A position-by-position look at the New Orleans Saints’ draft needs, ranked in order of importance from 1-14:
Current depth chart:
Drew Brees. Age 36. Signed through 2016.
Luke McCown. Age 33. Signed through 2015.
Ryan Griffin. Age 25. Scheduled to be exclusive rights free agent in 2017.
Draft possibilities: It's become very trendy to predict that the Saints will make a splash in this year's draft by drafting Brees' successor. And I understand why -- Sean Payton and Mickey Loomis are aggressive executives who are likely to be proactive when it comes to the future of their QB position, just as they've been with the entire roster this offseason.
However, I disagree with the notion that they'll draft a QB early just because Brees is 36 and he had a slightly-down year in 2014.
I think Brees will still be a top-10 NFL starter for at least three more years, and I believe the Saints feel similarly. They won't force themselves to draft a QB in Rounds 1 or 2 just because Brees is 36. They'll do it if and when they fall in love with a specific prospect and have a strong conviction that he can be the long-term answer at the position.
And I'm not sure this will be the year, considering this isn't a very strong QB class.
New Orleans would have to pay a huge sum to trade up for Oregon’s Marcus Mariota – something Payton flatly denied they would consider doing. Or it could consider Baylor’s Bryce Petty or UCLA’s Brett Hundley with the 31st or 44th pick in the draft. But that's awfully high for those guys, and I’m not sure how the Saints feel about those two prospects in particular.
“We’re not going to be able to just force a pick and take somebody just because we think Drew is getting older,” Loomis said last month. “It has be the right guy at the right time.”
Payton echoed those sentiments recently while shooting down a report from last season that the Saints intended to draft a QB high in 2015.
“What’s crazy is, how do you predict something like that?” Payton said, explaining that it would depend on a player’s grade even more than a positional need.
An equally popular notion is that the Saints could look to draft a QB in the middle rounds and develop him for a year or two behind Brees – but that’s an even bigger crapshoot than drafting a QB early.
Though it sounds like a nice idea, recent history proves that late-round QBs rarely pan out in the NFL. In the past 10 years, no QBs drafted outside of the first three rounds have gone on to start 20 games in the NFL – a stat that ESPN’s Kevin Seifert featured in this QB study last month.
Only two current NFL starters were drafted outside the first three rounds – Tom Brady (sixth round in 2000) and Tony Romo (undrafted in 2003). Those are extremely rare cases. Russell Wilson (third round in 2012) is a rarity, too.
ESPN Dallas Cowboys reporter Todd Archer highlighted a lot of these same facts in a recent piece on when the Cowboys need to find Romo’s successor. And his takeaway was this:
“Let’s say Romo plays another three years through 2017 when he is 37. In 2018, that’s when the Cowboys will really need to find his successor.”
I think the timetable is similar with Brees – unless the Saints truly identify a specific prospect in the meantime that they feel is to good to pass up.
Lastly, the Saints could certainly draft a QB in the middle to late rounds with the idea of developing him as a backup with an outside chance of becoming a future starter. But they don't need to force that, either, since Griffin has shown nice potential as an undrafted rookie in 2013. And it's not something the Saints have made a habit of. They've only drafted one QB under Payton -- Sean Canfield in the seventh round in 2010.
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