Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - April 2, 2019 - QB Tuesday

Episode Date: April 2, 2019

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Hey there everybody, welcome on in to a Tape Tuesday installment of the Lockdown Patriots podcast. Mark Schofield back here in the big chair for today, Tuesday, April 2nd, 2019. I hope you survived April Fool's Day. April Fool's Day has now become a day for brands to do their whole little tweeting thing. For example, the Tennis U.S. Open put out a tweet that they're hiring puppies to be ball puppies with a picture of, I believe, a corgi chasing down a ball right near their net, which was kind of humorous. You had the Tampa Bay Buccaneers saying that Mike Evans has made the decision to play defensive back.

Kind of a humorous treat. And, of course, you had Tom Brady. Now Tom Brady has sort of limited his social media exposure to Instagram and Facebook. We all know the Alligator Times post that he puts on Facebook after games. Of course we all remember the Instagram post of him and Gronk after the AFC Championship game. We ain't going nowhere. But he joined Twitter on April Fool's Day to announce that he's retiring in his spare time, that he's going to be tweeting. Of course, it was a joke, touched off a whole bunch of memes and stuff like that.

Brady got like 80,000 followers in like 15 minutes. It was crazy. But if you're here, you survived it. You probably saw that that was a joke. But hey, you know, April Fool's Day came and went. We all sort of move on. What we gonna do today today is tape tuesday we're gonna dedicate it to the quarterback position i know you get bored of hearing me talking about quarterbacks but it's what i do i'm gonna make the case for one quarterback in this draft i'm gonna have my scheme fits my ideal scheme situations for the top 10 guys on my quarterback board, and we're going to have some fun with it. Before we do anything, though, a reminder to follow me on Twitter, at Mark Schofield.

Check out the work at places like InsideThePylon.com, Pro Football Weekly, The Score, Matt Waldman's Rookie Scouting Portfolio. By the way, the Matt Waldman RSP is now available. Check that out, MattWaldmanRSP.com. Also, the trio of SB Nation websites Big Blue View Bleeding Green Nation where I co-host the QB Show with Michael J Kist and of course Pat's Pulpit gonna have pieces for all of those sites pods for all of those sites out this week let's start though with a tweet it's a tweet that went out on Sunday morning, I believe. Maybe it was

Saturday night. I responded to it on Sunday morning. And for those of you that do spend time on the venerable Twitter machine, you've probably realized that as we get closer and closer to the draft, football Twitter, more specifically perhaps draft Twitter, takes on a very dystopian Mad Max vibe. It's pretty much every person for themselves. Every man, every woman, every child for themselves. They're like packs of tribes, so to speak, ready to pick off somebody that has an outlandish take.

So football Twitter can be a little tough in this time of the calendar. But every once in a while, a tweet sort of breaks through that I want to respond to. And that tweet this weekend, either Saturday night or Sunday morning, was Luke Easterlin from the DraftWire who put out a series of tweets, but the one I wanted to talk about was

what player would you bang the table for? That's, you know, scout speak for which guy, if you were in a team's wall room, would you say, look, I don't care, this is the guy to draft. And I responded with, of course, Brett Rippon. Now, it would be hard for me to sort of stand on the table and make the case for my guy on the top of my quarterback board because, look,

it's Kyler Murray. It's hard to say that, oh, the guy that I would ban the table for and be outside of the box on will be the guy that's going to get drafted first overall. But Brett Rippon is a different case. Brett Rippon might not get drafted. Again, we've talked about how there is that chasm between how I view him and others on the outside view him and how those on the inside view Brett Rippon, the Russell Lans, the Greg Gabriels, the NFL itself perhaps. And so I'm very curious to see where he stands. But I made the case for Brett Rippin.

Got mostly positive feedback. There was one of the dear, dear listeners to the show. Basically said, look, when you fall, you fall hard. Of course you were going to say him. Not going to name any names. Happens to be a realtor from north of the border. She knows who she is. All in good fun, of course.

But yeah, I'm going to make the case for brett rippin and i wrote up a piece for matt waldem inside it might be up by the time you listen into this it might not be where i talked about why i would bang the table for brett rippin and there's an easy answer to that which we'll get to sort of a oh yeah, well, what about this kind of reason? But as far as the pure trait-based analysis goes, look, I've said it. Rippon is a refined, experienced passer in a class that is lacking that kind of guy, okay? Yeah, you've got guys near the board that are near the top of the board that are better quarterbacks, perhaps. Might have a higher ceiling, perhaps. But Rippon is the guy that can do the little things, the little things that

matter. For example, evaluating quarterbacks, evaluating other players, other positions, for example. It's a snap to finish discussion. The ball is snapped. You see what they do. You watch them through the end of the play. Snap to whistle. Quarterbacks, it's different. Your analysis has to begin at the line of scrimmage. How active are they in the pre-snap phase of the play? If they are active, is it on their own initiative or is it coming from the sideline? Now, for a guy like Dwayne Haskins, he can do a little bit of both. Sometimes it comes from the sideline. Sometimes it doesn't. For other quarterbacks, yeah, they're looking to the sideline to get assistance. For Rippon, it's all on his own initiative.

And you might say, look, that doesn't matter anymore. You got the radio headsets. Coaches are talking to the quarterback all the time. And I would invite you, friend of the show, to re-watch Super Bowl 53. Because you had Sean McVay getting the team to the line of scrimmage so he could use every second on that radio headset play clock situation where he can talk to Jared Goff until 15 seconds left on the play clock. So he gets them to the line of scrimmage. He says, okay, they're in cover two right now. Remember, these are your keys on this play.

What did the Patriots do? They gave two defensive play calls on the huddle. When that 15-second mark hit, they adjusted, and now Jared Goff is on his own. So as a quarterback, you have to be able to do this stuff on your own. You're not going to always have that help. And the Rams put up three points in the Super Bowl, one of the highest-scoring offenses in the league. And so Goff's, I mean, excuse me, Ripon's ability at the line of scrimmage matters to me,

and it should matter to NFL coaches. It should matter to you when you do your scouting. So his ability at the line of scrimmage is huge. His accuracy to all levels, I am a fan of that. I charted out a number of his games by ball placement to exact yardage distance sideline with vertically horizontally all that stuff very impressive to all levels of the field matt waldman did a video on his accuracy and says it might be flawed in spots but it's fixable so he's not concerned about it i think he's a very good very accurate passer to all levels of the field short intermediate deep boundary he checks those boxes for me i've talked about manipulation with him you have to move defenders with your eyes brett ripping can do it he's incorporated now the ability to do it with his full body as well

so he checks that box for me his ability to hand in the pocket stare down the gun barrel when you know you're going to get hit he He's not an overly athletic quarterback. I'll get into some weaknesses in a second. Not an overly athletic guy, so he's not going to escape and extend like, say, a Kyler Murray or even some of the lesser athletic guys in this class. But he will stare down the gun, hand in the pocket, take the hit that he knows is coming, and that's a huge thing for me. I'll get to my little trump card on

him in a second weaknesses look there's a quicksand issue sometimes it takes a while to sort of rebound for mistakes he will make some bad mistakes at times sometimes it's a potential arm strength issue which we'll talk about in a second sometimes it's staring down routes he does need to get better at moving his eyes even though though he's very good at it. He could still be better. There's a size issue. Lance Zerline over at NFL.com says that he measured in an undersized for the quarterback position. He has the nine-inch hands. Sometimes it matters.

You go back to his film, you see some fumbles in the pocket. You see some ball exchange issues. You look at weather games. His game against Fresno State in the Mountain West Championship game, cold, wet, snowy, seemed to struggle a bit at times. So that might be an issue for him. And the Armstead question I think is settled, but NFL teams might still be wary. I think he's got the velocity to make the throws you need to make in the NFL. In the piece I did for Matt Waldman's site,

I highlighted a throw against UConn, throws it from the minus 46 left hash to the plus 25 right hash. So it's 25 plus, excuse me, to the right boundary. So it's 25 plus in terms of yardage, but you're going left hash to right sideline. That deep out that NFL coaches want to see. Can you drive that ball on the deep out 20 plus? He does it. But there are times when he puts more touch on throws and so even though he hits 59 miles per hour on the gun maybe he doesn't check that box and so there are some weaknesses to him he's not a perfect prospect but this class is lacking a perfect prospect at the quarterback position he's the refined guy but here's the ultimate trump card on him

when you get into that sort of bang the Tambo range, you're talking like second round, third round, fourth round. The value aspect to drafting Brett Rippett in, say, the fourth as opposed to a Jarrett Stidham or Will Greer in, say, the second? Worlds apart.

And if you are, say, the New England Patriots, and you are looking at, say, your draft board, the picks that you have available to you. I'm looking at Tankathon right now. Sometimes the numbers are off between different sites, but Tankathon has them, the pick at 32, 56

and 64 in the second, 74, 98, 102 in the third, and 135 in the fourth. If you're telling me Will Greer or Jared Stidham at 56 and 64, or Brett Rippon at 135, and then you can get an Irv Smith at 56, or a Charles O'Meana who at 64 and an Irv Smith at 56, and then you get Rippon at 135. Stidham and Greer might have slightly higher ceilings than Rippon, but I love Rippon's floor, and I love his fit in New England's offense. And so it's that little value trump card that

I think Rippon has. And some people might even think that 135 is too rich for him. But that even strengthens my case. Because if you could get Brett Rippon at 135 or later, think of what you can do with picks at 56, 64, 74, 98. So even if you don't particularly like Brett Rippon as a prospect, the value thing works in his favor. And so you put that together.

That's the reason why, yeah, look, I'd be happy if the Patriots drafted him at any point in this draft, other than 32 overall. But if you start getting into that 74-98, 102-135 range, I'm going to start saying, look, if I'm in that room, Brett Rippon is here.

Brett Rippon is here. Just making sure the coach is aware. It's like that scene from The Rock at the end when they're coming up on the deadline and one of the mercenaries is telling Hummel, just making sure the commander is aware of the time. Sir, I'm going to be like that

voice in the air. Brett Rippon's still on the board. And so, that's why I'd ban the table for him. He checks a lot of boxes for me and then there's the value issue. Up next, we're going to work through some more quarterback stuff. We're going to be talking scheme fits for my top 10. It's going to be a fun day here. I know you're excited to talk quarterbacks here.

That's up next here on Locked on Patriots. Mark Schofield back with you now on this Tape Tuesday installment of the Locked on Patriots podcast. And what we're going to do now is sort of get into a series I'm working on for the fine men and women over at Pro Football Weekly, where I give you my best land and fits, land and spot scheme fits, kind of jarbled that one,

for my top 10 quarterbacks. And my top 10 will be different than most top 10s, but hey, my top 10, my top show, my land and spots, my scheme fits. So here we go. We're going to start with the bottom five. We're going to start with Gardner Minshew, who's QB 10 for me. People listening to the show, reading my work know that I got a little bit of a soft spot for Gardner Minshew.

I think there's some things he needs to work out, but I'm kind of a fan of his game, kind of a fan of his footwork and approach. And also, the air raid system is more and more a part of today's NFL offenses. Every team's got a mesh concept. Every team's got some variation of why cross. And so gone are the days where you're looking at an air raid quarterback and wondering, how is that going to work in the NFL? Most teams are running stuff that he's run. And Minshew is no exception. And looking at him, I keep looking at the Philadelphia Eagles. And you might wonder, well, that doesn't really make sense.

They've got two guys. And they do. They have Carson Wentz coming back. They have Nick Sudfeld, who they value somewhat highly. They put a second-round tender on him. That's going to scare some teams away. But when I see Minshew, I see him running a lot of stuff that Peterson is doing air raid wise. Yes, you have Carson Wentz, but he's coming back from an injury. Yes, you have Sudfeld, but he was a late round pick type guy. They signed him off the street

from Washington from their practice squad. They do like him, but I think it's a situation where we've seen them carry three quarterbacks before. I think Minshew would be a fit in their offense. I think it would be a very good landing spot for him in terms of getting a chance to learn the system, get into Peterson's offense, be a backstop practice squad type guy, and sort of develop. And so there you go. Gardner Minshew, Philadelphia Eagles. Next, Ryan Finley, NC State. Listeners to the show probably know where I'm going. The New England Patriots. I think he fits with what the Patriots value at the quarterback position in terms of the mental aspect of the game, the timing and rhythm-based offense. I think that makes a ton of sense as a fit and a landing spot for him.

It would be a situation where he wouldn't have to play right away. Now, that might be an issue. Some of you have already said, ah, he's 24. He's an older quarterback. Maybe that is something to consider, but he checks a lot of the boxes that the Patriots seem to value when they evaluate quarterbacks. I love his fit in a time and rhythm based offense, which is basically what New England's offense is built around. And so it makes sense to me. Ryan Finley, New England Patriots. Tyree Jackson, QB 8 for me. And I go back and forth with Jackson and Stidham. I mean, I went back and forth with Jackson and Stidham.

I ended up Stidham 7, Jackson 8. Part of it is that lower body mechanical issue and the mechanical inconsistencies and my hesitancy about him getting all of that cleaned up. But I do think there is a perfect landing spot for him, and that's Carolina. Let's put it this way. You've got a quarterback who is tall, great size, big, athletic, can deliver throws with impressive velocity to all levels of the field solely with his arm,

but also uses his shoulders and upper body to generate impressive torque as a passer, somebody who might be best in a vertical passing game that also incorporates his ability to make plays with his legs. Am I describing Cam Newton or Tyree Jackson? You probably can't tell with the way I phrased it.

And that's why I think this is a perfect fit. Cam Newton, I still am a member of Cam Newton Nation. Big fan of his as a quarterback. But he's battling injuries. He's coming off the shoulder issue. You don't quite know if he's going to come all the way back. They might want to get themselves a backup option at the quarterback position.

And I think Tyree Jackson could be that guy. They are somewhat similar in how they play the position. And North Turner hasn't solved, yes, his sort of vertical-based pass and attack, but he's incorporated some spread, some RPO-type stuff off of it. I think it would be a tremendous landing spot for Tyree Jackson, who I think would work best in an offense that's a spread-Corey-El-type system. I think it makes a ton of sense. And look, are you putting all your eggs in Taylor Haneke or Kyle Allen? Allen had a great

game at the end of the season. Yeah, but I don't know. We read too much into that. If you're Carolina, are you putting all those eggs in those kinds of baskets? I'm not so sure. And so from where I sit, I think Tyree Jackson in Carolina, behind Cam Newton, similar play styles, similar types of quarterbacks, I think that makes a ton of sense. So next is Stidham. And Stidham is a difficult one to come up with. I went back and forth on a number of different places. I almost thought about, look, ideally for him, San Francisco, because he looked so great,

so great at the Senior Bowl in Kyle Shanahan's offense, and talking to him about it seemed so happy in that system. But I don't know if they're going to address quarterback here because they've got Garoppolo coming back, they've got Nick Mullins, they've got C.J. Beathard.

Probably not going to go quarterback. So I'm going to go Atlanta, and this might be an interesting one to think about, but they just hired Dirk Cutter, more of a vertical-based passing guy, but he showed some flexibility and the ability to incorporate a bunch of different concepts into the offense, some West Coast stuff, some air raid stuff. And I think with Stidham, again, it's a difficult thing to peg because he was in Baylor's

offense and then he was running Mel Zahn's. But I think if you look at him from a trait-based perspective, I think you can find a quarterback that is fairly scheme diverse. And you look at a situation where Atlanta, yeah, they got Matt Ryan, but maybe they want to think about a guy to develop just in case. I think Stidham in Atlanta makes a lot of sense.

I think it would be a good scheme fit for him. And finally, Daniel Jones. Daniel Jones is QB6 for me. That's going to be lower than most boards, I think. That's going to be lower than most boards, I think. That's going to be lower than where he goes. I anticipate him going, worst case scenario for him, early second round, far more likely he comes off the board in the first. I'm just lower on him than the rest.

And again, that's fine. You might be a huge Daniel Jones fan. That's totally fine. Quarterback rankings, they are subjective in nature. People value different things at the position. And so it's totally fine. Now for me, I view him as very much a West Coast quarterback. And so I look at the landscape right now. I look at the Oakland Raiders and say, if they want to hedge you a little bit on Carr, and if, for example, Daniel Jones somehow gets out of the first round,

it might be a situation where the Raiders could make a grab at him. And maybe even, not even do it at 35, they've got three first round picks. And so if you're the Raiders and you're a little wary and you want to hedge, maybe at 27, the pick you got from Dallas in the Amari Cooper trade, maybe at 35, maybe at 24, Chicago, you don't want to go early. You don't want to go Kyler Murray or something like that trade-up with these three picks to go get a guy. But you want to hedge a bit. I think Jones is a

tremendous fit for what Gruden likes to do, the West Coast stuff. And so I think that would make a lot of sense for them. Maybe not, but I think so. It's my show. So there you go. So those are the bottom five. Next we're going to do my top five, the scheme fits for

those guys in the top. There will be one team listed twice. You might know where I'm going. But hey, it's fun. We're having fun here. More on these quarterbacks up next on Locked on Patriots. Mark Sofil back here to close out this quarterback Tuesday here at the Locked on Patriots podcast.

And let's get to the top five here. And there's going to be a little bit of overlap. At least one team is going to be listed twice. It's Locked On Patriots. You probably know where I'm going with it. Let's start with my QB5, Will Greer. And Greer is interesting from sort of a scheme fit perspective because I think he is somewhat scheme diverse.

That offense he ran at West Virginia, that Holdren's offense, obviously got some air raid, some hell mum to it. But back when he was at Florida, it was a little bit more of a conventional pro-style pass and attack with some stuff under center.

I think there's some schematic diversity to him. I'm going to go with Washington. Washington is in a very interesting position right now. Yes, they've acquired Case Keenum. Yes, they have Colt McCoy. There is Alex Smith handing out in the wins. And so I don't think they go quarterback early in this draft, even though you might sort of look at the Alex Smith situation and think,

well, he's not coming back. We can't bank on that. And you might have an argument there. You might look at Case Keenum and say, Case Keenum doesn't quite do it for me. And you might have an argument there. And you might look at the rest of this situation and say, I'm just not sold.

All very good. And so, Greer would make some sense. You don't go quarterback early. You get a guy at, say, 46. I think that would be a good little spot for him. And you've got at least a quarterback that you can evaluate.

I think it would work in Gruden's system. And so we'll go with Will Greer of Washington. And that brings us to my QB for Brett Rippon I started the show talking about him so you know what I'm going to say here the New England Patriots I think it would be a great fit I would ban the table for him start in the third

round I think it makes a ton of sense might just be me though he could literally go undrafted again that gulf on him between how the league views him and how it seems Draft Twitter views him could have me stunned

in a good way or stunned in a bad way. He could come off the board in the third round. I'd say, yeah, it totally makes sense to me. He could not get drafted and be like, well, I guess the league really just did not like him. I guess we'll see. Next is Drew Locke.

Locke might be one of the guys that comes off the board of the top 10. You get why the league likes him. He's got the big arm, can give you the stuff in the vertical passing game. When I look at Locke,

I think there are a number of fits that might make sense, but the one that I think there are a number of fits that might make sense. But the one that I think makes the most sense, and this was one that I think Daniel Jeremiah came up with, was the Los Angeles Chargers. Probably don't need quarterback early. But they could address it at 28 maybe if he's there. And maybe Locke finding his way to the Chargers is not viable.

Because it's not like the Chargers have a ton that they could do to go up and get him. Would 28 and 60 get you into the top 10, top 15? Probably not. 28 and 60 in a future second or future first, would they do that? Maybe not. But if16, a future second or a future first. Would they do that? Maybe not.

But if he could somehow find his way to the Chargers, I think that fit would make sense. They do some stuff in the vertical passing game. We saw that in the divisional round. So I think that would make some sense. Him learning from Phillip Rivers, I think, would make some sense. It would give him a year or so to refine the footwork. I think that would make some sense. And so when it comes to Drew Locke, I like the idea. I think it was Jeremiah, like I said, Drew Locke to learn under Phillip Rivers. Brings us to our top two. Dwayne Haskins, QB2 for me and the Giants. If the Giants aren't going to acquire Rosen, then I think that makes a ton of sense.

Haskins at six. I love Haskins from the mental approach. I love Haskins and his ability to sort of make the reads, do the mental stuff. We need a little bit of help, some weapons around him. Obviously, he would have had more weapons before this trade that sent Odell to Cleveland, but they would still have some weapons around him. You look at this Giants offense right now. You've got Evan Ingram, a player I love. You've got Saquon Barkley, who's had a fantastic start to his career. Sterling Shepard, Golden Tate. There's some pieces that you could put together an offense with. The other thing that I think would really help Haskins is he's your prototypical pocket passer, your battleship type guy. He's going to be learning from a similar guy in Eli Manning. And so I think that would help him as

well. And so when I look at Haskins and an ideal landing spot for him, we go to the New York Giants. And finally, Kyler Murray. And I think the easy one is the obvious one. And that's Arizona at one. As much as I like Josh Rosen, as much as I liked him last year, as much as I still like him after the rookie season he had, you look at what Cliff Kingsbury does on offense, you look at what Kyler Murray has done. I mean, Cliff recruited him. He knows what he can do. We've seen what Murray can do. And if Kingsbury is going to bring his offense to the NFL, Murray is the guy to run it. Sometimes the right answer is the obvious one that's been staring you in the face, I guess. And so since it seems to be trending Kyler Murray at one to Arizona, I think it does

make the most sense. Now, I saw a recent debate about how running quarterbacks maybe aren't the best type of quarterbacks to put behind a patchwork offensive line. It sometimes somewhat challenged my sort of conventional wisdom view that oh if you're worried about your offensive line to get a guy like kyler murray that can live and survive back there maybe that's not the best mode maybe you want a guy that can sort of handle pressure and hand in the pocket more like a ripping than a murray but i still think that murray's athleticism and his escapability is going to keep him in a good situation, even behind a Patrick offensive line.

And so Murray, Arizona, there you go. The 101, I think that's where it's all headed. Speaking of headed, I'm headed out of here. That will do it for today's show. I will be back tomorrow. Until next time, keep it locked right here. To Mark Schofield and Locked on Patreons