Carolina Panthers: 3 2020 NFL Draft QB prospects to replace Cam Newton
By Randy Gurzi
2. Cole McDonald, Hawai’i
Sure, the idea here is that Matt Rhule might want someone to start right away to replace Cam Newton. But what if he decides that he wants to continue to see what Kyle Allen and Will Grier have. Or what if he wants to land a bridge quarterback such as Andy Dalton in free agency and groom a player he thinks can be special with the right kind of coaching.
Should Rhule and the Panthers want to go that route, they could look to Hawai’i’s Cole McDonald in the mid-to-late rounds of the 2020 NFL Draft. He’s a name that hardly gets any attention and a lot of that has to do with where he played. The Rainbow Warriors aren’t exactly a hotbed for NFL talent and they don’t send quarterbacks to the league very often.
However, McDonald could be well worth a mid-round flier as a guy to work with. He could push Will Grier and Kyle Allen and his ceiling makes the risk well worth it. McDonald has a rocket for an arm and is able to thread the ball into tight windows.
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While he is able to hit on deep passes with ease, it’s the short-to-intermediate throws that hurt McDonald’s stock. But he does have some mechanical issues that could be cleaned up that might really help in this area.
In the end, this is a boom or bust pick in the 2020 NFL Draft and he could do better on a team not needing a quarterback right away. Still, it’s fun to think about what a team with D.J. Moore and Curtis Samuel could look like with a quarterback that can throw it deep — especially given the room that can be created with the play-action off Christian McCaffrey‘s running game.