INDIANAPOLIS — The Lions keep telling us they’re not ready.
The quarterbacks, that is.
Yet in saying that, Brad Holmes & Co. might be telling us they actually are ready to draft one this spring, though this year’s class of quarterbacks isn’t exactly throwing off a lot of can’t-miss vibes.
Jared Goff is unquestionably the Lions’ starter for 2021, and maybe for some time to come, considering he’s only 27 and under contract for three more years.
But if the Lions are serious about finding a franchise quarterback to grow on their own, don’t expect them to wait too long.
Because the one thing they readily admit — and the reality so many NFL teams are facing these days — is that even the most talented young quarterbacks take time to develop. And they probably could use a professional apprenticeship.
That was true back when Tom Brady and Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers came into the league. Or for Patrick Mahomes in Kansas City more recently. And it’s even more imperative today, given how many quarterbacks run RPO-heavy offenses in college and face a steep learning curve transitioning to the pro game, where you’re asked to understand all the protections and make full-field progression reads, play after play.
There are exceptions to every rule, of course. Justin Herbert’s early success with the Chargers certainly is one. Kyler Murray’s in Arizona is another. But the other side of the ledger is weighed down by examples that run the gamut, from Marcus Mariota to Dwayne Haskins to Sam Darnold and so on. Justin Fields, a player many Lions fans were clamoring for in last year’s draft, probably had no business starting for the Bears last season, which explains why he led the league in sack percentage and interception rate as a rookie.
“We ask them to do so much: That’s why there’s always this time factor,” said new Denver Broncos head coach Nathaniel Hackett, who spent the last two years as Green Bay’s offensive coordinator drawing up plays for Rodgers while developing a first-round understudy in Jordan Love.
“You want as much time as you can (as a young quarterback), so that you can learn and can be comfortable. You try to do your best to kind of anticipate what they’re going to be, and then it’s about them growing into it. But it’s just one of those never-ending sagas that we all have on how to find a great quarterback.”
So the moral of the story, perhaps, is this: If you’re drafting a quarterback, you better be ready to protect him. (The Lions are in a good position there with the offensive line they’ve built, and the run game that should follow.) And you absolutely need to have plenty of patience, along with a detailed plan, whether you're taking a quarterback at No. 2 or on Day 2
"I don't think there's a harder position in professional sports to develop than the quarterback position,” said Ben Johnson, the Lions’ new offensive coordinator. “And if you draft a guy, especially this day and age, they need so many more reps than they used to.”
And those are hard to find, whether it’s game action in a shortened NFL preseason or live reps on the practice field, where the starters take most of the No. 1 snaps, leaving the backups to fight over the scraps.
“I think there are ways that you can set up practice so that there are meaningful, valuable reps where a guy is still improving and getting better, and not necessarily forcing him into game action when he may not be ready yet,” Johnson added. “That's something we've gotta look at and talk about if we go down that road.”
But will they?
The Lions’ never-ending saga took an unexpected turn last year, with Matthew Stafford asking for a trade and then leading the Los Angeles Rams to a Super Bowl title, while Goff landed in the middle of a roster rebuild in Detroit.
The way Goff finished up the 2021 campaign, posting a 101.8 passer rating over his final six starts, “was encouraging,” according to Holmes, who was a strong advocate for the Rams’ trade up to land Goff at the top of the 2016 draft. But that shouldn't preclude them from looking for something better.
The question now is whether there’s anything in this draft class that qualifies. None of the top half-dozen quarterback prospects are projected to go in the first 10 picks this year, something that’s happened only once since 2000. (The other time was in 2013, when E.J. Manuel went 16th overall as the first quarterback.)
Pitt’s Kenny Pickett is the most NFL-ready quarterback in the group. Desmond Ridder (Cincinnati) and Matt Corral (Mississippi) have some traits that project well at the next level. But Liberty’s Malik Willis, a freakish athlete with a live arm, might be the most intriguing prospect for a team like the Lions, who got an up-close look at most of these QBs while coaching the Senior Bowl last month.
“If you're going to take a ‘flier’ on a quarterback at the bottom of the first round, I sure as heck would like to have a big payoff at least as a possibility,” NFL Network draft analyst Daniel Jeremiah said. “He's that guy. When you look at the quarterbacks in this draft, he's the one with all that upside.
“I think you could look at some of the other guys and say, okay, they've got a chance to be starters, but I don't know that anybody is saying they've got a chance to be high-end starters.”
They’ve heard that a lot by now, all of them.
“I think this quarterback class just gets a lot of crap that they don’t deserve,” Nevada’s Carson Strong said Wednesday. “Just because there’s not a Trevor Lawrence or a guy who’s supposed to be the No. 1 pick, like an Andrew Luck-type where he’s been the No. 1 kid since high school … Maybe I’m biased because I’m in it. But I think there’s a lot of guys who have a ton of potential to be really good in the league.”
At least they’re keeping a sense of humor about everything. Willis fielded a question Wednesday about whether he should be the first quarterback selected, and he deadpanned: “I think so, but I don’t make that decision. … I hate that for me.”
Pickett said he’ll run the 40-yard dash here in Indianapolis — Willis is waiting until his pro day, by the way — but Pitt’s QB was busy tempering expectations.
“I won’t be breaking any records, let me say that,” he said, smiling.
North Carolina's Sam Howell, meanwhile, said the first thing the Eagles’ reps asked him to do in one of the 18-minute interviews players are shuttling through at the combine was shoot baskets at a mini-hoop.
“I only made like two out of five,” Howell laughed, “so I’m probably not high up on their board.”
Who knows where any of them will rate on the board that'll be set in Allen Park come April. But while the Lions decide when to shoot their shot, they should know the clock is running.
