The number 1 overall pick and almost-bust in the 2005 draft went into extensive detail on when a rookie QB is truly ready to play – and when they’re not.
Fun fact: neither of my parents cares much about sports, not even a little bit. It’s honestly a coin flip whether either of them could even tell you who won the Super Bowl 8 months ago. So when they ask me about something sports-related, that means only one thing: whatever that subject is has become such a water-cooler oh-my-god topic that it’s got the entire greater New England region either uncontrollably excited, or absolutely furious (and in the case of many Boston-area sports fans, those two emotional states are one and the same).
This week, as it surely was for everyone in your life that hasn’t argued this subject to death since August like us true New England Patriots sickos, was, of course “so what do you think about Drake Maye playing?”
Calling the Drake Maye situation the elephant in the room this season for the Patriots is almost not giving enough deference to the size of elephants; even if they somehow rattled off 4 straight wins to start the season, instead of 1-3, the urge to start the QB of the future NOW and free the Patriots from the scourge of 150-yard Jacoby Brissett is unavoidable. Anyone who’s cracked into the Halloween candy early enough that you had to go to the store and restock before any kids even showed up knows the feeling.
Where no two Pats fans (or, quite possibly, even two Pats coaches) are exactly alike is what qualifies as the right time to throw Drake in the mix, that’s really the best for him, given the circumstances, the pieces (or lack thereof) around him, the time in the film room, and on and on and on. Unless you think the right time was Week 1, I guess.
But there is a guy who was thrown into, let’s say, a less-than-ideal situation, with expectations through the roof, expectations of being the chosen one, on a team that had a proud tradition of annual trips to the Super Bowl, and quarterback play that parents and grandparents would tell their kids and grandkids about like they saw a god walk the earth among mortal men. We’re talking, of course, about the San Francisco 49ers, and 2005 1st overall pick in the NFL Draft, Alex Smith.
It has been almost 20 years since Alex’s disastrous rookie season, so, if you need a refresher, how about this:
9 games played, 84 completions on 165 attempts, 50.9 completion %, 875 passing yards, 1 touchdown, 11 interceptions, 29 sacks, and a passer rating of….40.8.
2006 didn’t get much better. Well, it sort of did, mostly just because Smith managed to even out his TD-INT ratio – like, literally threw 16 of each – and almost cracked 3,000 passing yards in a full 16-game season.
But eventually, like you probably remember, Alex Smith evolved like a Pokemon into a functional NFL starter, and by the last few years of his career, he’d made a few Pro Bowls and was universally respected around the league as exactly the kind of smart, capable, wily old head that you want in your locker room, whether you’re trusting him to carry the team for a year, handle business until a rookie is ready, or both.
And on the podcast Pablo Torre Finds Out this week, in an episode titled “Confessions of a Number One Pick Gone Bust”, Alex had a lot of thoughts on what’s going on with today’s rooks, the proper way to bring one up and teach them what they need before throwing them out into the wild, and even a couple specific thoughts on Drake and the Patriots.
(here’s the Youtube link; it shows up as Unavailable if I try to embed it here, because the NFL hates fun)
Anyway, here’s the parts where Alex goes deep on all things QB development:
On Bryce Young getting benched for Andy Dalton, and playing the rookie vs the experienced backup:
(after hearing Panthers coach Dave Canales say Andy gave them the best chance to win this week)
“No sh*t! Andy gave you the best chance to win all year! Just like I should not have been playing! That’s not the f*cking point. Peyton Manning didn’t give the Colts the best chance to win his rookie year. He threw 28 interceptions. He set an NFL record. That’s not the point. That once you had committed yourself to that path, the whole baptism by fire…..and then here in Carolina, you pull the rug out two weeks in.
Which, I have a lot of emotions on this whole thing. But having watched Bryce’s tape, and this gets to the core of what I went through – you can develop bad habits! This idea that you’re just going to play through dysfunction, it’s not very sane. It’s not logical. You go out there as a quarterback, you’re so dependent on everything around you, not just the 10 guys in the huddle, but defense and special teams. Just to have a chance to show what you can do. You can go out there, and in the midst of this dysfunction – which is what the Panthers are, dysfunctional – you can develop bad habits. You can lose confidence. You can become rattled. The pressure and the anxiety that certainly comes with the expectations of being the Number 1 pick can consume you.
And I felt like that’s what I saw in Bryce this year. And it so much reminded me of myself. And so actually him getting to finally sit back and watch a guy like Andy….maybe that is actually the best thing for Bryce.”
On the value of a rookie watching a veteran prepare:
(they’re still talking about Bryce Young and Andy Dalton, but we can use our imaginations and swap “Drake” and “Jacoby” in there easily enough)
“I hope that Bryce was able to analyze and watch Andy operate. You could not put a value on the up close front row view to watch Andy prepare all week, right? In the meeting rooms with coaches before and after meetings as he preps in the, in the weight room getting ready, how he deals with the receivers. Like there are a thousand things that Bryce will get an up close view to watch Andy do. And Andy’s been doing this for 14 years, okay? The vast experience that he, and knowledge that he’s accumulated that now Bryce will get to watch that, right? And even though that it’s still not a great situation, but watch Andy go out and play fast and get rid of the ball and continue to do the little things that added up to the first 300 yard three touchdown performance of the season.
And this was like, what was so ridiculous last year, like this whole idea of like, Andy was sitting there all the last year. Yeah. What was the rush? Like, why you traded up to get Bryce? Why wouldn’t you as an organization do everything in your power to ensure that when Bryce takes the field, he has the best chance of success? You have made this huge investment for your company, for your team, and you’ve literally just like sabotaged him. There is no plan in place to like, how are we gonna big term vision, long term vision, how are we gonna ensure success? And there’s, they’re, they’re impatient and they just want to see the shiny new toy, right?
And they, they know it puts butts in the seats And. so they’re like, let’s just get ‘em out there, right? And they, they, they can’t stay patient. They can’t stick to their guns. And the problem is, you have guys like Peyton and CJ Stroud, they’d mess it up for everyone. Yes, yes. Right? Yes. Like CJ Stroud just had the greatest rookie season ever playing right away. Agreed. And. so probably the truth is that, that like, there isn’t one size fits all. Like that’s just the truth. Like every situation that you walk into is different, right? Like the supports that are in place, how good’s the team. So when you, when you’re factoring risk here, you’ve taken this, this pick. Do we, let’s play ‘em early, let’s throw ‘em out there and hope that they work their way through it and let’s hope they’re CJ Stroud and hope that they’re, you know, Peyton Manning.”
On Drake Maye, Jacoby Brissett, and the Patriots, specifically:
“I hope, you know, flipping again to this year, like at the Patriots, Jacoby Brissett is a good quarterback. Let him go out and play. That team is not ready again. New head coach, lots of new things going on. Offensive line isn’t very good. Like, let Jacoby go out there and play. Let Drake may sit and watch. I hope that Jerod Mayo can stay patient and stick to this plan, when and if the losses mount they can still stay strong to this.”
On some recent examples of rookie quarterbacks benefitting from learning behind a starter:
Alex: “There’s such power in the veteran quarterback and just in what they’ve seen, right? Like to go out and operate so much of playing quarterback is decision making, right? Like beyond the physical attributes. It is, it is these little incalculable unmeasurable little things that add up. And this is obviously to a much larger concept of kind of mentorship, but like you go look at Patrick’s path, right? You go look at like Jordan Loves and Aaron Rogers. Path in all of those cases. Could they have started earlier? Sure….”
Pablo: “Well that’s because of you, buddy! That’s because you were ahead of Patrick Mahomes!”
Alex: “Yes. But like, my point, and it’s hard when I was in it, right? Like, no, no, you don’t wanna get your, the replacement. You’re, you know, they draft your replacement and he’s sitting there, right? Of course. Like, that’s not like something you wish for in the moment, but from a football fan, if you were a Chiefs fan and you, how about just an operational, you know, you look at like the, the brilliance of it from a big picture. Like, hey, draft him. I was in my 13th year at that point. I had my career year, by far. Yes. I mean I led the NFL in a couple categories, like was in the MVP conversation by the end of the season. And the brilliance of that, again, Patrick got to see an up-close view of it for an entire year. Everything that I had accumulated, all the knowledge, the routine, like the operational playbook of playing quarterback, like Patrick got the up close view and he’s like, Hey, take what you want, take what works for you and then send me on my way.
And oh yeah, get some draft picks in return, right? Like, it’s brilliant. It’s brilliant. And then, oh, by the way, Patrick’s first, like his first start the following season, I think he threw six touchdowns. Like, like you’ve just ensured again, you made, you traded up to get him with the 10th pick. You wanna do everything in your power to ensure that, that it works, that he has a chance of success. And that’s part of this. And like, it just, it, it, it seems so obvious from the outside looking in and yet it it’s still so rare.”
On being a rookie and not having anyone with experience to turn to:
Pablo: “He (Mahomes) credits you for doing the thing that you did not receive, which is, it seems you helped him feel less alone.”
Alex: “Pablo, the two quarterbacks when I made my first start for the Niners, the two quarterbacks had a combined one start, the two other QBs in the room. So there were three of us, one start, they were a second year and third year player who had one start. And I’ll never forget after practice, sitting in the film room watching film by myself and having no idea what I was doing. I put in the hours Pablo, I was working hard. I was trying hard, like I had heard stories of, again, Peyton and these guys that like, just watched so much film and I’d be in there too watching film and had absolutely no idea what I was doing. Like no idea what I was looking at, what I should be looking at, how to do it.
Like none. And I just, I, I stumbled for years doing this and, and, and slowly learned as I went and made mistakes. But it was, again, it was five, six years in the making, just inconsistency and crappy play and mistakes. And. so fast forward to Patrick again. I had been obviously an early pick and here’s Patrick. It had been an early pick and I very well remembered what I went through. And again, that, that feeling of being alone and that, yeah, I didn’t wish that on anyone. And again, Patrick and I hit it off like, you know, respect, respect, give respect, get respect. And like he and I became fast friends and, and yeah.
As much as he was the guy that’s gonna take my job, but like, you don’t wish that on him, you know.”
And a feel-good note to send us out on:
Alex: “The reason the NFL is the greatest challenge in sports is because it takes a thousand different things to get the formula right. It does. And those are constantly changing. And I think that’s what I think is fascinating about it. I think that’s why people are consumed with it. And I know that that’s why I am as well. But for anybody trying to take credit for the singular thing in that like, you know, winning and quarterback success again is just, doesn’t know what they’re talking about.”
Wherever you fall on the “Drake Maye should start ____” continuum, the New England Patriots continue their 2024 campaign of “playoffs? I just hope we can win a game!” against the Miami Dolphins at Gillette Stadium on Sunday at 1:00pm EST.