look like they are going to the Super Bowl this year. I look at a team like the Lions and look how they’ve rebuilt from the ground up and I think they are the blueprint model for how to rebuild in today’s era. On the other hand – I look at the Saints and look at how they haven’t been to the playoffs since 2020 and since the start of the 2021 season – they have a 27-32 and have been by every definition – treading water. That point of course is about how teams rebuild but I think it applies to quarterbacks too.
What would have happened if Jordan Love – a raw prospect in the 2020 draft class went to the Colts and they started him right from the beginning? How different would the results be for Jordan if he started as a 22 year old fresh out of Utah State? I don’t know and the reason I bring Jordan Love up is because he’s a gunslinger at the position which can be good and bad. I think Jordan is a very talented quarterback – but would he have thrown more interceptions than touchdowns and would Indy have come close to developing him the way Green Bay has over the past few years?
I personally don’t think they would have. And we can even go back to Zach Wilson in 2021. I wasn’t the biggest fan of Zach coming out and I thought he was the definition of a boom or bust prospect and I don’t think it should be a surprise that a player throwing to Elijah Moore, Corey Davis, Keelan Cole, and Jamison Crowder didn’t pan out. Now they eventually drafted Garrett Wilson and Breece Hall – but the Jets are still 2-6 with a much better quarterback than Zach Wilson. I’m not saying Zach is going to go down the Sam Darnold route and I don’t think that’s a reality for every quarterback disappointment drafted in the first round – but this mentality of we are going to have our franchise savior from day one has to stop. And in the cyclical sense – I think this is going to stop – and soon.
Yes you’re still going to have teams that draft a quarterback in the first round and expect them to single handedly turn the franchise around – but if the past few years have shown anything when you look at the league from afar – quarterbacks need time. And throwing a 21 year old quarterback into a fire and expecting them to have every answer in the book doesn’t work out as often as teams would like. Hell – Caleb Williams – who was of the better quarterback prospects over the past 10 years – has struggled in the early parts of his rookie season.
And what did we hear all summer long about Caleb? All we heard – and yes I also echoed this and I don’t want to act like I was screaming anything different from the mountain tops – but what most of us said was that this was the best situation a number one pick has ever walked into. Now I do stand by that and I still think that’s true – but Caleb has struggled at times throughout his rookie year. And to be fair to Caleb it’s been due to a variety of reasons – whether it’s due to his offensive line – which was always a problem even entering the year – or Shane Waldron – or anything else – it has not sunshine and rainbows the entire time throughout his rookie year. I think he will be a great quarterback over time and he is far from the problem in Chicago – but if Caleb is struggling in a great situation – should we be surprised that Bryce Young, and Anthony Richardson who were thrust into worse situations – and especially Bryce – also struggled?
No. And I think this goes back to the NFL being cyclical and I think we’re going to see teams look to give their first round quarterbacks a year to sit more than they have over the past 10 to 15 years. And I think that would benefit everybody. The player, the team in the long run, and of course – the fans.
If you enjoyed reading this article there is a near 20 minute video breakdown on this exact topic! I hope you enjoy!
