2022 NFL Draft: QBs soaring and sliding after week one
Phil Jurkovec, Boston College
Stock: UP
Phil Jurkovec may not have the biggest arm in this class, but he’s got plenty of arm talent to play in the NFL and he’s a very intriguing dual-threat at the position.
He showed some stuff last year after transferring from Notre Dame, and he was tremendous in the season-opening tune-up against Colgate.
Jurkovec finished this game with 303 rushing yards and three touchdowns while also adding 61 rushing yards.
The arrow has been pointing up for Jurkovec all offseason after reviewing his 2020 film, but it’s certainly a big help for him to have a playmaker like Zay Flowers, who could sneak into the first-round conversation himself.
Tanner Mordecai, SMU
Stock: UP
The two most impressive quarterback “trees” right now are growing in Oklahoma and Alabama.
At one point in time, all of Tua Tagovailoa, Jalen Hurts, and Mac Jones were on the same team with the Crimson Tide, and they’re now all high NFL draft picks.
The same could ultimately be true of the crew at Oklahoma not too long ago with Jalen Hurts, Spencer Rattler, and Tanner Mordecai.
Mordecai, like Hurts, decided he needed a change of scenery and left Oklahoma for SMU, where he had one of the best 2021 debuts of anyone at the QB position in college football.
He finished this game with seven touchdown passes, a number of them going to fellow former Oklahoma Sooners star Grant Calcaterra at the tight end position. At 15.2 air yards per attempt, Mordecai was slinging it in this game and deserves some major stock up attention.
Dorian Thompson-Robinson, UCLA
Stock: UP
In his second game of the 2021 season, Dorian Thompson-Robinson needed only nine completions to help UCLA beat LSU in a massive non-conference game for Chip Kelly and the Bruins program.
Of those nine completions, three went for touchdowns and Thompson-Robinson continues to show intriguing playmaking ability.
He’s got to improve upon his 59.9 percent completion rate, but the arrow is trending slightly up for the UCLA QB.
JT Daniels, Georgia
Stock: DOWN
Yes, Georgia had probably the best win of any college team in week one.
Yes, JT Daniels was the one quarterbacking the offense in a defense-dominated game.
Still, the talk of Daniels being a possible first-round pick was not exactly matched with his play on the field in this game.
Daniels was efficient for most of the game, though he did throw an interception and was forced to be ultra-conservative against the very fast and aggressive Clemson defense.
Compared to what we had expected from Daniels, his stock is down after week one even though Georgia had an impressive win as a team.
Kedon Slovis, USC
Stock: UP
Kedon Slovis is probably a little bit underrated at this point. He’s got the stuff and has for quite some time now.
Watching him in the USC Bowl game against Iowa a couple of years ago, you could tell that this was a kid with an NFL future and he just continues to remain rock-solid.
In this game against San Jose State, Slovis kept things on schedule completing 24-of-36 passes for 256 yards and two touchdowns, showing off some nice pocket maneuverability and better mobility than I think people have come to expect from him.
He showed some really nice things in this game from a timing perspective, he put nice touch on his throws, he made nice throws on the move, and he was just all-around really good.