[Quesadilla Joe]

1. Wait till next year? On my podcast the other day, my old buddy from NFL Network, Daniel Jeremiah, and I discussed a concept that I believe will come up plenty in the weeks to come: Some teams drafting high could wind up punting on the 2017 draft class of quarterbacks altogether with an eye towards 2018. The most pro-ready of the 2017 quarterbacks, Mitch Trubisky, had a grand total of 13 college starts. One college scouting director told me he believes Clemson’s Deshaun Watson is a year away from being ready to play, and Notre Dame’s DeShone Kizer is two years from that. And Cal’s Davis Webb and Texas Tech’s Patrick Mahomes come from an Air Raid style of offense that has made the NFL transition complicated for others (see: Jared Goff, Robert Griffin).

On the flip side, UCLA’s Josh Rosen, USC’s Sam Darnold and Wyoming’s Josh Allen have flashed top-of-the-draft potential, and all of them come from pro-style offenses and will have multiple years as starters under their belts in the spring of 2018. And on paper, it makes sense, and there will be teams that will determine there’s not a franchise guy in this year’s group, and that there will probably be more than one next year. Yup. Sounds great.

But the guys I talked to emphasized the risk in that sort of approach. “Sure, if you have job security and your owner is on board,” said an AFC exec. “You better make sure what you’re waiting for is worth it, though. This time last year, everyone would’ve said ‘Tank for Watson.’ Now, not so much. So you gotta make sure what you’re passing up isn’t gonna bite you in the ass. No one would’ve said ‘Tank for (Carson) Wentz’ a year ahead of time. Nobody even knew about the North Carolina kid last year. … If you find Andrew Luck in college football, yes, tank for him. But you better make sure you get him. It’d suck to be Washington and get the second guy.” The Redskins, you’ll remember passed on QBs in 2010 and ’11, then were one pick shy of Luck in ’12, winding up with Robert Griffin instead. (They did OK in the fourth round that year). “I’d say no on Rosen (there are off-field questions, in addition to a nerve issue he fought last year),” said the college scouting director who called Kizer and Watson projects. “Darnold, I like a lot, but needs to repeat that this year. He wasn’t good enough to start the season at USC—Why? And Josh (Allen) needs to make a lot of strides to be considered a top guy. He’s talented, but not accurate.”

Bottom line: Waiting is a dice roll, albeit one that could pay off big, and there aren’t many decision-makers who have the kind of job security to go through with it. That said, all those guys also are aware that getting it wrong in a pothole-ridden year for QBs like this one is just another route to the unemployment line.

http://mmqb.si.com/mmqb/2017/02/16/j...gm-career-path