Deshaun Watson Represents new Era of Quarterback Prospects

Deshaun Watson has moved into the No. 1 slot of my quarterback prospects. He is sure to become a franchise quarterback someday.

Finding a franchise quarterback in the draft is getting harder to do every year. It was easier when your top prospects ran pro style offenses but the spread offense has taken over college football. And many of those guys get downgraded because of it.

Scouts want to see quarterbacks throw down the field into tight windows and with anticipation. They want to know if the quarterback is smart enough to read defenses. That way, he can get his team into the right play and change protections.

But less and less quarterbacks are doing so in the spread offenses with dummy cards for playbooks. For goodness sakes, they don’t even have verbiage in their offense. And to change the play, the offense looks back at the coach on the sidelines.

So the field-general part of being a quarterback is taken away from them in college. Then there’s the running element of the spread offense that values speed and quickness at the position. So oftentimes, these colleges are using undersized quarterbacks.

Meanwhile, pro scouts are putting too much emphasis on size and arm strength. Don’t get me wrong here, I know a pencil necked quarterback won’t make it through an NFL season. And a quarterback with no arm can’t play past October because of the weather.

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But in this new era of quarterback prospects, we need to change the way we evaluate them. Pro style offense or not, he has much to learn so more emphasis should be put on desire and intelligence. How fast a quarterback can learn and process information is golden.

Poise is also important but the most important thing for a quarterback is mental toughness. There will be struggles so you have to be mentally tough to see it through. The old-school evaluation is why Dak Prescott ended up going in Round 4 in 2016.

The NFL got it right with Cam Newton, who came from the spread to become an NFL MVP last year. Derek Carr had two years in a pro style offense but also came from the spread. Alex Smith has become a solid quarterback and Marcus Mariota is on the way to stardom.

So I got out of old-school mode to see that Deshaun Watson is the best quarterback prospect in this draft. He has great arm talent and at 6’2″, 210 pounds, he has average size. And be it that he graduated in three years, he has the mind to learn things very quickly.

In the National Championship Game against Alabama, he showed his mental toughness. He threw accurate passes from the pocket knowing he was going to get crushed.The way he stayed with it when things didn’t start out so well was another part of his mental toughness.

Then of course, the poise he showed to pull out the victory at the end says it all. Watson has his flaws like staring down targets but he’s a gamer that you can teach. Put that together with is mobility and you have my new No. 1 quarterback prospect.

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