NFL Draft Open Thread: Any Team That Spends A High Pick on Josh Allen is Completely Incompetent Edition

Above: if you like Christian Hackenberg you’ll love Josh Allen

It’s surreal watching draft mavens try to claim that Josh Allen might be the best prospect in the draft because he’s a tall white guy with a strong white arm white. Rodger Sherman:

I keep waiting for the joke to end—for NFL draft analysts to collectively say “Gotcha!” and for all of us to laugh about the time they really convinced everyone that Wyoming’s Josh Allen could be the no. 1 overall pick. But now we’re a day out from the draft, and a player who was not on any list of the top quarterbacks in college football is still considered by some to be the most sought-after prospect in the sport.

Don’t get me wrong: I have nothing against players from small schools. Quite the opposite, in fact: I love when amazing players lift up programs that are typically out of the spotlight. You think college fans like watching Alabama win every year? Hell no, man. What makes the sport great is its endless variety—130 FBS teams doing ridiculous things to succeed.

It is impossible to find a stat that makes Allen look good. SB Nation’s Jason Kirk wrote a full rundown recently, and the results are brutal. Allen’s 2017 completion percentage was 56.3; as Football Outsiders notes, the most successful quarterback since 2005 who was taken within a draft’s first 100 picks and posted a final-year college completion percentage below 58 is Jake Locker. In QBASE, an advanced stat, Allen scored below zero, giving him a ceiling of “Josh McCown or Brian Griese.” Bill Connelly’s success rate stat gives Allen a ceiling of Ryan Mallett. Wyoming’s passing S&P+ during Allen’s senior year was 119th of 130 FBS teams; that would be the lowest of any player ever drafted in the top 100 picks.

Allen throws passes off target more than any recent top QB prospect, with DeShone Kizer and Christian Hackenberg not far behind. The other top 2018 quarterback prospects all have passer ratings under pressure well above the FBS average; Allen’s is well below that mark. He is the worst quarterback in the draft on short throws, medium throws, and long throws. He throws more interceptable passes than any other prospect in this class. And it isn’t his receivers’ fault, either—they dropped fewer passes than the receivers of any other heralded 2018 draft QB.

After watching the tape, I don’t get it. Allen misses so many easy throws! He throws it to places where there are no targets whatsoever! The only player I’ve seen miss throws like this is Hackenberg—whose ugly college stats were also blamed on poor teammates—and well, I have plenty of receipts on that.

I don’t get it. I don’t get it! I understand that Allen is tall and strong. But why is being strong more valuable for a quarterback than being able to throw a football to a teammate? Are we really supposed to believe that being bad at throwing is fixable, but other quarterbacks’ arm strengths are locked firmly into place? I don’t get why teams are considering Allen as a Day 2 pick, let alone a first-round pick, let alone the first quarterback taken, let alone the firstoverallplayer on the board. Isn’t that a huge, ridiculous risk, especially when there are more proven options available?

Look, because of the large gap in competition between the pros and peonage ball the data that correlated with NFL performance — completion percentage, level of competition, and starts — are going to produce a lot of false positives. I w0uld definitely take Mayfield #1 if it was my pick but if your team’s scouts prefer Jackson or Rosen or Darnold that’s not unreasonable; scouting matters a lot once a player has established NFL potential. But they generally don’t produce false negatives. Nobody with performance with anything Allen’s has turned into a good NFL QB, let alone a great one. As for the wind in Wyoming, his dreadful performances against Iowa and Boisie State were on the road, and if you can’t move the ball at all against the 2017 Oregon Ducks unless you’re playing in a monsoon you’re not a top NFL prospect.  When scouts have projected players who weren’t effective in the NCAA would be good in the NFL because they were tall white guys with strong arms they’ve always been wrong. It’s not impossible that Allen will be the exception, but it would be dumb to spend a first round pick on the chances and insane to spend a top 10 one.  Arm strength is nice, but it’s neither necessary nor sufficient. Watch Tom Brady lately? Indeed, as Paul has observed this is the part of the Tom Brady story that generally gets ignored, the Drew Henson part. Brady was actually a very effective NCAA QB who was outstanding against Alabama in the Orange Bowl, only he never had a firm hold on the job because of Henson, who managed to convinced multiple organizations in two different sports he was capable of being a top-quality player against all evidence because he was a great athlete. (I happened to watch Henson’s only career NFL start for Dallas, and in every reaction shot Parcells looked like Nicky Santuro was squeezing his balls in his vice. It wasn’t even anger so much as intense pain about what this chud was doing to the sport he loved. But he was a tall white guy with a strong arm!)

And the idea that Mayfield should be severely discounted because is the same thing. Haven’t we seen Russell Wilson make assholes out of the organizations who picked punters and Brandon Weedens ahead of him? Haven’t we just seen Drew Brees finish his 14th season of elite NFL performance? (Think about that for a second. Peyton had 15. Marino 12-14 depending how generous you want to be. Maybe BUT CAN HE SEE OVER HIS LINEMAN isn’t quite as important a variable as we learned to think once a player has proven he can preform at an elite level.) You can reasonably rank him below one of the other legitimate prospects, but the idea that he’s not a top prospect because of his height is silly.

Tanier’s preview also has a lot of good stuff in it. One reason this draft is interesting is that QB aside the best prospects tend to be at low leverage positions, which means that smart organizations may play it a little differently than usual. I wouldn’t take Barkley #2 for the reasons Barnwell explains— if I thought the Giants could seriously contend the next two years with Eli I might, but I don’t — but picking him before any wideout or offensive lineman in this particular draft wouldn’t be outrageous.

And, finally, my NHL picks are Vegas in 7, Nashville in 7 in what should be a phenomenal series, Tampa in 6, and (alas) Pittsburgh in 6. Berube has the Pens in 6, Bolts in 5.