NFL Draft: Making Sense of Top QB Logjam After First 3 Weeks of Season

Three weeks into the college football season, the Power Five has given us a four-horse race in terms of quarterbacks who can potentially find themselves as first-round picks. If an NFL franchise is trying to find a franchise quarterback in the coming 2017 draft class, Notre Dame’s DeShone Kizer, Clemson’s Deshaun Watson, Oklahoma State’s Mason Rudolph and Miami’s Brad Kaaya are a tier above any other eligible passers.

The biggest riser of the group is Kizer, who saw split reps throughout the spring but won the Fighting Irish’s starting gig during his Week 1 performance against the Texas Longhorns. Despite Notre Dame losing two of the squad’s first three games of the year, he’s done enough to convince some, like CBS Sports’ Dane Brugler, that he’s the top passer in the class:

A lot of work to do. But if the #NFLDraft was today, the top-3 on my board: 1) DE Myles Garrett2) DL Malik McDowell3) QB DeShone Kizer

— Dane Brugler (@dpbrugler) September 19, 2016

Kizer plays in a system which asks him to make several option runs, as either the dive or outside ball-carrier, which may lead some to consider him a dual-threat passer, but his bread and butter is what he can do as a vertical passer. In many ways, the redshirt sophomore—who is listed at 6’4″ and 230 pounds on NFL Draft Scout—compares similarly to Jameis Winston or Eli Manning, who were both first overall selections in their respective draft classes.

In crunch-time situations this season, Kizer has thrown perfectly placed balls against the blitz on third down, the barometer of which most judge quarterback prospects by. He does need some refinement, just as Winston did coming out in 2015, but the ability to flip on a game-changing switch never goes away, as we learned during the former Florida State Seminoles’ rookie season.

In 2014, the year before Winston was drafted by Tampa Bay, the Buccaneers were just 2-14. Since then, they’ve posted a 7-11 record, a difference largely attributed to their deep passing game.

That’s the type of franchise-swinging momentum that Kizer can provide.

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Right behind him in most quarterback rankings is Watson, who may have posted the best individual performance in a national championship game (405 passing yards, 4 TDs, 73 rushing yards) when the Clemson Tigers nearly came away with a win over Nick Saban’s Alabama Crimson Tide last season. That effort elevated his draft status to being the guy in the 2017 class, but his team has started off slow in 2016.

Many of Watson’s offensive skill players returned for the 2016 season, including receiver Mike Williams, who himself is a potential first-round pick and missed almost all of their 14-1 season due to a neck injury which occurred when he ran into a goal post. That set a high standard to which the passer has yet to meet expectations for.

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Watson completed just 46 of 86 passes against Auburn and Troy, two one-score victories, with four passing touchdowns and three interceptions in the first two weeks. He executed a clutch touchdown drive against Auburn in Week 1 and rebounded in Week 3 with a 12-of-15 performance against South Carolina State, but a three-touchdown performance against a winless FCS squad is not what makes a first-round quarterback.

If you’re still on the Watson wagon right now—and there’s only a two-game sample to suggest that you should ditch the train all together—it’s because of what he was able to do as a true sophomore in 2015, when he looked like a mix between Robert Griffin and Teddy Bridgewater, …

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