The draft’s most polarizing prospect (a potential Dolphins target) makes big decision
The most polarizing player in college football has signed on to play in college football’s most important all-star game.
Oregon quarterback Justin Herbert — a potential top-10 pick — has agreed to participate in the Senior Bowl, Jim Nagy, the showcase’s executive director, announced Tuesday night.
Herbert will join Oklahoma’s Jalen Hurts and Utah State’s Jordan Love in Mobile, Ala., later this month.
All three quarterbacks will do their best to impress the dozens — if not hundreds — of scouts, coaches and general managers who will descend on the Gulf Coast to kick off draft season.
With Herbert, Hurts and Love on board, Nagy has put together an impressive roster of quarterbacks. And if he can convince LSU’s Joe Burrow to join them, it will be the best group of signal-callers to participate in the game — open to college seniors and fourth-year juniors — in recent memory.
Herbert has a ton to gain — or lose — in Mobile.
He is widely viewed as the class’ third-best quarterback behind Burrow and Alabama’s Tua Tagovailoa, but there’s a real debate about how high he should go.
He has great natural ability but his pocket presence and instincts leave much to be desired. Some say top 10. Others wouldn’t take him in the first round.
ESPN’s Mel Kiper lists Herbert (6-foot-6, 237 pounds) as the draft’s seventh-best prospect. (He ranks Burrow second and Tagovailoa third).
“He can be a maddening evaluation, though overall this season he has shown improved accuracy and better decision-making,” Kiper wrote recently. “As I wrote in May, he just looks like a potential No. 1 pick — great size, a powerful arm to make every throw, limited interceptions, good athleticism. Yet he took a step back in consistency in 2018, and that’s why I thought he made a good decision to return to Oregon for his senior season. Herbert has 32 touchdown passes and only five interceptions this year. Because of his physical tools, there will be teams that love him. But there will also be teams that stay away from him because of his inconsistent play.”
Herbert will have a chance to sway critics during a week of high-level practices in two weeks. Dolphins GM Chris Grier will be watching his progress closely.
This story was originally published January 7, 2020 at 8:59 PM.
