Mike Blewitt - NFL QB Snapshot

The transcript discusses the state of quarterbacks in the NFL, focusing on the turnover and uncertainty surrounding the position. The speaker highlights the importance of experience and college performance in determining success at the professional level. They also analyze the impact of draft position on a quarterback's chances of sticking with a team. The discussion includes specific examples of quarterbacks and their backgrounds. Overall, the transcript emphasizes the challenges and unpredictability of the quarterback position in the NFL. Five, four, three, two, one. Hey everybody, welcome back to Sports Grid. Mike Blewett in for Scott Farrell today. It's smarter to be on Sports Grid. Welcome to Coast to Coast. The new Sports Grid app is out and on the iOS and Play Stores. As NFL season fast approaches, we wanted to make sure we had our Android users covered, so go to the Play Store to download that app. You can track scores and live odds, and of course, stay up to speed on all the latest content from your favorite hosts, hopefully me, and certainly Scott, and my guy Joe Ranieri, and watch or listen to us live anytime, anywhere on the app, Sports Grid app, available on iOS, and now the Play Store. It's smarter to be on Sports Grid. So, given the Trey Lance news this week, I thought it was important to do, go through an exercise that I often do during the course of the NFL season, and certainly the off-season, tracking exactly what the state of quarterback looks like in the NFL. There's obviously changes made every year, more than I think most fans would realize, as well as new draft picks coming in, and I think there are profiles that I try to look at to determine whether or not these players will be successful. Now, there's so many factors that go into it that these profiles have some validity to it. Others, you just kind of throw it out the window. Bad coaching matchup, bad coaching chemistry, a bad system, ROM system, poor ownership, many, many different factors that go into whether or not coaches are successful, and certainly their respective quarterbacks. I'm sure many of you out there, like me, have questions about some of the coaching and quarterback matchups as we go into 2023, but year over year, we do see quite a bit of change. Just this year alone, we're going to see nine new starting quarterbacks in the NFL out of those 32 teams, quite a bit of turnover, and that's primary starter. You have guys like Desmond Ritter, where he started last year. We knew he was going to be the starter coming into 2023, so he doesn't get the check mark, but Sam Howell does. Sam Howell started just the one game last year, and now he's a new starter. You have guys like Jimmy Garoppolo. He's new in Vegas, and Derek Carr is new in New Orleans, so nine new guys. Aaron Rodgers to the Jets, nine new starters, and when I look at the state of the quarterback for the 2024 season, I got about nine more question marks. Certainly more can be added, but as much as I am a believer in Justin Fields, it doesn't feel like that the macro NFL landscape is certain that he's going to be the quarterback in 2024. Now, I understand that that one is debatable, but what's not debatable is teams like the Tampa Bay Bucs. Yeah, Baker Mayfield's a starter for now. Kyle Trask waiting in the wings, perhaps, for Baker to flail and or fail, but that's a question mark. When you look down to Washington, I just mentioned Sam Howell before. Sure, they'll give it the old college try. He's a fifth-round pick inserted into the starting lineup with a lame-duck head coach. What is that gonna look like in 2024? I think we don't know, so that's nine new QBs right now in week one, and potentially nine new ones next year, so in just a two-year span, you could see a turnover of 18 of the 32 quarterbacks. I think it's important to note how tenuous this can be. Feels great when you have Patrick Mahomes or Justin Herbert, or certainly now, if you're a Philadelphia Eagles fan, it feels great to have Jalen Hurts, but a year ago, that wasn't a certainty. No chance, no how. A lot of people debated whether or not Jalen Hurts would make it. I was a supporter of Jalen Hurts. I thought he was so good in college, I thought him getting the chance to be the full-time starter in Philly was the right move, but did I think he was gonna be an MVP candidate? Obviously not, so I think that's important to note. Lots of turnover in the NFL when it comes to QB. Now, another component of this that I often like to look at is the profiles of said quarterbacks, because Trey Lance, number one first-round draft pick, third overall, and his career is up in smoke. His predecessor at North Dakota State, Carson Wentz, first-round draft pick, second overall, his career is up in smoke, currently a free agent. Carson Wentz is not on an NFL team right now, and we are less than two weeks away from kicking off the NFL season. So, why did I bring Trey Lance up? My concern for guys like Trey Lance is the lack of experience at the collegiate level. 16 starts for Trey Lance. Perhaps not long enough of a look for those NFL scouts to get at a player, how he'll progress through his NFL career. Other guys of note with not a lot of starts, Mitch Trubisky, Mark Sanchez, the list goes on from there, but I can tell you there's not any case studies right now with players not having started a lot of games in college and then being successful at the next level. It's a relatively small sample, I understand that, but that's important to note. I have concerns when players do not start a lot of games and then are inserted into the starting lineup, and who fits that profile this year? None other than Anthony Richardson for the Indianapolis Colts. Owner stood on the table to draft him. I think the relationship would stike him, and hopefully will grow, and they'll both be successful. There's a lot swirling around the Colts right now beyond Jonathan Taylor. There's a rookie QB in there, a rookie head coach, and that rookie QB does not have a lot of experience. Did he destroy the combine? Absolutely. Am I rooting for him? Of course. I don't see any of these guys fail, but his lack of experience at the collegiate level is a massive concern for me. I just have yet to see any of those types of players be successful. It doesn't matter how talented they are. There's a lot more to this. And the last component of the quarterback profiles that I like to look at, because I do find it pretty fascinating, is exactly where they're coming from. And when I say where they're coming from, I mean their collegiate conferences in particular. What programs did they play for? Right now, we've got one player from the American Athletic Conference. His name is Desmond Ritter. Seven and a half, this is my own grading system, or my own way that I track it. Seven and a half QBs from the ACC. Well, who's the half? Russell Wilson, he played three years in the ACC, one year in the Big Ten for Wisconsin. So seven and a half goes to the ACC. Three and a half to the Big Ten. Again, that half for Russell Wilson, the other Big Ten quarterback, CJ Stroud, Justin Fields, and Kirk Cousins as well. So that's Big Ten. Big 12, six and a half quarterbacks right now from the Big 12. We've got Pat Mahomes, Ryan Tannehill, Kyler Murray, Baker Mayfield, Geno Smith, and Jalen Hurts as well, as well as Brock Purdy. Brock Purdy, very unique on this list. I'll get to that in a moment. One FCS quarterback, Garoppolo. Three Mountain West quarterbacks right now, in Carr, Jordan Love, and Josh Allen. Jordan Love, obviously, a new starter in Green Bay. And then a few Pac-12 guys, Aaron Rodgers, one of them, and six and a half from the ACC. That's really increased year over year since I've been tracking this. And you've got Bryce Young, yet another ACC quarterback comes into the lineup. But beyond that, and this is the final point I really wanna make, is where do these guys get drafted? Who really has a chance to prove themselves at the next level? Talked about all those concerns about guys not getting enough starts, but the reality for the NFL teams is, if you are not drafted highly by them, it is rare that you're even going to get a shot. And if you get a shot, that window is ever so small. 22 of the starters, as we go into week one, just two weeks away, presumed starters, I should say. I think we're all locked down on who the 32 starters are with the Trey Lance news. Brock Purdy gonna be the starter, Sam Darnold gonna be the backup. Sam Darnold, another guy, drafted highly and is now a backup, probably a career backup. 22 of the starters, first round draft picks. Four of them, second round draft picks. That's Geno, Jimmy G, Carr, and Hertz. We got a couple of third rounders, Russell Wilson, Desmond Ritter. Couple of fourth rounders in Kirk Cousins' deck. Prescott, a fifth rounder in Sam Howell, new. And Brock Purdy, no sixth rounders in Brock Purdy. Forever, we had Tom Brady there as a sixth rounder, showing the success, but if you're not drafted in the first or second round, and really, this is almost exclusively a first round discussion, you've got virtually no chance to stick. That's why I think this 49ers situation is so unique. A first round draft pick, highly drafted first round draft pick in Trey Lance, and the very last guy drafted in the draft just a year ago in the seventh round, the 262nd pick, Brock Purdy. For years, Ryan Fitzpatrick was the seventh round pick and he hung in there, but the Russell Wilson, Kirk Cousins, Dak Prescott conversations are few and far between. If you do not get drafted in the first or at least the second round, you're really not even gonna get a chance. That's why I find this to be an awesome situation for Purdy, devastating for Trey Lance. I think so many people are piling on to him. It's totally unfair, I think, I don't think the Niners knew exactly what they were going to get. It's why I go back to the number of starts or the lack of starts that he had in college. It's a really difficult situation to be able to come in there with so little experience playing at the different level that he was in FCS and to have the teams know exactly what they're going to get. Just a really interesting study of the profiles of these players. If you're a first round pick and you wash out, they don't even really want you around. Carson Wentz and others have failed and really don't even get a chance to be on a roster elsewhere. I think the Sam Darnold fashioning himself into a backup long term will be an interesting dynamic and can he stick there, can he support Brock Purdy in the way that he needs to be supported and come off the bench when needed. But again, these players come from a certain profile. They are first round picks from power conferences and now that the Pac-12 is disintegrating, it's really going to be from three conferences. The ACC, the Big 10, I guess the Big 12 and the SEC, excuse me, four conferences instead of five. So it gets even more concentrated. The first player we had picked outside of the Power Five this year was the 47th pick overall, ironically, in North Dakota State, Frenson Blyman and Cody Mock. So I just wanted to give everybody a sense of what I think about the profiles of the players, how are they going to be successful and we'll come back with more from me and Joe Ranieri on Coast to Coast, Mike Blewett here on the grid.