This year’s draft is shaping up to be rather unpredictable as anywhere from two to four quarterbacks have a shot to go No. 1 overall and nobody has any real idea how the middle of the first round will shake out. There does seem to be something resembling a general consensus, however, on what quarterbacks will be taken in the first round– Bryce Young, CJ Stroud, Anthony Richardson, and Will Levis. What order they will go in remains up in the air but it would be a shock to see any of those four slip out of the first and even more so for another name to join them.
If Max Kellerman were a general manager, he would be the one adding that fifth name. He told Jay Williams and Keyshawn Johnson that if he held the No. 1 overall pick in this year’s draft he would select not Young, or Stroud, or Richardson, but Hendon Hooker, the 26-year-old sixth-year Tennessee QB who tore his ACL in November.
Despite his age and very recent injury issues, Hooker has a lot of fans after his stellar final year at Tennessee in which he threw 27 TDs and only two interceptions in nine wins, including one epic battle with Alabama. He showed some good stuff. But you do not take an older prospect with one year’s worth of good tape with the first overall pick in the draft. The chances of a prospect with those particular set of circumstances developing into a superstar are astronomically low, and aiming for a superstar is the entire point of the No. 1 overall pick.
It goes to show how far Hooker has come within draft circles that Kellerman wasn’t laughed out of the room by his two coworkers when saying this. But we will not see a QB who tore his ACL five months ago get picked in the top-five. He may not even go in the first round. But Kellerman wanted Iguodala and he wants Hooker!
