2015 NFL Draft Prospect Watch: Shane Carden, QB, ECU

Continuing our series looking at the top quarterback prospects in all of college football, we’re digging into one of the more underrated senior signal callers in the country here in East Carolina’s Shane Carden.

Carden is 6’2″ 220 pounds, and has drawn some comparisons to Colt McCoy for his ability to operate in the spread out Pirates offense, take what the defense gives him, and be extremely productive.

As a junior, Carden was nearly unstoppable, throwing for 4,139 yards and completing over 70 percent of his passes with 33 touchdowns compared to only 10 interceptions. He also added 10 rushing touchdowns and a reception for a touchdown.

I’m not yet sure what to think of Carden as it translates to the NFL. He certainly knows how to operate an up-tempo offense, and he’s got the arm to be able to do things that NFL coaches will want him to. His completion percentage last year is an indicator to me that he makes great decisions with the football, and you can see in watching him that he’s not averse to simply taking what the defense gives him.

It’s clear that Carden does the work off the field to know what matchups he can exploit, how he can create offense where there are holes in the defense, and he does that very efficiently.

This is a gritty competitor who works hard on and off the field, in the weight room and in the film room. He has a great reputation among teammates and coaches and is the kind of player that I could see being a nice developmental prospect in the NFL in the mid-rounds.

Perhaps he can ascend even higher than that. It will be really interesting to see how good Carden is a year out of having a huge breakout campaign. Certainly the spotlight will be on him early  this season, and he’s going to have a variety of chances to impress scouts.

Here’s a video of him taking it to the North Carolina Tar Heels from the good folks at DraftBreakdown.com.