League execs, scouts, coaches assess QB class
**Composite projection:** Round 2-3
After an uneven
Senior Bowl week, the Heisman Trophy runner-up threw the ball better than expected at the combine and his pro day, backing up Hurts’ insistence that he’ll play quarterback at the next level. “Some GMs and some offensive coordinators and head coaches will just hate the style and say this guy’s not a quarterback, no different than what you saw with Lamar (Jackson),” an AFC executive said. “He’s not as dynamic as Lamar was in college by any means. But if teams boil it down to ‘what does this guy do well, this guy had one of the greatest college football seasons in history in a passing offense’ — and he’s a super clean kid, highly professional, really competitive — I think someone probably will take [Hurts] on Day 2.” Said an AFC quarterbacks coach: “The dude went 38-4 as a starter and played in a lot of big games. The LSU game, they ran into a freight train, but it looked like he was pressing. He’s best when he just goes out and plays ball. He needs some development, there’s no question. He can really spin the football. Sometimes he gets uncoordinated with his lower half and his delivery, so it gets him a little awkward. He just needs to clean up some of that stuff and become more consistent with it.”
Hurts was a part of three Alabama teams that reached the national championship game, then took Oklahoma to the College Football Playoff after his graduate transfer. His one season with offensive guru Lincoln Riley and the Sooners was by far his most productive: 69.7 percent passing for 3,851 yards and 32 touchdowns with just eight interceptions, plus another 1,298 yards and 20 TDs rushing. “The Oklahoma stuff is kind of skewed because it’s a f—— high school 7-on-7 tournament every game they play,” another AFC exec said. “He’s a bright kid. He’s cerebral. He doesn’t process things and see things real quick and get rid of the ball. He kind of has to see it to believe it. And then his arm is good, it’s not special. I don’t think he’s a super-instinctive player.”
The play of fellow Riley proteges
Baker Mayfield and
Kyler Murray as rookies probably helps Hurts’ cause, though both were more polished passers coming out. No team formally asked Hurts to do combine drills at a different position. But given his build (6-1, 222), speed (4.59 40 at the combine) and concerns about accuracy, decision-making, anticipation, etc., some scouts wrote him as a running back while Hurts was at Alabama, where
Tua Tagovailoa replaced him early in the comeback win over Georgia in the January 2018 national championship game and never gave back the starting job. (After Tagovailoa’s ankle injury, Hurts came off the bench in the SEC title game the following season and led his own comeback win.)
Some envision Hurts in a package role while he develops as a QB, in the mold of
Saints‘ Swiss Army Knife
Taysom Hill. “Mike Gundy hit it right on the head: He is a wishbone quarterback, man,” an NFC scout said. “First and second read, (then) take off and run.” Hurts’ quiet, no-nonsense personality gave some teams pause early in the process; the staff at Oklahoma assured them it comes across the right way in the locker room, and Hurts can let his guard down at times. “Everyone respects him at both schools, because he’s the hardest worker, he’s super serious, he’s all about football, about winning,” an NFC coordinator said. “If you have to play him early, you’d have to protect him with your run game, and know what you’re getting early on and hope you develop him into a more complete player. Because the mindset is off the charts. I think the kid’s special.”
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