Just say no to Josh Allen and Trading Down
April 23, 2018Manny Machado’s big weekend prompts more Indians trade ideas
April 23, 2018Okay, my 500 words is really 1500 words today? Why? I didn’t write on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. No excuses. While my goal will always be to pop out a 500-word piece daily, to make this authentic, I don’t want it to interfere with life, and life got into the way. The good news? I’ll have a piece on the amazing local breweries in Cleveland this week. The bad news? C’mon, there isn’t any…This week, 500 words will focus on the NFL draft, starting with that #1 selection.
If there’s any doubt regarding who the Browns should take with the #1 pick, you won’t find it here. Baker Mayfield should be the choice, period. You can thank Jake Burns for that, although I would have been a Mayfield lean either way. Here’s why…and no…these little preludes don’t count towards my word count…gotta have a cheat somewhere…;)…
Let’s get that giant elephant out of the room right now. Baker Mayfield isn’t Johnny Manziel.
We all get the doubts. Mayfield is sub-6’1″ tall, and he’s gotten into some trouble over his college career. Yes, he was tackled by the police in Arkansas. Yes, he planted the Oklahoma flag in the middle of the O in the Horseshoe. Yes, he grabbed his crotch against Kansas.
Any perceptive person can see that Mayfield has run into trouble that certainly shares some similarities to the former Texas A&M starter and Browns first round pick. But we can also disseminate the differences between the two quarterbacks, right?
The Manziel comparison
We can remember all of the signs regarding Manziel’s issues, including brushes with authority, weekly issues with brashness on the field that stepped over the line, and offseason misgivings that included problems with autographs, and issues with his parents. The red flags with Manziel always seemed to go far beyond just “being youthful,” and being overtly brash. With Manziel, there was a privilege that seemed to always be a part of the equation.
Yes, Mayfield is brash. Yes, Mayfield has made mistakes. But through it all, there’s been an up-frontness regarding the former Oklahoma quarterback that has always seeped through the cracks of “Manziel-comparisons.” Sure, Mayfield has made mistakes, but unlike Manziel, Mayfield hasn’t shied away from the conversation and been upfront with everything.
First, there’s what Mayfield had to say regarding his arrest in Arkansas.
“I don’t know if there’s anything that I could really say. I mean the video kind of speaks for itself. I didn’t harm anybody. I’d love to take it back, making the police officer’s job very difficult and not just listening to them. That would be the one thing that I’d want to take back and change. I really put myself in a situation that just shouldn’t have happened.”
Regarding how hard it was to call his parents.
“Mom and Dad, by far the hardest one,” Mayfield said. “It was a rough one you know because that’s the first people you think about letting them down … first thing I said was, ‘I’m sorry.’ And so, that was hard to even get those words out of my mouth.”
And maybe most telling, how his parents reacted to his arrest.
His mom Gina:
“As any parent who gets a phone call at 3:20 in the morning in a dead sleep, you are concerned … but he was sobbing and he was apologizing and it truly did devastate him to have to make that phone call. So he just, he was just apologizing for being stupid.”
And his dad James:
“He’s just damn lucky he didn’t get hurt,” added his father, James, a former walk-on QB at Houston. “But just the stupidity of it. And once we got the details, it was even dumber.”
The Ohio State flag-planting incident? The Buckeyes had manhandled the Sooners in Oklahoma the year before, and the team had spent the better part of the year looking to exact revenge. The Kansas crotch grab? The KU captains had refused to shake his hand prior to the game, and then later hit him with a cheap shot.
There are red flags for Mayfield, and it’s certainly something he’ll need to harness in the coming years, but it’s never hurt his play, and it’s never hurt his impressive work ethic.
The Baker Mayfield differences
Baker Mayfield works his ass off. Baker Mayfield has always worked his ass off. He was never considered a top prospect out of high school, even though he worked himself into one of the top prospects out of high school.
But according to everyone who knew him back then, he never stopped working. According to his high school coach at Lake Travis, Manziel and Mayfield have nothing in common.
“I’d say it’s reckless to compare them. Baker has never been involved in something where he’s causing harm to someone, ever,” Carter says. “I’ve never heard anyone question Baker’s love for football. I’ve never heard anyone question Baker’s dedication in the film room, or on the practice field, or in the offseason. His ability to be coached. Those are some of the things the media was putting out there, true or not. But you don’t hear anyone saying that about Baker because it’s not true.”
What about Manziel? Well, this year on Dan Patrick’s show, he blamed the Browns for drafting him without knowing how little work he put in.
“If Cleveland did any of their homework, they would have known that I was a guy who didn’t come in every day and watch film. I was a guy who really didn’t know the Xs and Os of football…”
Manziel was the epitome of privilege and talent and just didn’t put the work in that you need to become an NFL quarterback.
Mayfield is all about the work ethic. He’s always felt slighted. In High School, he wasn’t chosen to start his junior year, and only got the nod when the starter got hurt in the first game. Prior to his senior year, Mayfield went to an elite QB camp and was shunned, even though his performance was on par or better with the bigger prospects. He walked on at Texas Tech, then walked on at Oklahoma, and never once didn’t put his work in.
It’s that chip on his shoulder that has been his calling card. It’s also likely that same chip which has caused him some trouble on the field. The off-the-field trouble is such a random blip, that it’s almost not worth to even discuss. He’s not a partier of the field, and that’s been well-documented since his high school days.
He’s electric on-the-field
On the field, Mayfield was as electric a college football player his senior year as anyone has ever seen. He completed an insane 70.5% of his passes and set the NCAA record with a 198.32 QB rating. He threw for 4,627 yards, 43 touchdowns, and only had six interceptions.
But on the field, it goes a bit deeper than that. The one thing that Mayfield has always excelled at has been working through progressions before moving out of the pocket to make things happen. He’s a pocket passer first, and not the frenetic, “makes things happen himself” sort of player. If you skim through his 2017 highlights with Oklahoma, you’ll see several drop back throws to all areas of the field.
What’s most impressive about the pocket passing game is that he’s making all of the passes you need to be successful in the NFL. He has touch through to the sidelines, a rifle that can go down the middle, but with the finesse to feather it over the linebackers and the covering corner. He has the cannon to roll one out 65 yards down the field.
Now he can throw on the run but is always controlled when he does it. In the Ohio State game, with Oklahoma on the ten, Mayfield dropped back to past and went through his first three progressions in the pocket. They were covered, so Mayfield rushed up into the pocket and hit his receiver who broke out of his route heading for the end zone for a touchdown. Every second of that play fit within the confines of the play, including utilizing the whole in the pocket when things did begin to break down.
Earlier this year, prior to getting his consultant gig with the Cleveland Browns, Scot McCloughlan compared Mayfield to a slightly shorter version of Brett Favre. While I hate comparisons regarding prospects to Hall of Famers, you can certainly see the skill-set that McCloughlan is talking about.
On the field, Mayfield plays with a fiery leadership that is hard to quantify, but he always stays within the confines of the offense as that leader. He makes big plays in the pocket, but also can make those off-kilter plays with his legs when a play breaks down, after all of the progressions.
He’s accurate in the pocket to both shoulders, and deep. Like Favre, he throws “off-platform.” When a play finally breaks down, he can throw it any way you need him to. His motion isn’t perfect, but how he throws it finds the passing lanes and gets to where it needs to go. And while Mayfield can move and throw at the same time, when he decides to run, look out. He ran a 4.84 at the combine but has also run a 4.81 unofficially. He can fly on the field when he breaks open field for a QB and has that game speed that you talk about. No, he’s not a runner by trade, but he does add that weapon to the arsenal.
The red flags are there, but the talent and work ethic far supersede the quirks. Baker Mayfield should be the Browns choice because he’s simply the best quarterback in the 2018 draft. He’s a game breaker with accuracy, a cannon, and leadership ability, and that’s exactly the Cleveland Browns need.