57 Mocks Munched! Suh Consensus No. 1, Bradford for Skins

[Lotus]

Originally Posted by Zorn on the 4th of July

Very thought-provoking post, but remember that great QB play is different than hot QB draft prospects, and improving QB play doesn't necessarily involve the draft or even the QB himself.

Gentlemen, your conference-winning quarterbacks of the last ten years (and NFL draft round):

John Elway (1)
Chris Chandler (3)
Kurt Warner (undrafted)
Steve McNair (1)
Trent Dilfer (1)
Kerry Collins (1)
Tom Brady (6)
Brad Johnson (9)
Rich Gannon (4)
Jake Delhomme (undrafted)
Donovan McNabb (1)
Ben Roethlisberger (1)
Matt Hasslebeck (6)
Peyton Manning (1)
Rex Grossman (1)
Eli Manning (1)

Thank you for that fine list. Let's look at it again:
1) 7 out of 16 were not drafted in the first round. So the statement, "Winning teams can find QB's in later rounds, or even undrafted" appears to be true.
2) But 9 out of 16 came in the first round. The most common draft position, by far, is the first round. So the statement, "Winning teams most commonly have QB's taken in the first round" also appears to be true.

Put it together and we see that winning teams can draft QB's late (or not at all), but the best-worn path to winning is with a first round QB.