MOBILE, Ala. — Jim Nagy looked around the conference room and feigned surprise.
“Bo Nix is here this week?” the Senior Bowl director asked Tuesday with a smile, shooting a glance to his right where Nix, the Oregon quarterback, waited his turn to take the podium.
Nix was indeed there, paired with Washington’s Michael Penix Jr. as the highest-profile in a group of quarterbacks taking part in this game that also includes Notre Dame’s Sam Hartman, Tennessee’s Joe Milton, South Carolina’s Spencer Rattler, Tulane’s Michael Pratt and South Alabama’s Carter Bradley.
The question of the week, however, — and, in some ways, the early question for the 2024 NFL draft — is this: Where is Nix in the NFL’s eyes? Compared to the likely top trio of Caleb Williams, Drake Maye and Jayden Daniels. Compared to Penix. Compared to Michigan’s J.J. McCarthy. Compared to a league currently boasting a plethora of young, talented signal-callers but also several teams, the Broncos included, that figure to be considering their options this spring.
Put a different way: Assuming the top three quarterbacks come off the board in the top four or five picks, will Denver have a good quarterback option at No. 12?
The work week at Hancock Whitney Stadium didn’t answer those questions and certainly didn’t provide an affirmative. It was never going to, not entirely at least. All the same, none of the quarterbacks here put together the kind of ‘wow’ performance that will cause teams to radically change their views. None of them played so poorly as to crater their stock, either, though the overall work particularly Tuesday and Wednesday felt underwhelming.
“Everybody’s going to freak out and overreact,” one veteran agent said.
Then Thursday, Penix and Nix in particular looked sharp in red zone work. Crisis averted.
Real questions remain ahead, though, for teams like Denver to sort through.
The veteran quarterbacks
Even for a game that, by its very name, is going to feature experienced players, it’d be difficult to imagine a more battle-tested group of quarterbacks than the one in Mobile the past week.
Nix (61) and Hartman (60) played in the most games over their college careers, but Penix and Rattler played in 48 each and Pratt 47. Pratt played four years, the other four either logged five or six.
Pratt’s also the only one of the quintet who didn’t start at multiple schools. That means teams not only have reams and reams of film to watch of these players — they ranged between Nix’s 1,936 collegiate pass attempts and Pratt’s 1,204 — but they’ve had to learn new systems and adapt to new teammates and concepts over their careers.
So what is there to learn in a week for teams?
“I think it’s more about the operation and how you lead and how you interact with players and the interview process,” Nix said Wednesday. “So there’s a lot along those lines. They’re not worried about what we do on the field (this week). They’ve seen us in a competitive environment, seen us play. That’s the fun part for us is to play in the game and learn a different thing.”
Not surprisingly, teammates of the top pair raved about their traits on and off the field.
Tackle Roger Rosengarten, for example, had been at Washington for two seasons before Penix transferred there from Indiana and went 7-9 overall (2020 shortened UW’s schedule to four games). In two years with Penix: 25-3 and a national title game appearance.
“Mike’s a Heisman-type of player for a reason,” Rosengarten told The Post. “He came in and changed the program like I haven’t seen anyone else do. He came in and he was familiar with the offensive scheme we were running, but he lives up to all of the hype.”
In Mobile, Penix put the arm on display and showed the best combination of strength and ball placement in the group. When he had a clean pocket to work with, he threw darts all over the place. But his accuracy waned substantially with traffic around, similar to the difference between his carving up of Texas in the playoff semifinal and the tougher sledding he faced in the title game against Michigan. And two previous ACL injuries plus a college shoulder injury will have teams’ attention during the medical evaluations at the NFL Scouting Combine later this month.
Nix is solid across the board but doesn’t have one standout tool. He was cordial with reporters on the week but bristled at different stages when asked about his processing ability and his comfort level playing under center — ”100 percent comfortable” — he said flatly with no elaboration.
Rattler’s week was parallel to his career at South Carolina: The highlight reel stacks up with anybody’s, but there’s inconsistency, too. If a battle forms after the top trio among McCarthy, Penix and Nix, then Rattler and Pratt likely end up jockeying for mid-round positioning.
Early draft strengths
Even if the quarterbacks didn’t put on a laser show in Mobile, the overall depth of talent at the game was impossible to miss.
Teams could easily have been watching seven or more offensive linemen who go in the first two rounds and that’s without several of the class’ top players in attendance.
Even without what’s widely viewed as the top quartet of wide receivers in the class — Marvin Harrison, Jr., Rome Odunze, Malik Nabors and Brian Thomas, Jr. — participating, Mobile was littered with pass-catchers whom teams will be happy to grab on the second and third days of April’s draft.
“This is our best roster and I don’t mean for that to sound boastful at all,” Nagy said. “It should be our best roster when we can open it up to the underclassmen pool. It’s certainly helped. It’s helped the star power of the game.”
Indeed, at Hancock Whitney Stadium you could find impressive defensive linemen of various shapes and sizes like Texas’ T’Vondre Sweat, Missouri’s Darius Robinson and Florida State’s Brandon Fiske. Interesting edge guys like Penn State’s Adisa Isaac and Western Michigan’s Marshawn Kneeland. Feisty corners like Jarvis Brownlee, Jr. and rangy ones like Khyree Jackson and Cam Hart. Unique defensive weapons like James Williams and Payton Wilson.
Something for everyone.
Last year, two participants got picked in the first round but the game featured 38 Day 2 selections, according to the Senior Bowl website.
None of the four first-round receivers played, but the game still featured immediate-impact rookies like Puka Nacua, Tank Dell, Rashee Rice, Jayden Reed and more.
With the addition of underclassmen to this year’s game, the depth only improved across the board.
The key decision
All of that adds up to a critical set of decisions forming for the Broncos.
The top three quarterbacks will almost assuredly be long gone by No. 12, and it will cost a fortune to move into position to select one.
In 2021 San Francisco moved from No. 12 to No. 3 for Trey Lance and it cost No. 12, its first-round pick in each of the next two drafts and a future third-rounder.
Even a willingness from head coach Sean Payton and general manager George Paton to pay that kind of price presumes a willing partner, and it’s unclear whether one will emerge.
Chicago, Washington and New England hold the top three spots and could snap up Williams, Maye and Daniels in some order. The New York Giants at No. 6, Atlanta at No. 8, the New York Jets at No. 10 and Minnesota at No. 11 all could reasonably be in the market, too.
Denver, meanwhile, has no second-round pick and traded one of its two 2024 third-rounders last year during the draft to move up and select cornerback Riley Moss.
If the Broncos have conviction that one of the quarterbacks on the board at No. 12 or as their pick approaches can be the face of the franchise moving forward, they should of course take him or try to move up a couple of spots.
Opinions, however, still vary widely. In a recent top-50, NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah had Nix ranked No. 23, McCarthy No. 27 and Penix No. 40. ESPN draft analyst Jordan Reid has McCarthy solidly in the first round, a late-first/early-Day 2 grade on Nix and an early-Day 2 grade on Penix.
That’s not to say one or all of them could end up picked before that — quarterbacks are over-drafted almost every year — but there’s no consensus that any of them are good value at No. 12.
Nix was asked this week how he’d try to separate himself and he said, “Just being myself. If it’s going to happen, just let it naturally happen. … You’re not going to be able to drastically separate yourself because of the standards and the success that the (other Senior Bowl quarterbacks) have. It’s just been good. Just trying to be myself and do the best I can to be the best quarterback I can be.”
There are still nearly three months before the draft to continue trying to prove how good that is for Nix and the others. The class will continue to take shape as teams gather more and more information.
At this juncture, though, it’s setting up for the No. 12 pick to land in the middle between the top group of quarterbacks and the next.
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