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Nearly every year, the main talking points heading into the NFL draft revolve around the quarterbacks. And there seems to be no shortage of teams eager move towards the top of the draft to take their next face of the franchise.
It’s only a matter of time before your favorite team needs a new signal-caller. Whether the last one left for free agency, retired, or just simply wasn’t very good, the best NFL quarterbacks are typically drafted high. And franchises will pay steep premiums in pursuit of finding the right one.
As Reddit user Luck1492 pointed out Wednesday, nearly every team has spent a first-round pick on a quarterback since the turn of the 21st century. In fact, only three haven’t: the Seahawks, Cowboys and Saints.
Seattle has leaned on diamonds in the rough for the past two decades. The Seahawks signed Jon Kitna as an undrafted free agent in 1996, who emerged as the team’s starter from 1999 to 2000. Then, the Seahawks acquired former sixth-round pick Matt Hasselbeck in a trade with Green Bay, who went on to make three Pro Bowls and was the team’s starter for the rest of the decade.
Russell Wilson was famously a third-round pick in 2012, and his offseason departure has the Seahawks poised to finally snag a quarterback in this year’s first round.
The Cowboys have only drafted two first-round quarterbacks in their history, and both won Super Bowls with the team: Craig Morton in 1965 and Troy Aikman in 1989. Until the arrival of Tony Romo—who signed with Dallas after going undrafted in 2003—the Cowboys had a bit of a revolving door at quarterback that featured Quincy Carter, Chad Hutchinson, Drew Bledsoe and a 41-year-old Vinny Testaverde in 2004.
Then we have the Saints, who have gone 1-for-1 in drafting first-round quarterbacks. The only time they used their first pick to take a quarterback was in 1971, when they used the No. 2 pick to draft future Hall of Famer Archie Manning. Former fourth-round pick Aaron Brooks was the predominant New Orleans signal-caller for this century before Drew Brees’s arrival in 2006.
Clearly, waiting until later in the draft to take a quarterback is the exception to the norm. More than half the league has drafted a quarterback in the first round at least once over the past five years. Three—the Bears, Jets and Cardinals—have done so twice during that span. The Packers even took one in 2020, just before their incumbent starter ripped off back-to-back MVP seasons.
The moral to the story, if there is one, is that drafting a quarterback is an inexact science. This year’s draft class might not be lauded for its potentially franchise-altering quarterbacks, but that doesn’t mean none will emerge from the pack.
