NFL Draft: Passing On Passers

National Football League Draft (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It always happens.  For months, you've seen every Tom, Dick and (maybe a few) Marys give their take on what player their favorite NFL team should draft in every available form of media.  As for the people who do this for a living, their picks seem to change by the hour depending on what kind of information the teams themselves choose to tell them.

Thursday's first round of the NFL Draft in New York showed why many of these so-called speculators would be better off scratching lottery tickets.  In a year where all we've heard about was the plethora of high-value college quarterbacks (i.e. Johnny Manziel of Texas A&M and Teddy Bridgewater of Louisville), most teams went for offensive or defensive line help.  Which is fine, because we're told defense wins championships.

The only quarterback chosen among the bottom of the barrel (that is, the first ten teams in the draft) was Blake Bortles of Central Florida, chosen third by the Jacksonville Jaguars.  Manziel, Bridgewater and a baffled nation watched as team after team in the first round passed on these passers.  Even the Cleveland Browns and Minnesota Vikings, teams that were known to be seeking its latest franchise-saving QB after their last ones didn't pan out, went with defensive help first.

So why did it take until the 22nd pick (and a trade with the Philadelphia Eagles) for the Browns to choose Manziel, or the Vikings with the 32nd pick (and a trade with the Seattle Seahawks) to choose Bridgewater?  Is it Manziel's sophomore status or his baggage?  Was it Bridgewater's reportedly lousy audition that undermined his otherwise stellar collegiate career?

Whatever it was, all the fake drama succeeded in making the ESPN crew covering the draft look like fools after having hyped "Johnny Football" for so long.  But after awhile, it became a bit much to watch analyst Jon Gruden constantly defending his man when the possibility existed that Manziel might not get drafted in the first round at all--until he was.  For a quarterback with two years of college experience, he sure sucks a lot of the air out of the room.

As the draft continues through Saturday, this is only Step One of a long process to see whether any of the players drafted has what it takes to be NFL material.  If not, at this time next year, others will be chosen by either the league or ESPN as the Next Big Thing in football.  That's why we have college football.  Like it or not, they exist to prime the pump for (to paraphrase Joni Mitchell) the starmaking machinery that is pro football.