MOBILE, Ala. _ LSU quarterback Joe Burrow is almost a guarantee to be taken with the No. 1 overall pick in this year's draft.
But at the Senior Bowl this week in Mobile all eyes and microphones are pointed in the direction of Oregon quarterback Justin Herbert to see if his draft grade will improve or regress.
The Panthers' quarterback situation is up in the air. Cam Newton has one year left on his deal, but his health is still unknown after having surgery on his left foot in December. And with a new coaching staff taking over, it's a definite option for Carolina to explore taking a quarterback early in this year's draft.
Could the 6-foot-6 Herbert be an option at No. 7 overall? Maybe not _ plenty of mock drafts have Herbert going outside the top 10 and later in the first round. But teams have different feelings on the Oregon product, which is why this week and the rest of the draft process, including the combine, will be so important to how teams view him.
When asked if he had met with the Panthers yet, Herbert deflected.
"I think that's something that I'd like to keep private at this time," Herbert said. "I appreciate the question."
Overall, Herbert looked good in his first day of practice, completing several impressive throws, including multiple deep downfield. His accuracy was on point, especially seen on an over-the-shoulder reception by Florida Atlantic tight end Harrison Bryant, whom Herbert had said he was excited to play with. Not much could have gone better on his first day.
Teams' concerns with Herbert involve his consistency on the field and his ability to lead and not be too quiet. And while showing he can put up the same performance over and over again on the field may take all week to reinforce, he addressed the off the field talk head on.
"I think people are worried about leadership and me being a pretty quiet guy," Herbert said. "But I would say I'm not too quiet. I'll talk your ear off. So there are these things I want to be transparent with (teams on). And (try to) give a good representation of myself."
Herbert said he wouldn't qualify himself as an introvert or extrovert, but instead said he is somewhere in the middle. Not too far in either direction. Outside of his personality, Herbert elaborated on what teams would be getting from him off the field.
"(I'm) a really hard worker. I'm a guy that I pride myself on the way I prepare and how hard I work," Herbert said. "I'm going to do my best, I'm going to do everything I can to be successful and play this game for as long as I can."
During his senior year at Oregon, he put together a strong season, throwing 32 touchdowns to six interceptions and completing 66.8% of his passes. Herbert said Tuesday that in his final season with the Ducks, he improved on his decision-making abilities, getting out of bad situations and having a better feel at the line of scrimmage.
Bengals coach Zac Taylor, whose staff is in charge of the South team which Herbert is on, pointed out Herbert's strong arm and the fact that he is hard to bring down is what stood out to him.
On top of everything else, Herbert was named Pac-12 Scholar of the Year with a 4.01 GPA. He was a general science major at Oregon and compared what he learned from the school with what he has to do one the field.
"I like to think about how things work and I think defenses kind of work similarly," Herbert said. "I think you need to know how (defenses) work and why things work the way they do, I think that's a big correlation between those two."
One note for Panthers fans on Herbert: He said when he studied NFL quarterbacks in college, he's watched a few of them, many of whom are familiar to everyone in Carolina.
"We watched a lot of Matt Ryan in college, we watched a lot of his play fakes, a lot of his play-action type stuff, rolling around and getting his eyes snapped around," Herbert said. "We were big on Drew Brees and Tom Brady, their mechanics, so we looked at a lot of their stuff as well."
Inconsistency and how we will perform on a day-to-day basis on an NFL level aren't things that can be erased with one Senior Bowl practice. And there are so many questions that would have to be answered before the Panthers select a quarterback with the seventh overall pick, a year after they took Will Grier in the third round.
But with the Panthers' full coaching staff in attendance, and likely meeting with Herbert, they will have a much stronger answer if he could be a good fit once the rest of the questions get checked off.
