According to an NFL insider, future quarterbacks will apply a successful past lesson to find the team of their choosing. In football, just like in every professional sport, struggling teams earn the right to choose the best players in the upcoming draft. With that time-tested and widely accepted practice, players will usually play for the worst teams in the league, depending on which teams possess the top draft picks.
However, over the last two decades or so, a phenomenon began to take shape. Players, especially quarterbacks and their representation, balk at what teams will select them and where they will begin their NFL careers. To the chagrin of team executives and the delight of the media, this process looks like it will happen more often.
NFL Analyst Projects Quarterbacks Will Attempt to Subvert Draft Process
For those who can remember, quarterbacks attempting to game the draft system to pick the team that drafts them is not new. However, with the burgeoning problem of NIL potentially keeping signal-callers in school, the NFL sits at a disadvantage. Quarterbacks command the most collegiate money from name, image, and likeness.
This comes on the news that Chicago Bears quarterback Caleb Williams tried to maneuver away from the franchise selecting him in the 2024 NFL Draft. Suffice it to say that the reaction to that news did not go over well.
As a result, staying another season in college doesn’t hurt them. One analyst, Ari Meirov, believes that quarterbacks will attempt to pull this power play, saying:
“I believe in the future that we’re going to have a player who knows he is so good. And he sees a team at number one, and it’s going to be like, ‘I don’t want to go there.”
In all fairness, Meirov is partially correct when he asserts that the number of athletes that will attempt to influence their draft landing will increase. Additionally, citing NIL will serve as the larger reason. However, Eli Manning was not the first talent, quarterback or not, to force a team to not select him.
In 1983, Stanford quarterback John Elway, by all indications, would become a member of the Baltimore Colts, who held the top pick. Elway did not want to play for Baltimore. He felt the organization was a mess and wanted no part of it. Under those circumstances, the standout forced a trade with leverage.
Back in the 1980s, NIL did not exist. Instead, the Elways and agent Marvin Demoff used the fact that the quarterback could go play outfield for the New York Yankees. The Colts still drafted him, sending him to Denver for quarterback Mark Hermann and a 1984 first-round pick.
Now, while the baseball options still exist, it falls woefully behind NIL in scope, leverage, and presence. Unlike their predecessors, potential first-round draft picks can somewhat dictate where they will end up. The script flipped, and the power dynamic started to slowly shift with Eli Manning. Now, the shift evolves into an avalanche where players can pursue options.