Why Oregon State's Sean Mannion Is the Tom Savage of This Year's Draft

Evolution is a slow process, and the NFL is just beginning to understand that a player's raw physical tools rarely translate from college to the pros. The NFL draft is still in the midst of this realization. And so, when there's a power vacuum at a position, pure NFL physical tools are still drafted highly in the hopes that something can be chiseled out of them. 

And so you have the story of Oregon State quarterback Sean Mannion, who is poised to benefit from the lack of quarterback depth in this draft because somebody has to. Mannion has prototypical size for the position at 6'6", 229 pounds. When given time to step into his throws, Mannion has the cannon arm that is synonymous with the "classic" pocket passer scouts drool over. 

But time is often not found in an NFL pocket. And, as scouts often overrate the best 20 throws they see a player make and underrate down-to-down consistency, there's a real chance that Mannion goes off the board on Day 2. That would be insane, and I would say that it's roughly equivalent to the rise we saw from Texans quarterback Tom Savage last season—a rise that placed a UDFA quarterback into the fourth round solely because of tools.  

Mannion is, in my mind, better than Savage was. Obviously this doesn't factor in scheme or surrounding talent, but Mannion's college stats blow Savage's out of the water. Mannion threw as many touchdowns in 2013 as Savage threw over the course of his entire college career.

Player	College	Yards	Completion Percentage	TD/INT
Tom Savage	PIT/RUT	5,690	56.8%	37/19
Sean Mannion	Oregon St.	13,600	64.6%	83/54

But that doesn't necessarily make Mannion a great NFL prospect. And Mannion, like Savage, is benefiting from the pro day dance. For those of you who are an unfamiliar with the mating rituals of scouts and players, the pro day is where we decide that Teddy Bridgewater's ankles are too skinny and ignore, you know, what actually happens on the field. It's a place where scouts make mistakes. The drunken barn dance of the NFL offseason, as Jordan Palmer explained to The Oregonian's Sean Meagher:

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"I think a couple of teams fell in love with him," Palmer said. "They were flirting at the combine. They were courting at the pro day. And then for the next month, I think some teams are really going to dig deep and understand who he is, his character and who he's going be.

"They're going to fall in love with him and they're gonna feel like they're going to have to take him really high, because somebody else is gonna take him if they don't."

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And, like two lovers going off to different colleges and trying to maintain a relationship, betting on the pro day and tools usually doesn't end well. Savage got a few snaps last season for the Texans and looked completely unprepared to play quarterback. And I'm not saying he doesn't have the arm talent—I'm saying he even had problems handing off to running backs. 

Mannion, coming from a noted developer of quarterbacks like Mike Riley, isn't quite as embryonic as Savage. But he does have clear flaws in his skill set. Matt Waldman of the Rookie Scouting Portfolio ranks Mannion as just the 10th-best quarterback in the class behind players like Nevada's Cody Fajardo and Alabama State's Brandon Bridge. Waldman speaks to what these scouts are seeing and why they'll love Mannion in the Rookie Scouting Portfolio:

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Mannion represents the idea that size and arm can’t be taught, but pocket skills and decision-making maturity can. Much of this “teaching” is throwing the player into the fire and letting him teach himself.

Mannion will have appeal and earn some of the “NFL-ready tags" because he plays under center, has a quick, compact release that is over the shoulder, and he'll look off a defense as part of a set play. The Ron Jaworskis of the world will praise Mannion for his willingness to abandon one side of he field and focus on another, displaying the patience from the pocket that made Jaworski the meat for the Polish Sausages that Lawrence Taylor served during Eagles games. ...

When Mannion feels interior pressure or he perceives time is wasting, he'll deliver the ball off his back foot or without his feet completely set and the ball sails. Mannion also begins his set up with a narrow base at the top of drops and has a wider release when he steps through. This encourages the back foot to leave the ground without enough torque in the hips to to keep the ball down. 

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But ultimately, with a very undeveloped sense of pocket awareness, Mannion has little upside as a developmental quarterback. If poor reactions to pressure aren't a knockout factor in the NFL, they're damn close. Mannion would be one of the very few players to buck that in the NFL if he were somehow able to figure it out. 

As it is, he's very robotic as a quarterback, and if you throw him off his game in any way, the down is over. 

Still, you can expect some team to "fall in love" with those traits, project the improvement necessary to see him as the next Ben Roethlisberger and draft him higher than is rationally advisable. It only takes one team to buy in for this to happen. 

And, as you can see by the recent buzz, somebody out there likes him. That didn't turn Tom Savage into a promising prospect. It doesn't make Mannion one either. 

All DYAR and DVOA numbers cited are courtesy of Football Outsiders. Learn more about DVOA here.

Rivers McCown is an NFL Analyst for Bleacher Report and the co-host of the Three-Cone Drill podcast. His work has also appeared on Football Outsiders and ESPN.com. Follow him on Twitter at @riversmccown.