The 2025 NFL Draft quarterback picture remains extremely blurry, even as college football’s Heisman race and playoff picture start to gain some clarity.
After another big weekend for some of the top QB prospects, The Athletic draft experts Dane Brugler and Nick Baumgardner answer some questions on where things stand:
Dane said on the “Scoop City” podcast last week that Cam Ward currently would be his bet to be the first QB drafted come April. Is that a reflection of Ward’s performance and development or an indictment of this year’s quarterback class as a whole?
Brugler: Both. The top quarterback this year would have been competing for QB4 in last year’s class, at best — maybe even QB6 or QB7.
Ward is 6-foot-2 and 225 pounds with an electric arm and the elusiveness in the pocket to create opportunities. He is a really loose player, though, which is a double-edged sword. It’s what makes him dangerous as a play creator, but it also will lead to negative plays.
With better talent around him at Miami, he’s lowered his turnover-worthy play rate and sacks taken, even if both still pop up on every tape. His progress each year gives evaluators reason to be optimistic about him as a player, both today and in terms of where he will be in the future.
Just some more Cam Ward magic for your timeline 🪄
📺: ABC #GoCanes | #HE1SMAN pic.twitter.com/OpPUUF7iQX
— Miami Hurricanes Football (@CanesFootball) November 2, 2024
Ward was a wing-T quarterback in high school and ran strict Air Raid schemes at Incarnate Word and Washington State. This season, in OC Shannon Dawson’s offense, he’s still operating an Air Raid playbook but with plenty of variation — and he’s putting new things on tape that he wasn’t asked to do before. Scouts are encouraged by Ward’s character reviews, too. Past and present coaches rave about his intelligence, confidence and leadership.
The most important thing to remember: There won’t be a consensus on these quarterbacks. One team’s QB1 will be another’s QB4.
Baumgardner: It’s all of the above, but largely about this year’s class. This QB group isn’t as bad as the one from 2022, but it’s on that dance floor.
Ward’s situation feels like a product of his smart offseason maneuvering, as much as anything. I still think he’d have been picked late in last year’s draft year, but Ward worked the transfer portal as well as anyone we’ve ever seen. This is the best offensive line he’s ever been behind, there are multiple pros in his WR room, and he has a real running game to lean on.
Most importantly, he’s a wonderful fit in Dawson’s pass offense and, without question, has been the FBS’ most consistently lethal downfield passer this season. The only other player with an argument in that category would be Shedeur Sanders.
As far as QB1 goes? If we forced Dane to answer the QB1 question every week for the next six weeks, we’d probably break his brain. We can’t afford that, so we’re not going to do it, but it’s all because this class has been so erratic. So far, Ward and Sanders have been the calmest in the storm.
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Ward is a five-year starter, across three schools, but it still feels like he has something to prove. Assuming he gets a playoff opportunity, how wide is the range of potential draft outcomes that’ll hinge on his performance?
Brugler: The ACC is extremely underwhelming this season, especially on defense, which complicates Ward’s evaluation.
Consciously or subconsciously, playoff games will be weighted a little more by NFL teams. And they should be, because of the high-stakes atmospheres and competition level. But quarterback evaluation always will be more about body of work than a single-game performance. Michael Penix Jr. threw for 430 yards in the semifinal against Texas last year, then fell apart against Michigan’s defense — the closest thing he had ever seen to an NFL defense. Obviously, the Falcons were comfortable with his body of work.
Baumgardner: You never want to make everything about one or two games, but C.J. Stroud catapulted himself after a spectacular College Football Playoff performance against Georgia, because it confirmed all we thought possible after watching the rest of his career — mostly against overmatched defenses.
I don’t want to say it’ll be all about how Ward performs in the playoffs (or if he faces Clemson in the ACC title game), but it’ll be a pretty massive part of his evaluation. Being in a truly high-pressure situation against a top-level defense is about the only thing Ward has never attempted in college.
Let’s be clear: He’s been a walking highlight all year — spectacular, maybe my No. 2 Heisman vote, right behind Travis Hunter. Still, a lot of this is about the team he’s on. No FBS quarterback has received more yards after catch than Ward (1,714 yards). He’s at 9.0 air yards per attempt and confident over the middle, but he’s also benefitted from explosive screens at a Quinn Ewers level.
Everything Miami runs is open, and though Ward already has eclipsed 3,000 yards, you could argue he’s left plenty on the field by missing open targets as a result of sloppy footwork and an inconsistent pocket process. Ward’s current off-target rate (14.6 percent) is the worst it’s been since his last year at Incarnate Word in 2021. I’d be surprised if he had a consensus first-round grade. (But there’s also no way that was ever the case with Bo Nix or Penix, and they were both chosen in the top half of the first.)
Georgia rallied past Florida, but Carson Beck threw three more interceptions (and two TDs). Is he still a Round 1 prospect in this year’s class?
Brugler: If the draft happened tomorrow, my guess is Beck would be drafted in the third round. He was viewed as a potential first-rounder after last season (his first as a starter), because of the progress he showed in each game — he took care of the football and took what the defense gave him while leaning on his weapons, notably Ladd McConkey and Brock Bowers.
22-yards to the 🏠
📺 ABC#GoDawgs pic.twitter.com/TsmpeAIp5E
— Georgia Football (@GeorgiaFootball) November 2, 2024
This season has been almost the opposite. He’s thrown multiple interceptions in four of the last five games (after posting zero multi-interception games over his first 17 starts), and he is pressing and forcing throws instead of finding other options. Without McConkey or Bowers, it looks like a completely different offense.
Beck has NFL tools. But when things haven’t gone according to plan, he has struggled to make second-reaction plays and create. It is a hard sell to draft a quarterback in the first round who can’t consistently produce out of structure.
Baumgardner: While Ward’s been able to work with a better supporting cast this season, Beck has had to adjust to a lesser one. It has not gone particularly great and, as a result, it feels like Beck has slid back into the “tweener” tier — probably behind at least Sanders and Ward, as we sit today.
We weren’t blind last season. Beck made many big-time throws, but he often did so inside stable pockets and with Bowers and McConkey running open. This year, Beck has faced about two more pressures per game (up to 8.25), and that’s resulted in too many poor decisions and some lost confidence. Beck has made big throws in basically every start this year. He’s also consistently made dangerous — or just plain bad — decisions, something we didn’t see much of last season.
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Much of it is a result of Beck simply not knowing what to do out of structure if no one’s open and/or he’s facing pressure. The first interception he threw Saturday was a direct result of this. His early reads weren’t open, he panicked and started fading backward before slinging one up for grabs.
In a year with so many question marks at QB, it’s hard to rule out the first round for Beck. Same time, it’s also hard to rule out a slide, especially if things don’t even out down the stretch.
Dane also mentioned on “Scoop City” that he’d like to see Penn State’s Drew Allar (and LSU’s Garrett Nussmeier) stay in school and develop for another season. Given Allar’s performance this season — and especially Saturday vs. Ohio State — what might be giving NFL scouts pause?
Brugler: The Anthony Richardson situation has been another reminder that the NFL isn’t a developmental league. I understand underclassmen wanting to strike while the iron is hot and jump to the NFL — and every player’s situation is different — but that decision should always come down to what is best for each player’s long-term development. In most cases for quarterbacks, that means returning to school for valuable experience. NIL can grease the wheels in the decision-making process these days.
Allar is a good-sized passer with the talent to become an NFL starter one day, but that day still looks far away. In each start, it appears as if Allar is figuring out different solutions to move the football, yet he still plays like a “young” quarterback. There is no doubt that Allar would benefit from another year of experience at the college level (although, the Penn State offense will lose several of its key players next season, so shopping the transfer portal might be a necessity for head coach James Franklin).
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As for Nussmeier, considering that his father is an NFL quarterbacks coach (Philadelphia Eagles), no underclassman QB will have better information on his draft projection.
Despite being a fourth-year player, he has just nine career starts, and the lack of experience is evident, at times, with some of his decision-making. But Nussmeier shows tremendous pocket movement and instincts for the position and has more than enough juice in his arm to rip throws down the field. Though he absolutely has a chance to be a first-rounder if he declares, Nussmeier could be better set up for the future with another season in Baton Rouge.
Baumgardner: Allar is still sort of a low-volume passer, especially this season. He rates No. 98 nationally in attempts per game (23). And, as we saw during the Ohio State loss, many of Allar’s attempts come on third or fourth down, as the Nittany Lions have a very diverse run game/trickeration package they like to tinker with on early downs.
One of the biggest things that hits me every time I go through Cam Ward tape is how I’d really like to watch Drew Allar in a functional pass offense. #FoodForThought
— Nick Baumgardner (@nickbaumgardner) November 3, 2024
He’s shown elite arm talent and an ability to really do damage between the numbers. We just haven’t seen enough of it. Allar has had his share of misses, but plenty of those have come because Penn State’s offense doesn’t really operate with much of a consistent rhythm or flow.
As with Ward, if Penn State gets to the playoff and Allar starts landing more of those shots in big moments, his stock will soar.
Since he threw for six TDs this week, let’s at least mention Ole Miss’ Jaxson Dart. Does he do anything for you as an NFL prospect?
Brugler: Dart has a Jekyll-Hyde quality. If the Arkansas game Saturday was your first exposure to him, you would guess he is in the top-10 conversation; if you watched the Ole Miss or LSU games, you saw a much more inconsistent player. After feasting on inferior non-conference opponents in September, Dart was responsible for only three touchdowns over his first four SEC games.
I know scouts like Dart — both as a quarterback and as a leader — but how he performs down the stretch will be a major factor in figuring out where he’ll be drafted.
Jaxson Dart and Missouri’s Drew Lock in 2017 are the only SEC players to ever do this 😲 @OleMissFB | @JaxsonDart pic.twitter.com/GPnDnxNE7Z
— SEC Network (@SECNetwork) November 2, 2024
Baumgardner: I’ve long been a Dart fan and definitely think he’s going to surprise some people once they start to dive into everything after the season. He’s really accurate, aggressive and, like a great three-point shooter, his arm never seems to tire. Ole Miss’ offense is very college-like (as opposed to pro style), which complicates Dart’s evaluation.
The biggest thing here, though, is I’m not sure we’d say his performances against top-end competition have been great, and he was downright bad last season vs. Alabama and Georgia. Dart will have a chance to show he’s made strides in that area this Saturday, however, when Ole Miss hosts Georgia.
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(Photo of Cam Ward: Michael Pimentel / ISI Photos / Getty Images; photo of Carson Beck: James Gilbert / Getty Images)
