This is driving me insane, I know BB & SP are not fools but why a QB in round 3? why? This has caused me to lose sleep.
Instead of "why a QB in round 3"...how about "why THAT QB in round 3".
In the last 16 years (AKA, the free agency era), the Super Bowl winner has had at QB either:
- A high 1st round draft pick (Aikman, Young, Elway, Dilfer, Meathead, Goober and Goober Jr.)
- A low round/undrafted player (Warner, Brady, B.Johnson)
- Brett Favre
Since the Pats hope to never be in position to draft that high in the 1st round (or pay that money for a QB to develop), you have to think the Pats would have to strike gold again in finding their post-Brady QB. So Kingsbury, Cassel and Gutierrez shouldn't be a surprise.
In addition to showing how beneficial financially it can be to build a team around a QB picked outside the top half of the 1st round, Brady also provided a prototype for what the Pats should be looking for. Brady, Cassel, Gutierrez and O'Connell could probably share clothes. That isn't by accident.
But Cassel and Gutierrez were late round flyers. Why pick O'Connell? He fits the prototype and is a superior athlete, but is technically raw. If the Pats can coach him up and get his footwork and release correct and consistent, he will be a starting caliber QB in the NFL. If the Pats have guessed right and he has the intangibles necessary to process information quickly and make good decisions, he will be a Pro Bowl caliber QB in the NFL. Those are pretty big "if's" and that is why he didn't go on the 1st day of the draft.
Why the 3rd round when he was projected to go in the 5th? Simple. That is the spot the Pats knew they had to take O'Connell to minimize the risk someone else would trump them. That says the Pats feel good about their ability to coach him up and O'Connell's ability to take good coaching and apply it on the field.
If they are wrong, they blew a 3rd round pick. Is that a disaster? Two words...Brock Williams. Two more...Guss Scott. Both of those players were drafted in years the Pats won the Super Bowl.
If they are right about O'Connell, they will have a gem at the most important position in football. His rookie contract will be up right around the time Brady may be starting to think about his life in politics. Or judging beauty contests around the world. Regardless, O'Connell is an investment that could pay off big in the future.