Betting Stuff: Back a run on quarterbacks to open the 2024 NFL Draft

Quarterbacks went 1-2-3 in the 2021 NFL Draft. Atlanta broke ranks and drafted Florida’s Kyle Pitts. Quarterbacks went 1-2 in the 2016 and 2015 NFL Drafts. Quarterbacks went 1-2-3 in the 1999 NFL Draft before Indianapolis broke ranks for a running back. In the modern era of the 7-round draft (since 1994), we haven’t yet seen 4 consecutive quarterbacks taken to begin a draft.

But sometimes there’s too much smoke.

FanDuel is currently offering +170 odds on the first 4 selections all being quarterbacks, and that looks like the play ahead of Thursday’s opening round.

(Full disclosure: the prop was priced at +230 on Tuesday morning and by the time this column was finished, it had moved pretty significantly. So, there’s that.)

Caleb Williams is the overwhelming favorite to be taken first overall by the Chicago Bears — a fitting franchise face for a floundering franchise. At the time of publication, a $100 bet on Williams to go first overall at FanDuel would win 2 quarters.

Washington also appears to be locked into a quarterback at No. 2 as well. Both quarterbacks who played for the franchise in 2023 have since left the team — one via trade and one via free agency. Whether the Commanders select LSU’s Jayden Daniels (the favorite) or North Carolina’s Drake Maye is irrelevant; the pick here is a quarterback for a club that hasn’t had a reliable player at the position since Kirk Cousins left.

The New England Patriots hold pick No. 3, and they’re reportedly listening to calls about the selection. According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, New England is “fielding calls” from teams but it would take a large package to move down.

Perhaps Patriots GM Eliot Wolf could follow Arizona’s roadmap from last year’s NFL Draft in moving down, then moving back up. New England would have to be enamored with a player like Michigan’s JJ McCarthy for that to be plausible, though.

“One way or another, I’d like to see us get a top-rate, young quarterback,” club owner Robert Kraft said at the league’s annual meetings in March, per NFL.com.

Is the extra draft capital worth the drop from Daniels/Maye to McCarthy? The Patriots are just getting over picking the wrong quarterback in the 2021 draft.

Arizona holds the keys to the kingdom for QB-needy teams this week.

At No. 4, the Cardinals are widely rumored to be a natural trade partner for a team like the Giants, the Vikings, the Broncos, or the Raiders. If Arizona keeps the pick, Ohio State receiver Marvin Harrison Jr. is believed to be the man. Cardinals GM Monti Ossenfort gets to gauge whether Arizona can move around the board and still land a No. 1 receiver for this offense, which is the thing the Cardinals desperately need to come away from this draft with.

Malik Nabers and Rome Odunze fit the bill on paper, but neither seems to have the pedigree with NFL clubs that Harrison has.

The Giants hold the sixth pick. Is McCarthy better than Daniel Jones? Maybe, but the potential of McCarthy could easily be better than the reality of Jones. The sixth overall pick in 2019, Jones has 2 career playoff appearances — and a very unsightly divisional round performance against the Eagles.

Minnesota holds the 11th pick and seems to be aggressively pursuing a quarterback. Denver and Las Vegas hold the next 2 picks, respectively. None in this tier have their long-term answer at quarterback.

Denver holds 5 picks between the third and fifth rounds, but it doesn’t currently possess a second-round pick. If the Broncos wanted to trade into the second round to get Bo Nix or Michael Penix Jr., they have the ammo to do so. Conversely, they could just move their first-rounder to do so.

Minnesota has a pair of first-rounders, but it doesn’t have another pick inside the top 100. Arizona has 6 picks inside the top 100.

Ossenfort said at the league’s owners’ meetings he is listening to calls.

“Listen, I think the way I look at it is, I love my house,” Ossenfort said. “I love where I live. My wife loves where we live. If, all of a sudden, there’s a knock on my door and someone’s going to offer me something, I’m going to look and see what they’re offering me. If I open that up and it’s something I’m not expecting, ‘Hey, Shannon [Ossenfort’s wife], let’s go. Pack up. It’s time to roll.’ I think that happens beforehand. It happens on the clock. I think different teams have different motivations but we’ll see how this one plays out [this] week.”

Ossenfort came out of the gates swinging to begin his Cardinals tenure this time last year. Arizona traded the No. 3 pick on draft day to the Houston Texans for a package that included the No. 12 pick, the No. 33 pick, a 2024 first-rounder, and a 2024 third-rounder. Then, Ossenfort traded pick No. 12, 34, and 168 to the Detroit Lions to move back into the top-10.

It was imaginative, and it has become a model that a team like New England could potentially follow.

Or, Ossenfort could just do it again.

Cardinals fans seem to already be in love with Harrison. And he’s exceptional. He was a two-time unanimous All-American and the 2023 Biletnikoff winner. But Washington’s Rome Odunze can do some of the same things. Nabers is his own brand of star-in-the-making. All 3 are top-10 wideouts in this draft. Is the drop-off actually that large between them? I don’t believe so, but I’m also not an NFL scout. And I don’t work for the Cardinals.

ESPN’s Jordan Reid has Nabers projected to go sixth and Odunze projected to go seventh. If Harrison is still on the board when the Los Angeles Chargers pick at No. 5, the entire board could shift for a number of clubs.

It comes down to McCarthy, and how in love any of the remaining four QB-leaning teams are with him.

The national champ has blown up during the pre-draft process. McCarthy was initially a 50-1 bet at ESPN BET to go No. 2 when the markets opened in February. When the league’s owners got together at the end of March, he jumped to 3-1 at one point. On Tuesday, he was sitting at 10-1 odds to go second, 4-1 to go third, and 3.5-1 to go fourth.

While the Michigan Man wasn’t a focal point in his college offense, he fits in pretty well with what Minnesota in particular wants to do. And with the presence of Sam Darnold in Minnesota, McCarthy wouldn’t have to step in the door as the No. 1 guy. He’d have time to grow.

More than anything, the presence of this many quarterback-needy teams in the draft bodes well. For McCarthy and for Arizona. The Cardinals, said to be content to wait until they’re on the clock to pull the trigger on any trades, can theoretically drive the price up for teams wanting to select McCarthy.

And there seems to be a distinct gap in how NFL clubs view the top 4 names against the Nix/Penix duo. Which could lend itself to a bidding war.

The 2023 quarterback class is still having its quality determined. The 2022 class was historically bad. Beyond Trevor Lawrence, the 2021 class looks to be filled with misses. The 2020 class was outstanding. The 2019 class had 1 star. That run has left quite a few teams in the market for a franchise face.

Using a rolling 5-year average, this year marked the fifth consecutive time the league average pass rate declined. Offenses really turned to the air from 2013-16, when the 2 highest average pass rates of the century occurred (55.4% in 2015, 55.9% in 2016). That period of time also featured the 2 seasons when average plays per game in the NFL were at their peak.

In the years since, the league average pass rate has cleared 55% only once and the average plays run have mostly stabilized around 63. Defenses are getting smarter, and offenses are adjusting. More and more, things are geared around what the quarterback can do with the football. And with an aging class of historic quarterbacks leaving the game or winding down their careers, a skill issue is presenting itself.

It’s understandable why teams might be drawn to McCarthy. He’s a proven winner and leader. He posted the nation’s third-best QBR in 2023 (89.2). In 2 seasons as the starter in Ann Arbor, he completed 68.5% of his passes with a 1.4% interception rate and an average of 8.7 yards gained per pass.

For all these reasons, I see a ton of value in betting on the top 4 picks in the 2024 NFL Draft to all be quarterbacks.