This NFL draft was not necessarily supposed to be all about the quarterbacks. It is one year after the eagerly anticipated pro football arrivals of Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota led to them being selected first and second overall in the 2015 draft, and this is a quarterback class without anything resembling that kind of star wattage.
But in today’s pass-happy NFL, it is always about the quarterbacks. Any franchise that doesn’t have a highly productive passer is in a constant, ever-more-desperate search to get one. Even with no former Heisman Trophy winners or celebrated quarterbacks adored by the football-watching public in the mix, and even with the Denver Broncos having just demonstrated to the rest of the league that a defense-first approach still can win a Super Bowl, it will be all about the quarterbacks Thursday night when the draft gets under way with its opening round.
Cal’s Jared Goff and North Dakota State’s Carson Wentz, both quarterbacks, are widely expected to be chosen with the top two picks after the Los Angeles Rams and Philadelphia Eagles made blockbuster deals to trade up to obtain those selections.
What remains up for debate is whether Goff and Wentz have sufficient promise as would-be NFL franchise quarterbacks to justify that lofty draft status and the maneuvers made by teams to be in position to get them, or if it all merely reflects how dire the circumstances are for the sport’s quarterback-deprived franchises.
“I took a lot of abuse a month or two ago for saying that I thought Wentz and Goff were every bit in the conversation with last year’s Mariota and Winston,” said Mike Mayock, a draft analyst for NFL Network. “And I still believe it. And apparently two other NFL teams do if they’re willing to give up that kind of firepower to move up and get those guys.”
Not everyone necessarily agrees.
“There’s no question this was driven by the needs at quarterback,” a front-office executive with one NFL team said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he did not want to comment publicly on players headed to other franchises. “These players (Goff and Wentz) are not quite on par with the two quarterbacks at the top last year.”
The prospect of being certain to get either Wentz or Goff was not enough to convince the Cleveland Browns, who have had 24 starters at quarterback since 1999, to keep the No. 2 pick. They traded it Wednesday to the Eagles for a handsome package of draft choices, a week after the Tennessee Titans agreed to send the top selection to the Rams. So the Browns will have to hope their quarterback of the future emerges from among the recently signed Robert Griffin III or a rookie chosen either with the No. 8 pick or later.
“Everybody keeps talking about two of the best quarterbacks in the draft,” Browns coach Hue Jackson said at a news conference last week. “No one knows that, right? No one really knows that. We will see how it all unfolds here in two or three years and see if we were right or wrong.”
If the Titans, who selected Mariota second overall last year, had retained the top pick, they would have chosen from among a group of prospects that includes Mississippi tackle Laremy Tunsil, Florida State defensive back Jalen Ramsey and Ohio State pass rusher Joey Bosa. Tunsil probably would have been the selection. So it was not until recent weeks, with the trades, that this became viewed as a draft in which quarterbacks would be selected first and second.
Goff, who once played as a freshman on a Cal team that went 1-11, and Wentz, who played at a Football Championship Subdivision (formerly known as Division I-AA) school and missed much of last season because of a broken wrist, have comparatively low public profiles. Even Mayock said he was unfamiliar with Wentz before doing his pre-draft homework beginning in October and November.
“I’d never even heard of him,” Mayock said. “He was just a name on my quarterback list. The first guy I looked at was Goff. When I got done four games of Goff, I said, ‘I think this is going to be my first guy. This is going to be my top quarterback.’ I liked everything about Jared Goff. I thought he was a top-10 pick in just about any draft.
“About a week later, I put in the first tape of Carson Wentz. And it was against Northern Iowa, and I remember it like it was yesterday. I was like, ‘Holy crap, that is a great tape. I hope the next one’s as good.’ The next one was as good, as was the next one. So right away I knew we had a first-round quarterback on our hands, and you needed to figure the kid out.”
The NFL is a copycat league, and the Broncos just made a run to a Super Bowl triumph powered by a dominating defense that more than compensated for less-than-overwhelming passing production by quarterbacks Peyton Manning and Brock Osweiler.
But that has not influenced other teams to abandon their whatever-it-takes pursuits of prized quarterbacks. It’s how the game is now played: NFL quarterbacks set single-season records last season for highest league-wide completion percentage and passer rating, most touchdown passes and lowest interception percentage.
The Rams sent a king’s ransom of draft picks to the Titans for the No. 1 choice. There is a growing belief within the sport that the Rams are targeting Goff and the Eagles want Wentz. From there, other quarterback-seeking teams such as the San Francisco 49ers, Browns, New York Jets, Buffalo Bills and Broncos will jockey for position for other prospects such as Memphis’ Paxton Lynch, Michigan State’s Connor Cook and Penn State’s Christian Hackenberg.
“I have five quarterbacks in this draft going in the top 35 picks,” former NFL coach Jon Gruden said. “I think the strength of this draft is at the quarterback position. I just don’t see a lot of drop-back quarterbacks at the college level on the horizon. And there’s so many teams that need them desperately.”
What other choice, some wonder, do teams like the Rams and Eagles have but to do what they’ve done?
“All I know is if you don’t have one of these guys, if you don’t have a quarterback, here’s the pool of quarterbacks in this year’s draft,” said Gruden, now an analyst for ESPN. “And if you have a real good scouting department, you can see who the candidates are going to be in next year’s draft. And I think when people are looking at this year’s group of quarterbacks, there are several that have the ability to play in this league. And if you don’t get one this year, I hope you have a magic wand to get one next year or the following year’s draft because nothing that happened five years ago is going to help you right now.”