Gun Slinger or Huge Bust

Mark Sanchez

The NFL combine was conducted over this past weekend at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. The NFL combine is basicly a meat market for the top college players who intend to be drafted in the upcoming NFL draft. At the combine players are test, measured and timed in the 40 yard dash, bench press, vertical jump, board jump and have to take an IQ test. NFL teams also have a chance to personally interview some of the players that they are thinking about drafting and see if they would be a good fit for their organization. So this has got me thinking how often does a top rated high school recruit end up becoming a 1^st round NFL pick? To make it easy I thought that look at position that is the most scrutinized on the field, quarterback. For a sample size I have used the top three rated quarterbacks by scouts.com from the classes of 2002 through 2009. In this group of 21 one time elite high school gunslingers there was only ONE Heisman Trophy winner, four national champions (of the four one of them was a backup) and so far four 1^st round picks. None of them have yet to win a Super Bowl. What was surprising was that six out of the twenty one transferred during their college career. Two were kicked off the team for off field legal issues, one left because of a coaching change and one because of a Mormon mission, the last two were not getting the playing time that they had expected to have. The most shocking number is that only three of them have had success in their pro careers. Even if we take out the three guys that have not taken a snap in the NFL, 3 out of 18 is still not a great number. The four are Vince Young, Tim Tebow, Mark Sanchez and Matthew Stafford

Tim Tebow

Vince Young did have a very successful college career, winning a national championship with Texas and becoming a 1^st round pick of the Tennessee Titans. Young did have some success in the NFL before he had some personal issues; right now it seems to have gotten his life back on track and is the back up for the Philadelphia Eagles. Ok so Vince Young has not had the best career but I think he has still brought the minimum to qualify as a good pick. Tim Tebow on the other hand did everything that a college quarter back dreams of, he won two national championships at Florida and was the first sophomore to win a Heisman Trophy. He would go on to being the 1^st round pick of the Denver Broncos and lead them to a playoff win in his first season as a starter. Unless you were living under a rock or not from North America then you probably heard how Timmy Tebow keeps on winning even though he doesn’t have the mechanics of an elite QB or that he is just an athlete in charge of a high school offense. Matthew Stafford had a pretty good career at Georgia and would a 1^st round pick of the Detroit Lions, with the Lions he has been part of the great turn around they had this past season. This leads us to our third “successful” quarterback Mark Sanchez, he was the leader of an elite program at USC and would become the first round pick of the New York Jets. He has probably had the most successful NFL career of these three so far. Most of the other guys in the group of 21 have been practice squad players, NFL backups or Arena Football League players. Trent Edwards who was the number two qb behind Vince Young in 2002 would go on to Stanford and has started a handful of games in the NFL but has mostly been known as a back up. Mitch Mustain was the number one QB in the class of  2006 ahead of Stafford and Tebow, he would be named the starter at Arkansas as a true freshman and looked like he was going to have a great college career. After his freshman year Arkansas coach Houston Nutt left and there for Mustain transferred to USC were he never started a game. Granted USC at point or another he sat behind John David Booty, Mark Sanchez, Matt Barkley and Aaron Corp. Mustain right now is playing minor league baseball in the Chicago White Sox organization. Aaron Corp who in a similar situation as Mustain, being behind Matt Barkley, has transferred to Div. 1 AA school Richmond.

Joe Flacco

            We have just taken a look at the quarterbacks that coming out of high school were the best of the best but we can also take a look at the guys who at 18 were not the best but where still adequate enough to receive a NCAA DIV. 1 A scholarship and what they ended up doing with their careers. Heisman Trophy winner Troy Smith was number 15 and has mostly been a backup in the NFL, and arguably the biggest bust since Ryan Leaf, Jamarcus Russell was number four in 2003. Also in 2003 Joe Flacco and Matt Ryan were back to back at 43 and 44 with both of them being 1^st round picks. Andy Dalton was the 73^rd recruit in 2006 and was drafted out of TCU in the 2nd round last year, 2006 was the senior year for Case Keenum who basically owns every career passing record in college football and is projected to be a mid round drafted was not even rated. 

            Taking a look at this years draft class none of them were among the top three recruits in their high school recruiting class, like I mentioned before Keenum was 73 on’06 Kellen Moore was 26 in 2007, also part of the ’07 class was Nick Foles 52, Ryan Tannehill 58. The top two signal callers in this years draft Andrew Luck was 7 and Robert Griffen III was 12. So can we predict which guys will be the next Dan Marino, Payton Manning or Tom Brady and who will be a Ryan Leaf or Jamarcus Russell. Odds are pretty good that none of them will be a total bust, of course there is a chance that one or two of them will be a mid or late round pick that will bounce around from team to team as a back up and spend some time on the practice squad before they move on to the Arena League., but having those prediction are for another blog post.