In mocks all across the country the question of the day is which NFL Quarterback Prospect is the “right” choice, Oregon’s Justin Herbert or Utah State’s Jordan Love. Most conventional mock drafts have Herbert as the favorite over Love, with some “experts” having the former Duck as high as 5th to the Dolphins.
It isn’t cut and dry this time of year as we’ve seen with previous QB heavy drafts. Many people thought Josh Rosen was the prize to get in the 2018 draft, only to fall short of the mark heavily. Guys like Lamar Jackson can be “slept on” and turn into MVP’s, while projects such as Patrick Mahomes can lead teams to Super Bowls.
I love the Qb position this time of year, especially with the looming Free Agent conversation for each team growing with debate each passing second. A lot of debate was swirling around last year between Justin Herbert and the NY Giants Daniel Jones, so it’s only fair that Herbert would enter this season with the same level of intrigue and concern.
My favorite thing about this debate is that ESPN’s own Todd McShay and Mel Kiper Jr.s have a $5k bet around which of these two will be taken first.
I love it. I love it for so many reasons, but mainly because it’s actual a tale as old as time. Do you take the Quarterback who is “better” and you know what you’re going to get, or do you go with the high upside potential that could be bust material?
Justin Herbert weighs in at 236 pounds with an official height of 6 foot 6 inches, a solid frame for a starting NFL quarterback. Herbert ran a 4.71 40 yard dash and was able to put up that glorious hand size of 10 inches.
Love on the other hand was measured in at 6 foot 4, 224 pounds. He ran an impresisve 4.69 (nice) 40 and has that key and crucial hand size of 10.5 inches.
A lot of people bring up that Jordan Love had a terrible year in college, but I don’t put the blame all on him in this situation. Love had lost a majority of his offense this past season, including receivers and O-Lineman that were crucial to his success early on. Herbert’s big knock is that we really haven’t seen him improve at all throughout college. He was a highly sought after target and has arguably the best arm talent in this entire draft, he just never quite learned how to read a defense the way he was supposed to.
Personally, I think it’s a no brainer that Herbert is taken higher than Love. Love has the upside potential of an NFL starter, but no I will not say he has the potential of Patrick Mahomes. Analysts really need to stop just throwing out comps like that…
Love has been increasing his stock recently, but it would take the perfect situation to occur for me to ever mock him below Herbert. Do I love Herbert? Meh, not really. I am big on Jacob Eason still who I believe will be in the first round as well!
thoughtsfromthebench.com 