This is a different group of quarterbacks in the 2022 NFL draft. Over the past three draft classes, there have been clear top options at the position, including eventual No. 1 picks Kyler Murray, Joe Burrow and Trevor Lawrence. That isn’t the case with this crop of signal-callers, as there’s no consensus among NFL scouts and execs about which quarterback is the best.
Pittsburgh’s Kenny Pickett — who is ranked No. 1 by both Mel Kiper Jr. and Todd McShay — has been the most consistent of the bunch. He returned for his senior season and catapulted his stock from late-round hopeful to potential top-15 pick.
Matt Corral guided Ole Miss to its first double-digit wins regular season, while Cincinnati’s Desmond Ridder is the engineer of a program-record 13 wins, with at least one game remaining; the Bearcats play Alabama in the College Football Playoff Semifinal. Liberty’s Malik Willis, North Carolina’s Sam Howell and Nevada’s Carson Strong already have rewritten the record books at their respective programs.
Heading into the teeth of the draft process — with the Senior Bowl and NFL combine to come in February and March, respectively — the order for the quarterback class could still materialize, as teams will keep doing their homework on each player.
Let’s dive into the background stories and journey of each of the top six quarterbacks in this class, with their strengths, weaknesses, rankings from Kiper and McShay, and what’s next. We’ll start with Pickett and finish with a few late-round options that NFL teams could find intriguing:
Jump to a QB:
Corral | Howell | Pickett
Ridder | Strong | Willis
Best of the rest of the class
Year: Senior | Age: 23 | Career starts: 51
Height: 6-foot-3 | Weight: 220 pounds
2021 stats: 4,319 passing yards, 67.2% completion rate, 42 touchdown passes, 7 interceptions in 14 games
Rankings: Kiper’s QB1 (No. 20 overall) | McShay’s QB1 (No. 16)
Scouts and evaluators search every season for the quarterback who could take a big…
Source : espn
