What do you value more in a quarterback: what they are, or what they can be? The 2023 NFL Draft is an interesting case study in that, as the consensus is that there are four potential franchise guys who can line up under center. Ohio State’s C.J. Stroud and Alabama’s Bryce Young are studs right now. Florida’s Anthony Richardson and Kentucky’s Will Levis aren’t, but have the physical tools that make NFL teams drool.
So, who do you want as your guy? Should a starting point closer to the finish line be what you’re banking on, or do you trust your ability to develop someone who won’t step in on day one and take over as your team’s starter?
In the lead-up to the Draft, we decided to take a look at each position and highlight players in the following categories: The Top Dog, The Next Best, Boom Or Bust, and Day 3 Swing. Parsing those first two things at this position, in particular, are going to be difficult, but ultimately, one guy narrowly wins out.
The Top Dog: C.J. Stroud, Ohio State
The top-2 quarterbacks in this class are, for me, a coin flip. If the Carolina Panthers take Stroud No. 1, the Houston Texans should be ecstatic that they get to pick Bryce Young (if they want a quarterback!). If the Panthers take Young No. 1, the Texans should be ecstatic that they get to pick Stroud (same caveat!). If Carolina wants to swing for the fences with Anthony Richardson and both dudes drop to No. 2, the Texans are going to have to make a very difficult but very exciting decision (it might be Will Anderson!).
So, why Stroud? To me, his accuracy to all levels of the field, his ability to get the ball just about anywhere, his ability to beat teams before the ball is snapped, and the fact that he rarely makes mistakes (well, kind of) are just about everything you want in a quarterback right now. You mix that with being 6’3 and a better athlete than he gets credit for being and that he is, for me, both the safest QB prospect in this class and someone who still has a relatively high ceiling.
The concerns with Stroud, other than his lack of a supercharged arm, basically come down to the fact that: 1) He’s going from a team that can out-talent basically everyone to a bad NFL team and, 2) He is weirdly averse to using his legs. That second thing, and this is pure speculation, is something that makes me wonder if that’s coached into him. Here are two situations from his game against Nebraska in 2021 — one on a fourth-and-1 incompletion where he doesn’t even look to run despite being able to pick up an easy 10 yards, and one where he passes on picking up a few yards with his legs to try and force a ball into a window that does not exist and getting picked — that have stuck in my mind. He’s not Michael Vick or anything, but it is stunning how frequently he just doesn’t take what a defense is giving him with his legs so he can try to take even more with his arm.
My hunch is part of that has to do with the first thing. Why, exactly, would you not trust your receivers when you’re throwing to Chris Olave, or Garrett Wilson, or Jaxon Smith-Njigba, or Emeka Egbuka, or Marvin Harrison Jr.? (Aside: When we do this next year, if we don’t have Harrison as our No. 1 receiver, you have permission to come to my apartment and hit me with a lead pipe.) Ohio State is a program that just produces dudes, particularly at receiver, and there is something to be said of the fact that Stroud very rarely went up against opposition that could match up with his pass catchers.
You can see this in games where the Buckeyes are playing teams that have a chance against them, talent-wise. There are moments against teams like Georgia, or Michigan, or Penn State where the talent disparity isn’t as gigantic and Stroud gets sped up and is prone to panicking — his final interception against the Wolverines, where he overthrows a receiver who he’d hit 95 times out of 100, is a really good example.
But the thing with those games is the very good outweighs the bad by some distance. The Michigan game, for instance, features a number of throws that are quite impressive. Young didn’t play Georgia’s indomitable defense this year, but each of the other top-5 QBs did (Stroud, Richardson, Hendon Hooker, Will Levis), and Stroud was the best by a country mile, as he took them to the brink and very possibly would have won if Harrison didn’t get knocked out of the game in the third quarter. Penn State’s secondary had three starters who made All-Big Ten teams this year and he consistently carved them up down the field.
If Stroud’s able to adjust his internal clock once he goes from a team as good as Ohio State to a team as bad as the Panthers or Texans, and he embraces his legs a little more, he’s going to be very good right away. If he doesn’t, I’m confident he’ll be very good at some point not too far down the road.
The Next Best: Bryce Young, Alabama
So, why Stroud over Young? Ultimately it comes down to Young’s size, because it is a very real concern. At 5’10 and 204 pounds, he’s right around the same size as Kyler Murray (5’10, 207 pounds), only without the kind of breathtaking athleticism that helps Murray compensate for the fact that he’s not always able to carve up teams from the pocket.
At the same time, Mel Kiper is right: If Young was 6’1, he’s one of the best quarterback prospects in recent memory. He wouldn’t quite be on the level of a guy like Andrew Luck, but he legitimately would not be far off. Young’s ability to process the game is as good as it gets for a college football quarterback, and he backs it up with extreme accuracy all over the field and poise that is not matched — it’s very easy to say that the Alabama quarterback benefitted from his team out-talenting everyone, but the Crimson Tide have taken a bit of a step back (particularly along the offensive line) in recent years, and Young has not been deterred by that.
Unlike Stroud, Young doesn’t really have concerns about getting sped up and dealing with pressure. The intangible stuff with him are next-level, and are almost more impressive than his ability to play quarterback at a high level. He doesn’t have Richardson or Levis’ arms, but he can spin it, and his accuracy when he is throwing the ball deep is quite impressive. On short and intermediate stuff, it’s like he is walking the ball down the field and just handing it to his target. When he has to extend plays, his feel and ability to figure out how to do that in the moment is remarkable. His numbers falling off during his final year is partly due to an injury he suffered against Arkansas, but mostly due to the fact that the Crimson Tide’s skill position players fell off in a big way.
Despite coming in a loss, his best performance came on the road against Tennessee. All of the focus was on Hooker’s game (and he was truly unbelievable), but Young flat-out outplayed him and nearly willed Alabama to a win in a hostile environment. The number of times he made something out of nothing (here, here, here) or made something very difficult look simple (here) was NFL-level, as he did the ultra-rare thing in college football of making his teammates look better.
If not for the size — and, to an extent, the fact that he’s never going to punish teams as a runner — he’s the clear-cut No. 1 signal caller in this class. But this is more of a tiebreaker, for us, between two very close quarterbacks. If my team was going to war with Bryce Young as my quarterback, I’d feel extremely confident that he’d be able to make something happen.
Boom Or Bust: Anthony Richardson, Florida
If you’ve followed this Draft process at all, you are not surprised to see the words “boom or bust” linked to the Florida signal caller. From the moment he is selected, Richardson is going to be one of the 2-3 best athletes to ever be a quarterback on an NFL roster. His athletic traits — 6’4, 244 pounds with record-setting testing numbers — and nuclear powered right arm are the sorts of traits that are legitimately once-in-a-decade types of things. When he is put in situations where he is doing stuff that comes naturally to him, you see why he’s going to go high. This doesn’t just mean ripping it down the field or running in the open field, as he’s comfortable in situations where, say, he’s rolling to his right by design and letting it rip.
His issues come when he starts playing it fast and loose with his fundamentals. Let’s go through an extremely Anthony Richardson sequence from one of his best games this year, Florida’s season-opening win over Utah. Start at the 4-minute mark of the below video, and let’s watch through the 5-minute mark.
You get a play action and bootleg where he doesn’t have to do anything more than roll out and throw, and while the ball needs to be put in a better spot, it just looks natural with him. The very next play, he drops back, the OL does a great job, but his feet are all over the place and he misses a receiver on what should be a big gain. He uses his legs to pick up a few yards on the next play, and then, he makes one of his worst throws of the day. He’s moving to his left while getting chased, throws to someone in double coverage, airmails him, should have been picked off. Next two throws: An incompletion where he puts the ball too low (in fairness, he was under pressure), and then, a strike on the numbers that he throws in rhythm.
His tape is littered with stuff like this, moments where you see a guy who sticks to his guns, does the simple stuff, and looks like a future star. Interspersed throughout those moments you get a guy who is prone to being his own worst enemy. I think it’s quite possible he becomes a superstar and that a team that needs a quarterback should take a swing on him, but it’s very much dependent on him getting essentially the NFL’s version of a redshirt year.
Day 3 Swing: Dorian Thompson-Robinson, UCLA
If you are going to bet on traits and development late in the Draft, taking a guy like Thompson-Robinson makes a ton of sense. A former blue chip recruit, DTR got better every year during his time in Westwood, as he got the starting job as a true freshman, went through plenty ups-and-downs, and saved his best year for last. Thompson-Robinson put up career-best marks across the board as a redshirt senior in Chip Kelly’s offense, going 266-for-382 (69.6 percent) for 3,154 yards, 27 touchdowns, and 10 interceptions with an additional 646 yards and 12 scores on the ground.
While a guy like Stetson Bennett is closer to a finished product right now, Thompson-Robinson has a relatively high floor for a late-round selection and has room to get better. His athleticism, growth as a passer, experience in Chip Kelly’s offense, and toughness (the dude took some insane hits during his time in Westwood and usually got back up and kept battling) will appeal to teams. The concerns come in when he gets sped up — if he is able to set his feet and throw in rhythm he is quite good. When he gets sped up, he’s prone to either taking off or throwing before he wants to, and that’s where he is prone to getting into some trouble. His game against USC last year is a good example of him at his best (a playmaker with his arm and legs capable of making every throw who can take over a game) and worst (he threw three picks, and while the first one was partly an excellent play by the defense back, the second and especially third were just not throws you can make).