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DRAFT Day is April 25^th. Well actually it’s three days 25^th, 26^th and 27^th, but you get the idea. Over the coming month, I’m going to do a position by position breakdown, of each team in the division. Just to compare known players apples to apples, and get everyone on the same page, before we start adding rookies, which can include anything from 1st round busts, to 6^th round sure-fire Hall Of Famers.

Today we breakdown (cities are in alphabetical order): The Triggermen

DALLAS: Dak Prescott started every game last year and went 12 – 5 in the process. His 36 touchdown passes led the NFL last year, contrasted against just 9 picks. Many would call it a bounce back year, but I said last year, that the media was over-blowing the 15 picks he threw in 2022.

Judging his abilities, and not weighing any pieces around him, Prescott can make every NFL throw, and has the experience to diagnose coverages. He doesn’t have dangerous mobility, but he can get himself out of most trouble, and make a play here and there. His arm however, doesn’t always react to his eyes in real-time, resulting in picks that seem like head scratchers.

Cooper Rush will someday own a bar, where his regulars extrapolate his limited career stats, into a HOF career “if only he got to play more”. He’s a cerebral back-up, with a mid-level arm. Two season’s ago vs the Eagles, he missed his only shot at stardom.

Now, Rush will be making room for Trey Lance, who is trying to resurrect his career, after just two years as a pro. Lance is seen as a reclamation project with high upside; and with Dallas electing to not extend Prescott, Lance could end up becoming the Cowboys starter in 2025.

NEW YORK: It’s been said that when he’s healed from his 2023 ACL tear, that Daniel Jones is the starter. His entire tenure as a giant, has been a dumpster fire that keeps re-igniting itself. BUT, he’s a personal favorite of the owner. He played 6 games last year, lost five and ended the season on I.R. (Injured Reserve), for the second time in his short career.

In five seasons, he’s thrown 20+ touchdowns, just once (24 as a rookie). His remaining 48 career scoring strikes, are spread out over four years! (Read that last sentence again.) His mobility and moxie helps him make plays with his legs, but it’s also costing him chunks of seasons. If his mobility is any way diminished, he becomes a statue who’s passing is an outright liability.

If not for Jones’s bloated and over-guaranteed contract, Tommy DeVito would probably open up this season as the guy. He plays like a guy who’s trying to get noticed and earn something. Which is more than can be said for a quarter of the players in the league. But again, Jones’s 40M per year contract, cannot be ignored.

At the third string, somehow, Drew Lock is still drawing NFL paychecks. What his role is expected to be, is anybody’s guess. If the idea was to sign a veteran player, the giants nailed it. If they were hoping for a special player that they could turn into a project… Swing and a miss! So much mediocrity here.

PHILADELPHIA: Jalen Hurts started every game last season, went 11 – 6, threw for career-highs in both yardage (3858), and TD’s (23). He also rushed for a career-high 15 scores. Yet, it was easy to see, that he regressed badly last year. Did I mention that he also threw a career-high 15 interceptions? I didn’t? My bad. He also threw a career-high 15 interceptions.

Some of that is likely due to a lingering lower leg injury that he suffered early last season. It robbed him of his explosiveness as a runner. So opponents stopped regarding his running as dangerous, and played to limit his passing options. His reads and inability to handle the blitz (as 3^rd year starter!) were exposed, and the Eagles Achilles Heel became front page news.

Kenny Pickett was recently added, via a trade with the Steelers. He was the 20^th overall pick in the 2022 Draft, but nothing in his pro game, says that he should have been. From everything I’ve seen so far, he looks like an average QB. A very average QB. Tanner McKee is the third stringer, at the moment.

WASHINGTON: At this moment in time, this position has only two quarterbacks and Jake Fromm, on the Commanders roster. The best one of them, is Marcus Mariota; and he doesn’t even have a picture on the roster page of their website.

So yeah. The level of that team’s commitment to him, is apparent. The other placeholders are the oft traveled Jake Driskel, and Fromm, who hasn’t been on an active roster since 2021.

This is it! No joke. If the season started tomorrow, this is their QB room. So you can bet your ass, that this team is drafting a QB on the 25^th of April. If he turns out to suck, the NFL might be morally obligated to black-out Washington’s games, until a messiah is born unto them. This is bad. I cannot recall seeing a worse QB situation, and that includes the expansion teams.

SO WHO’S THE BEST?

Right now, the nod has to go to DALLAS. Their starter has a clear command of his system, his weapons, and the same Offensive Coordinator as last year. Hurts is close, but he going to have a new OC, and his inability to handle the blitz is an outright liability. Until he shows that he’s gotten that problem solved, Hurts can’t be said to be elite, or even possess all the tools of a pro.

Dallas also has a proven back-up who can win them games. That gives them the deepest QB room going into 2024. In addition to that, they may have their next long-term starting QB already on the roster. The Eagles might also claim this, but Pickett doesn’t have nearly Lance’s upside.