NFL Teams That Should Target Developmental QB in 2023 NFL Draft
The NFL is a quarterback-driven league. That's no secret. Sure, it's possible to win a Super Bowl with an average signal-caller. But those years are few and far between.
It's a heck of a lot easier to do with Patrick Mahomes, though.
Of course, not every team has a Patrick Mahomes or Jalen Hurts. There are plenty of teams desperate to upgrade under center. It's likely that four of the top 10 picks in the 2023 draft will be quarterbacks. It's possible that four of the first five will be.
There are teams, though, that don't have a high enough pick to get in on this year's "Fantastic Four" under center. And teams with aging starters that want to add depth and/or a future starter without sacrificing a first pick to get it. And teams that just don't have a first-rounder to work with.
For those teams, the developmental route is the way to go. Sure, those quarterbacks aren't as highly touted. Some will take a while to acclimate to the pros.
But as Hurts, Russell Wilson, Kirk Cousins and Dak Prescott have shown, you can land a plus-starter outside the first day of the draft.
Minnesota Vikings
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The Minnesota Vikings have had stability at quarterback in recent years—for better or worse. Kirk Cousins has been the team's starter for the past five seasons, and as a whole, those seasons have been successful. The Vikings are 13 games over .500 over that span with Cousins on the field, including a 13-4-mark last year.
However, that regular-season success hasn't carried over into the postseason. The Vikings have made the playoffs just twice under Cousins, and the team has won just one playoff game with him leading the way.
Given that reality, and with Cousins headed into the final year of his contract, the drumbeats have grown in the draftnik community for the Vikes to select a successor for Cousins in 2023—potentially as early as Round 1.
For some, that has meant the Vikings going all-in and making a trade up in Round 1. For others like Daniel Jeremiah of the NFL Network, it meant making a play for Tennessee's Hendon Hooker at No. 23.
"The Vikings have been doing their homework on this quarterback class," he said. "Hooker is well-liked around the league, and he could sit for a year behind Kirk Cousins before taking over and ushering in a new era for Kevin O'Connell."
For Hooker, it would be something of a dream landing spot—a playoff-caliber roster with no immediate pressure to start. For the Vikings, it would be a smooth transition from the present to the future.
And for Cousins—well, given what his bank account looks like, it's hard to feel too sorry for him.
Tennessee Titans
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In some respects, the Tennessee Titans are in a similar position as the Minnesota Vikings. Ryan Tannehill has been the team's starter the past four seasons. Over that span, the 34-year-old has won almost twice as many games as he has lost. Tannehill has led the Titans to the playoffs three times, including the AFC Championship Game in 2019.
But the Titans haven't won a playoff game since that first year Tannehill was in Nashville. And with him heading into the final year of his contract and coming off an injury-marred season that was his worst with the team, there was some offseason speculation that Tannehill could be released.
That didn't come to pass. Most in the draft community appear to believe that Tennessee will use its first pick to bolster an offensive line badly in need of reinforcements. And the Titans just used a third-round pick on a developmental quarterback in Malik Willis a year ago.
But in three starts for the Titans last year, Willis was abysmal—he barely completed 50 percent of his passes and didn't throw a touchdown pass. Even if you think Tannehill still has something left in the tank, if last year was any indication, Willis just isn't the guy.
The Titans probably won't take a quarterback in the first round. But depending on how the draft's second day plays out, a pretty compelling argument can be made for drafting a quarterback for the second year in a row.
Las Vegas Raiders
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The times, they-are-a-changing in Las Vegas.
After a nine-year run as the starting quarterback for the Raiders, Derek Carr was sent packing following a disappointing 2022 season. The Raiders brought in Jimmy Garoppolo as their new starter—a move that Bleacher Report's own Brad Gagnon wrote could pay huge dividends.
"In the right offense, with an adept offensive coach capable of utilizing his skill set the way guys like Josh McDaniels and Kyle Shanahan have," Gagnon said, "it's clear Garoppolo has the ability to start for a Super Bowl team."
However, there are certain realities with Garoppolo. He's a good quarterback—maybe even very good. But he isn't great. Durability has also been a sizable issue, with Garoppolo missing at least six games in four of six seasons with the San Francisco 49ers.
Garoppolo is a short-term solution. A stopgap. A bridge starter. And with the Raiders in possession of the seventh overall pick in April's draft, analysts like Ryan Wilson of CBS Sports believes that a player like Kentucky's Will Levis could still be in play.
"Levis spent a lot of time at the combine explaining why the 2022 season went the way it did. In his defense," Wilson wrote, "he was banged up, his offensive line had been decimated, he had a new offensive coordinator and he was working with young wide receivers. And Levis didn't make excuses for any of this when we spoke with him in Indy."
Vegas is the kind of landing spot that Levis needs—a place where he has time to develop and acclimate to the NFL before becoming the face of a franchise.
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Los Angeles Rams
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It wasn't supposed to be like this for the Los Angeles Rams.
At the end of the 2021 season, the Rams lifted the Lombardi Trophy as the champions of Super Bowl LVI. But what came after was arguably the worst season a defending Super Bowl champion has ever had—an injury-marred five-win disaster that saw Matthew Stafford miss a big chunk of the season with a neck injury.
Amid speculation that the Rams were trying to trade Stafford, general manager Les Snead told reporters that despite the team's precarious salary-cap situation, Stafford remains an integral member of the franchise.
"There are some players that have been here, that have done that, that have shown they can change the math in a football game, Matthew Stafford being one of them," Snead said. "Unfortunately last year he went through a tough time with the injuries, so the recency bias in the last year is inconsistent for him other than the fact that there was a lot of injuries around him. He's definitely someone we're going to rely on, and someone we're going to have to rely on as we do remodel this. And the reason I said remodel and not rebuild is a player like Matthew Stafford."
The reality is the Rams probably couldn't get out from under Stafford's bloated contract if they wanted to. But Stafford is also 35, coming off a major injury and may not be ready for Week 1. The team needs both a fallback plan and a potential successor.
With no first-round pick, the big names are out. If the Rams are serious about competing in 2023, their three Day 2 picks would likely be better spent on filling other needs. But the Rams have a whopping eight picks on Day 3, so a late-round flier on a prospect like TCU's Max Duggan is a good idea.
In fact, drafting two quarterbacks in the later rounds makes sense.
Baltimore Ravens
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To be clear, given the apparent lack of outside interest, the most likely scenario for the Baltimore Ravens this season appears to be Lamar Jackson playing the 2023 season under a non-exclusive franchise tag that will pay the 2019 NFL MVP $32 million and change. Tyler Huntley may well be back after the Ravens placed a right of first refusal tender on the restricted free agent.
It's also possible that if Jackson does play for the Ravens this year, at some point hard feelings will be smoothed over and Jackson will sign an extension that keeps him in Baltimore long term.
However, it also can't be ruled out that the offers Jackson has received have left such a bad taste in his mouth that he's ready to move on. That he will attempt to bolt Baltimore at the first available opportunity. And while the Ravens could ostensibly tag Jackson again in 2024, at some point it's fair to wonder how badly the Ravens will try to keep a disgruntled player who doesn't want to be there.
And if that's the case, the team is going to need to start considering a Jackson-less future. And while Huntley played fairly well in relief of Jackson in 2021 and "made" the Pro Bowl in 2022, his play actually backslid last season.
This isn't to say that the Ravens should invest a first-round pick in a quarterback. Or even a Day 2 pick. With just five picks in this year's draft, using any draft capital at the position is an admittedly risky play.
But depending on what happens over the next month, the Ravens may face a choice. Consider the future under center now—or potentially be looking at a full-blown teardown in 2024.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
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The Tampa Bay Buccaneers are trying to do something very difficult in 2023—replace the greatest quarterback the NFL has ever known. And to be clear, the team's quarterback of the future isn't on the roster.
Don't tell Baker Mayfield that, of course. Per Rick Stroud of the Tampa Bay Times, Mayfield believes that he can not only win the starting job in Tampa, but thrive as well.
"To me, to be at the top of your game, whatever industry you're in, you have to be wired internally to believe in yourself and sometimes trick yourself that nobody else believes in you," he said. "I enjoy looking at some of the greats in all sports and how they've prepared, and that's how you do it. You've got to believe in yourself."
Mayfield was once the first overall pick in the NFL draft, but he's on his fourth team—in the last year. Third-year pro Kyle Trask has shown nothing to indicate that he's more than a so-so backup.
Getting one of this year's "Big Four" quarterbacks isn't likely—the Buccaneers would have to surrender a lot of draft capital in such a move, and the team has needs along the offensive line and in the defensive backfield.
But if the Buccaneers don't add a signal-caller at some point in this year's draft, it's essentially a tacit admission they expect to be in the market for one in 2024.
And that they expect to have a higher pick next year.
Detroit Lions
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The Detroit Lions head into the 2023 season with optimism surrounding the franchise at a level that hasn't existed in years. Depending on how the Aaron Rodgers saga shakes out, an argument can be made that the Lions are the favorites in the NFC North.
Quarterback Jared Goff deserves quite a bit of the credit for that Motown resurgence. After an up-and-down first season in Detroit, Goff played one of the better seasons of his career in 2022—over 4,400 passing yards, 29 touchdown passes and a passer rating of just under 100.
However, even if you believe in the 28-year-old as a long-term starter, the fact remains that there's not much on the depth chart behind him. He also carries a cap hit north of $30 million each of the next two years. That led Michael Renner of Pro Football Focus to posit that Detroit could spend a Day 2 pick on a player like Stanford's Tanner McKee.
"McKee would make sense for the Lions in that he plays the position similarly to Goff and shouldn't have much of a learning curve with the NFL readiness he showed at Stanford," he said. "He is not only a cheap insurance option this season, but he'll also be entering the vaunted year three of his rookie deal when Goff's contract is set to expire."
It would be a smart move for Detroit—insurance in the short term and options in the long term. And with five picks in the first three rounds, the Lions have the draft capital to pull it off.
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