2019 Quarterback Prospects

And here we are, less than a week away from the NFL Draft with the last of my prospect breakdowns. As a whole this draft class is light on top end prospects but has some intriguing depth, a trend that continues at the quarterback position. There may not be any high upside stars like there were a year ago, but there are some solid starters to be found here.

Will Grier, West Virginia

Grier is a refreshing change of pace in an era where every young quarterback seems to have been trained from birth to avoid making the big mistake. He’s a risk taker, and more often than not those risks pay off. He throws more deep passes than any quarterback I can recall watching, and even though he occasionally locks onto a receiver and predetermines that he’s going deep, he has a good knack for avoiding throwing the ball into double coverage. He’s willing to toss the ball up and let his receiver make a play in the air, targeting cornerbacks with their backs turned who aren’t in position to take the ball away.

Grier is the best quarterback in this class, but I still don’t see him as more than a mid first round selection. There are a few too many holes in his game for me to be willing to pass up an elite prospect at another position for him. The system he played in college relied on a lot of quick, simple reads, and even though he at times showed more complex reads across the field, I haven’t seen enough to convince me that he can do it on every play. His accuracy can be spotty at times, and he’ll miss throws that should be automatic, especially when he tries to vary the velocity of the ball and throw with touch. And the biggest concern for me is his arm strength. Though he has good zip on the ball to all parts of the field, he doesn’t have great arm strength for throwing deep. The ball will sometimes hang up in the air on him, which is death against athletic NFL safeties.

Still, there are a lot of parts of Grier’s game to like. He doesn’t target the middle of the field often, but when he does he has a good understanding for how to manipulate defenders with his eyes and how to hit windows with anticipation. He isn’t a threat as a runner, but he can move behind the line of scrimmage to make plays on the run. He sometimes struggled under pressure in college, though he had a good sense for when it was coming and how to make slight movements to avoid it.

Grier will never be a top five quarterback in the league, but I believe he can be a reliable starter, a bit inconsistent but with highs that can lead an offensive explosion. He’ll need some time to adjust to the speed of NFL safeties, and to learn how to play in an NFL offense. But he’s far enough along in both these things that he can pick them up on the go. I’d feel comfortable if he was starting week one this coming season, and I would definitely tune in to watch him let the ball fly.

Dwayne Haskins, Ohio State

Haskins is almost the opposite side of the coin from Grier. He has all the physical talent in the world, with an arm that can make every throw to any point on the field. He’s big, he’s smart, and he improved drastically over his one season as a starter. But the more I watched him, the more I found myself waiting for him to do something to blow me away. And while his talent still makes him worth a first round selection, the lack of anything extraordinary in his game left me, much like Walter Mondale in the 1984 Democratic Primary, asking, “Where’s the beef?”

The one part of Haskins’s game that comes closest to being elite is his ball placement. On throws in the intermediate area and over the middle of the field, the ball almost always ends up precisely where he intends it. His receivers can catch the ball at full speed without breaking stride, and he can fit his passes into tight windows between coverage. Even when he targets a covered receiver, he has a knack for missing in a way that prevents the defense from being able to make a play on the ball.

This same accuracy does not translate to deep passes. He is all over the place trying to throw deep down the field, and defenses should feel comfortable playing extra aggressive without fear of being burned deep. In general, he’s not a quarterback that is going to be leading a particularly explosive offense. He is good at breaking down defenses, at reading the coverage as it develops and finding the open receiver. But mostly he attacks the underneath area of the field, and his team is going to have to be comfortable picking up yards bit by bit.

The biggest hole in Haskins’s game is his reaction to pressure. He isn’t mobile as a runner, and he’s not much better moving behind the line of scrimmage. At times he is willing to stand in and deliver a ball with a pass rusher in his face, but if he gets hit repeatedly over the course of the game he begins to get skittish, no longer trusting his line to hold up long enough for him to go through his reads. He’s good at finding his checkdowns, but if the defense takes those away there’s nothing he can do.

Haskins only had one year as a starter in college, and he improved over the course of that time. It’s possible that more experience will open things up for him, and if that happens he has the potential to be the best quarterback out of this class. But I also see a lot of Derek Carr in his game, the sort of quarterback who can excel when everything is perfect, when his line keeps him upright and his receivers outclass the opposing defensive backs, but who is unable to elevate the talent around him and unable to consistently be more than a league average starting quarterback.

Kyler Murray, Oklahoma

The first thing we have to talk about with Murray is his athleticism, because that defines his game more than anything else. He is likely the most dangerous player with the ball in his hands at any position in this class. He is lightning fast downhill and can stop and start on a dime, making people fly past him looking foolish while getting nothing but air. He is lethal both on designed runs and on scrambles when the play breaks down. Just based on his running ability he might be a first round pick as a wide receiver or a running back. He is that good.

I can’t be as universal in my praise towards his skills as a passer, but he has enough there to intrigue me with his long term potential. Like Haskins he only started a single year in college, and he has a lot of growth still ahead of him as he adjusts to an NFL offense. His scheme at Oklahoma almost never asked him to make more than a single initial read, and when that first option wasn’t available his instinct was always to take off and run. He has no sense for how to manage the pocket, can’t tell when he is or is not under pressure, and doesn’t keep his feet in throwing position once he tries to move. In space he can make people miss, but in the tight confines of the pocket his small frame works against him, allowing pass rushers to bring him down if they can get even a single hand on him.

The pure passing skills are there, even if they need refinement. He has an incredible arm, both launching the ball high into the air and firing it into small areas. His ball placement isn’t great, and he regularly leaves passes behind receivers. But he can also make occasional precision throws, and he shows a good understanding for how to vary velocity to fit the ball through different windows. Oftentimes these windows are smaller than they need to be though, as he doesn’t display great anticipation for throwing to receivers before they come open.

Murray will be a dynamic playmaker from the moment he steps onto the field. Whether he can become a good quarterback, that’s harder to say. His instincts need a lot of development, and he needs to get better at integrating his athleticism with his passing game. He does a good job keeping his eyes down the field when he breaks the pocket, but his accuracy suffers greatly when he throws on the move. If he can fix this issue, he can make enough plays outside of structure to keep himself afloat as he gets better at playing within the system. But it’s going to be a rocky road ahead for whoever does draft him, and this is the sort of investment I’d feel better making in the final ten picks of the first round than in the first ten.

Drew Lock, Missouri

Of the four quarterbacks in this class with the potential to become long term starters, Lock is both the worst and the most ready to play in the NFL right away. Like Grier he has multiple years of starting experience to lean on, and like Haskins that experience came in an offense that regularly asked him to do the same sort of things he will do in the NFL. He’s a smart player who always looks comfortable as he sits in the pocket and diagnoses defenses. He is able to adjust on the fly to late blitzes or unexpected rotations in coverage, and he rarely makes a mistake throwing to a receiver that simply isn’t open.

Lock has plenty of arm strength, but his accuracy is poor. Each game he makes a couple nice aggressive throws into tight windows, but he misses more often than he hits. He is turnover prone thanks to his inability to make the ball go exactly where he wants it, and to his general lack of ball security in the pocket. He’s a good athlete and can do some damage as a scrambler, but he doesn’t handle pressure well in the pocket. His footwork falls to pieces as soon as he tries to move, and his accuracy follows, leaving him little choice but to fling the ball down the field with very little idea where it is going to end up.

Lock is ready to step in as a starter day one, but I’m not sure how much room for growth he has after that. He can work on his mechanics in the pocket to prevent some of his accuracy issues, but mostly it appears that he simply doesn’t have the talent that the three above him do. Still, he has enough to be a solid starter for a while, and if a team at the top of the second round wanted to try to plug him into a roster with some other talent already in place, he can contribute to a potential big turnaround next season.

Daniel Jones, Duke

There isn’t a great deal physically impressive with Jones. He has good height, but his arm isn’t particularly strong, and his ball has a tendency to die on throws to the outside. He can move better than you’d expect from someone his size, but I don’t think the running ability he showed in college will translate to the NFL. His deep ball accuracy leaves a lot to be desired, and while he can deliver balls with good velocity into tight windows while his mechanics are good, his arm strength mostly disappears when he doesn’t have a solid platform under him, which happens more often than you’d like.

There are parts of Jones’s game that are reasonably advanced. He has decent ability to work the pocket, with sporadic instincts for feeling pressure behind him and good feet to move into space to give himself an extra beat or two to throw. He doesn’t shy away from contact, and he is willing to make a throw with a defender barreling downhill at him. On single read plays off play-action he almost always makes the correct decision and almost always delivers the ball where it needs to go. He rarely misses easy passes entirely, though his ball placement on outside throws has a troubling pattern of coming in behind the receiver.

As developed as he is in these areas, I feel like Jones still has a lot of work to do to pick up the full weight that is placed on quarterback’s in an NFL system. He rarely went through multiple reads in college, and he had a tendency to lock onto one specific receiver and track him all the way across the field. He has no anticipation, always waiting until after the receiver comes out of his break or after he moves into a hole in the zone. He won’t be able to get away with this in the NFL, where receivers often aren’t open until the ball is already in the air.

Jones can make some nice plays, but mostly he just takes whatever the rest of his offense can create for him. He can be productive if he’s given a very good receiving corps to work with, but the minute he’s asked to create plays on his own he is going to struggle. He might have a future as a bottom-end starter in the league, but I think whoever drafts him should be hoping to make him a high quality backup, the sort of player who can keep things afloat if you need to turn to him but who you would much rather never put out on the field.

Jarrett Stidham, Auburn

Stidham, on the other hand, has no real chance of ever being anything more than a backup. The best thing I can say about him is that he is good at avoiding mistakes. His throws are always safe, and he never tries to place the ball in a tight window, likely because he knows he doesn’t have the accuracy to reliably hit these small targets. He’s perfectly willing—and occasionally even eager—to throw the ball out of bounds rather than take a sack or throw an interception. His style leaves plenty of plays and yards on the field, but it at least doesn’t completely sink his offense.

Stidham doesn’t really have any idea what he’s doing in the pocket. When he does sense pressure and slide into open space, he loses his platform to throw from and never really recovers it. He doesn’t have the arm strength to throw from a poor platform, and if you get pressure on him the play is essentially over. Of course, it doesn’t even take pressure to get him moved off his spot. He regularly bails from pristine pockets to try to race to the edge, and since he doesn’t have the speed to be anything more than a middle tier scrambler, these plays usually end with him lofting the ball into the sideline.

I’m trying to imagine a way I’m wrong about Stidham, and I’m not coming up with it. On the rare occasion he does throw on the run he has decent accuracy, but the ball doesn’t come out with much zip. He seems willing to give his receivers a chance to go up and make a play on the sideline, knowing that even if they can’t get to the ball it will just float harmlessly over their heads. But these moments will be few and far between, and if he ever makes it onto the field it will hopefully be just to keep things from sinking to fast until the usual starter finds his way.

Tyree Jackson, Buffalo

I wasn’t originally planning on breaking down Jackson. I added him after the Combine, when stories of his impressive arm and dominance of the athletic tests became enough to intrigue me into watching him. After sitting through four games of his, I regret that decision. There is absolutely no way I would spend a draft pick on Jackson, unless I got it in mind that he might make a Logan Thomas like move to tight end. And even then I’m not sure if there would be much point, since his athleticism at the Combine almost never showed up on the field. In shorts and a t-shirt he looks like Cam Newton, but apparently once he puts on pads he transforms into Blake Bortles.

Unfortunately for Jackson, his game resembles Bortles in more than just athletic ability. His accuracy and his decision making are both abysmal, and it’s remarkable that he only threw 12 interceptions last year. He’s reasonably competent on quick hitting passes over the middle, plays where he makes an immediate decision and gets the ball out of his hands. But he has no control over where the ball ends up when he tries to throw outside the numbers. He’ll skip it in low, sail it over the receiver’s head, lead too far to the sideline, or leave it behind, all depending on the specific play.

I suppose I should try to point out some positives about Jackson. He has a weirdly good sense for the pocket, hanging in there when things are clean and finding lanes to break free when pressure starts closing in. He almost never takes sacks, and once he’s outside the pocket he is usually able to make the correct decision with the ball (bwith a few egregiously bad exceptions). But in the end, really the only thing he has going for him is his arm.

I’m a believer in arm strength when it comes to quarterback prospects. I was higher on Josh Allen than most last year, and I regret not trusting my instincts more when I knocked Pat Mahomes down to a late first round pick. And Jackson certainly has a strong arm, even if he’s not in the same category as those two. He’s able to throw the ball 60 yards in the air with ease, and about once a game he’ll make a seemingly impossible throw while moving outside the pocket. But where the other two had a strange ability to make the ball leap out of their hands, Jackson requires a much bigger windup every time he tries to throw with any velocity. And as much as I do love big, strong armed quarterbacks, I can’t look past everything else that is wrong with Jackson’s game, not even to talk myself into taking him as a developmental prospect in the last couple rounds of the draft.