Bob Sturm is the best DFW Sport Columnist going on his Substack. Subscribe like I have for some real insight. Below is his paid article on Quinn Ewers so you can get a taste of his analysis- I find his suspicion that Quinn is being coached to not make mistakes persuasive.
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bobsturm.substack.com
Bob Sturm
Nov 22, 2024
∙ Paid
In the last few weeks, I have started to prepare for the draft. I really can’t dig too deep and begin the long process of daily evaluations until the Cowboys are finally put down for the winter, but I am assembling lists, tape, and projects that are all part of the long journey. I love this process, but it is a lot, and I want to only do it if I am taking it seriously. I want to do the best I can.
Already, several of you have asked me about some players specifically. And since more than a few have asked about the same player, I thought I would give you a piece – albeit not one that will have any solid conclusions – on Texas QB Quinn Ewers.
I cannot remember a roller-coaster ride like this one. But I do remember when I first talked to one of my NFL scout buddies after Quinn announced he was transferring back to Texas from Ohio State because he wasn’t going to wait for C.J. Stroud to leave:
“He has a chance to be the first pick in the draft in a few years.”
“Really?”
“Oh yeah. He has all the tools.”
I remember that call clearly. I made the mistake of relaying the message on the radio a few times, and when he looked lost without a compass in Stillwater in 2022 and at home against TCU a few weeks later, I had some UT folks remind me that I said he would be the first pick in the draft.
Well, I actually didn’t. I was just relaying what I was told, but it was my voice and therefore gets pinned to me. I get it. Those two games were ugly. Not just because of him, but he certainly wasn’t helping. Further, in the Oklahoma State game, in particular, he looked like he completely lost confidence in himself. It is still hard to watch that tape.
But the entire 2022 season was explainable, it seemed, due to his injury and his hurried rush back. He just needed time.
And in a nutshell, thus began the up-and-down ride of Ewers. Like I said, I get asked about prospects all the time, and I try to give an answer only if I have done the work. I am not going to BS you. If I haven’t studied a guy, I won’t say I did. Nothing is worse than hearing someone’s opinion and then echoing it as your own. But I will get to work on the person of interest and dive in. Sometimes I will like your guy, and sometimes I won’t. No big deal. I get many wrong, but I want to try to figure a guy out by watching him play.
But Ewers has been a strange journey because I have never felt like I got a handle on him. Some days I think he is going to make it, and other days I think he might be a bit of a lost cause. And I don’t think I am alone at all.
We all know QB is a high-stakes gig. We all know that it is thankless, and you better have blinders and earmuffs on. We also know fans are irrational, and if they are winning games by 10, many will want to know why they didn’t win by 20. And trust me, gambling isn’t helping this at all. Now, winning isn’t enough. Not covering is what makes people upset with their guys. He basically gets to take all of the criticism that Dak Prescott gets, except without the couple hundred million dollars.
In the last two years, Ewers and Texas are 21-3 and have lost three games to teams ranked 12th, 2nd, and 5th in the country. They haven’t lost to any unranked teams, and they don’t lose much at all. Their offense is usually quite good, but also, it does seem like there is considerable meat left on the bone because of QB play. That might have something to do with putting a ton of offensive players in the NFL last year and leaving Ewers with an entirely new attack. But of course, that doesn’t matter when he is getting ripped to shreds on social media and in the real media on a weekly basis for not looking like a first pick in the draft – or even the best QB on his own roster.
Ah yes, that issue. I don’t have to catch you up on the Arch Manning issue, because who could possibly not know that who is reading this? I was absolutely wrong when I was certain that Arch would be starting in 2024 no matter what. Whether it is him or his family, there is no question that players of his regard are not usually willing to exercise this much patience to wait their turn, but it is clear they want Arch to go very slowly and develop. That is expert-level knowledge (and perhaps a family fortune that can exist without urgency-based decisions) in a sea of “get rich quick” scheming that populates every level of the QB conveyor belt these days. Perhaps this is best shown by Ewers himself opting out of a high school senior year to grab a bag of cash. But again, this is well-worn ground at this point.
So, without walking you through every step of the journey again, I am looking forward to the possibility of seeing a ton more of Ewers play. He will have – potentially – seven more games in his 2024 season for us to work through. As of this moment, I use a bunch of different rankings from people I trust, and he is currently:
– Out of Dane Brugler’s Top 50 (he was No. 23 overall in August)
– Out of Nate Tice’s Top 50
– Out of the 33rd Team’s latest Top 100
– Ranked No. 61 in the PFF early big board
Now, again, these rankings are not binding, and there is a lot of football left to play, but as you can see, the shine seems to be gone. Many respected experts think he might actually be a Day 3 QB pick now. He was always a first-round prospect, and we have the team winning while his stock falls. Not exactly the right idea.
I caution us not to get carried away, though. QBs – especially in weaker classes like 2025 – are still the lifeblood of the industry and always get pushed up by desperate teams. They will talk themselves into flawed guys if the flawless models are absent. We know this, and Ewers is not alone in this group of “best that we got” with others like Carson Beck of Georgia and Drew Aller of Penn State. Even Shedeur Sanders is compared to guys with low ceilings like Geno Smith. Not horrendous, but also not enough to make you think you have your savior. It is just one of those years where beauty will be in the eye of the beholder.
Back to Quinn. When I am asked what I think of Ewers, I have thoughts for days. I like a lot of what I see, but I also concede that there are some flaws that make me crazy. I want to say again that I really don’t want to use any tape that already exists for his actual evaluation, but there is no player in this 2025 draft that I have studied more than Ewers. I have watched his games over and over for a few years now. I doubt I will discover anything new that I don’t already have in this laptop. If I try to watch 200 snaps of each prospect, I think it is safe to say he is over 1,000 already.
Let’s talk strengths and weaknesses:
Strengths: For me, Ewers is a guy where we start with traits. He seems very familiar with good decision making and how an offense should operate. He is well-schooled in the football classroom, if you will. He delivers a very catchable ball and can really throw it with zip and accuracy to a certain distance. At times, he has proven he can function outside of structure and, as crazy as it sounds, those moments produce some of his very best passes. If he could throw it every time like he is just working off his instincts and training, I believe he would be a better QB. Also, and this is no small thing in both Sarkisian’s offense and the NFL, he delivers a near-perfect ball to the flats almost every single time. His screen, swings, flares, etc are all on a perfect spot where the receiver catches it in stride and goes. I like his reasonable athleticism and his ability to work in the pocket, even if his clock seems a little slow in terms of knowing when to say “when” and just get the ball out. He also wins a ton of games by staying out of lethal mistakes. He may have issues, but I really do value a QB who understands he cannot make the lethal error that costs a team a game that it probably should win. He stays out of turnover-decisions pretty doggone well. So, we think he can make all the throws with NFL-level arm strength and athleticism. We think he makes very sound decisions almost all of the time. So, what is there not to like?
Concerns: Well, there are quite a few, to be honest. But let’s not nitpick. Let’s stick to the elephants in the room that won’t leave.
Risk aversion is a smart coaching strategy, but it’s almost impossible to play QB if you are always seeing danger. This is what people mean when they say “a guy is seeing ghosts.” He has convinced himself why every throw is too risky.
Sometimes, you have to trust your training and let it rip.
The Sunday stage gets tougher. The stakes get higher. And yes, the instincts of the home college fans being loyal and defending you quickly disappear when you get those huge contracts. There is no strong pack mentality in the pros quite like the college fan defense system, where we fight for our guy because he went to our school. Not like the eternal energy of Longhorn, Sooners, Aggies, Tigers, or Tide fanbases. In the pros, your home fans might be the first to declare you a failed bit. And, of course, the competition gets tougher, and expectations grow for you to fire that ball into that small hole before it disappears.
Let me show you some tape. The first is what I considered to be some of his best tape I had ever seen. I thought his Michigan game was phenomenal and here are many of those moments:
Bob Sturm
·
Sep 8
Read full story
But, then here is the Georgia tape. This is maybe his worst tape. This game featured zero “big time throws” and SEVEN “turnover worthy plays” and he played like a guy who was nowhere near a NFL starter.
From that piece:
Bob Sturm
·
Oct 20
Read full story
And then last Saturday, you had something in the middle of Michigan and Georgia as he played at Arkansas and seemed to channel back and forth between his good version and his bad version:
Here are five really strong NFL-level plays from Ewers.
And then here are five very poor plays from Ewers that would suggest that Texas might not be starting their best QB in 2024:
I mean, those deep balls are touchdowns. You simply cannot miss those and expect to win a national title. Then, the Cover 2 shot is looped in when it needs to be fired.
The Arkansas game was some good and some bad.
The bottom line on Ewers is that you can find audio of me saying he can do it all, and you can also find audio of me saying he may never realize his full potential.
He is as complicated as it gets and a frustrating prospect to analyze. Yet, I plan to try to forget all of this and use 200 new snaps for his Sturm 60 evaluation this spring.
He still has time. Nothing that has happened to this point will matter if he can go and win six more football games in a row. I say six because if he wins the first three, Texas will get a bye and then be three wins from winning it all.
If he does that, he will quickly be placed back near the very top of the 2025 NFL Draft, and everything else will be called “his development” along the way.
But for now, he is consistently inconsistent and, perhaps worse, in his own head and his own worst enemy. And those QBs don’t last long as QB1 in the NFL.
He might need to clear his mind and let it rip. That might be the only way to become the guy he was once said to be.
***********
The Most Complicated QB to Evaluate
Quinn Ewers has Texas in a great spot, but can he be the chosen one on Sundays?
bobsturm.substack.com
The Most Complicated QB to Evaluate
Quinn Ewers has Texas in a great spot, but can he be the chosen one on Sundays?
Bob Sturm
Nov 22, 2024
∙ Paid
In the last few weeks, I have started to prepare for the draft. I really can’t dig too deep and begin the long process of daily evaluations until the Cowboys are finally put down for the winter, but I am assembling lists, tape, and projects that are all part of the long journey. I love this process, but it is a lot, and I want to only do it if I am taking it seriously. I want to do the best I can.
Already, several of you have asked me about some players specifically. And since more than a few have asked about the same player, I thought I would give you a piece – albeit not one that will have any solid conclusions – on Texas QB Quinn Ewers.
I cannot remember a roller-coaster ride like this one. But I do remember when I first talked to one of my NFL scout buddies after Quinn announced he was transferring back to Texas from Ohio State because he wasn’t going to wait for C.J. Stroud to leave:
“He has a chance to be the first pick in the draft in a few years.”
“Really?”
“Oh yeah. He has all the tools.”
I remember that call clearly. I made the mistake of relaying the message on the radio a few times, and when he looked lost without a compass in Stillwater in 2022 and at home against TCU a few weeks later, I had some UT folks remind me that I said he would be the first pick in the draft.
Well, I actually didn’t. I was just relaying what I was told, but it was my voice and therefore gets pinned to me. I get it. Those two games were ugly. Not just because of him, but he certainly wasn’t helping. Further, in the Oklahoma State game, in particular, he looked like he completely lost confidence in himself. It is still hard to watch that tape.
But the entire 2022 season was explainable, it seemed, due to his injury and his hurried rush back. He just needed time.
And in a nutshell, thus began the up-and-down ride of Ewers. Like I said, I get asked about prospects all the time, and I try to give an answer only if I have done the work. I am not going to BS you. If I haven’t studied a guy, I won’t say I did. Nothing is worse than hearing someone’s opinion and then echoing it as your own. But I will get to work on the person of interest and dive in. Sometimes I will like your guy, and sometimes I won’t. No big deal. I get many wrong, but I want to try to figure a guy out by watching him play.
But Ewers has been a strange journey because I have never felt like I got a handle on him. Some days I think he is going to make it, and other days I think he might be a bit of a lost cause. And I don’t think I am alone at all.
We all know QB is a high-stakes gig. We all know that it is thankless, and you better have blinders and earmuffs on. We also know fans are irrational, and if they are winning games by 10, many will want to know why they didn’t win by 20. And trust me, gambling isn’t helping this at all. Now, winning isn’t enough. Not covering is what makes people upset with their guys. He basically gets to take all of the criticism that Dak Prescott gets, except without the couple hundred million dollars.
In the last two years, Ewers and Texas are 21-3 and have lost three games to teams ranked 12th, 2nd, and 5th in the country. They haven’t lost to any unranked teams, and they don’t lose much at all. Their offense is usually quite good, but also, it does seem like there is considerable meat left on the bone because of QB play. That might have something to do with putting a ton of offensive players in the NFL last year and leaving Ewers with an entirely new attack. But of course, that doesn’t matter when he is getting ripped to shreds on social media and in the real media on a weekly basis for not looking like a first pick in the draft – or even the best QB on his own roster.
Ah yes, that issue. I don’t have to catch you up on the Arch Manning issue, because who could possibly not know that who is reading this? I was absolutely wrong when I was certain that Arch would be starting in 2024 no matter what. Whether it is him or his family, there is no question that players of his regard are not usually willing to exercise this much patience to wait their turn, but it is clear they want Arch to go very slowly and develop. That is expert-level knowledge (and perhaps a family fortune that can exist without urgency-based decisions) in a sea of “get rich quick” scheming that populates every level of the QB conveyor belt these days. Perhaps this is best shown by Ewers himself opting out of a high school senior year to grab a bag of cash. But again, this is well-worn ground at this point.
So, without walking you through every step of the journey again, I am looking forward to the possibility of seeing a ton more of Ewers play. He will have – potentially – seven more games in his 2024 season for us to work through. As of this moment, I use a bunch of different rankings from people I trust, and he is currently:
– Out of Dane Brugler’s Top 50 (he was No. 23 overall in August)
– Out of Nate Tice’s Top 50
– Out of the 33rd Team’s latest Top 100
– Ranked No. 61 in the PFF early big board
Now, again, these rankings are not binding, and there is a lot of football left to play, but as you can see, the shine seems to be gone. Many respected experts think he might actually be a Day 3 QB pick now. He was always a first-round prospect, and we have the team winning while his stock falls. Not exactly the right idea.
I caution us not to get carried away, though. QBs – especially in weaker classes like 2025 – are still the lifeblood of the industry and always get pushed up by desperate teams. They will talk themselves into flawed guys if the flawless models are absent. We know this, and Ewers is not alone in this group of “best that we got” with others like Carson Beck of Georgia and Drew Aller of Penn State. Even Shedeur Sanders is compared to guys with low ceilings like Geno Smith. Not horrendous, but also not enough to make you think you have your savior. It is just one of those years where beauty will be in the eye of the beholder.
Back to Quinn. When I am asked what I think of Ewers, I have thoughts for days. I like a lot of what I see, but I also concede that there are some flaws that make me crazy. I want to say again that I really don’t want to use any tape that already exists for his actual evaluation, but there is no player in this 2025 draft that I have studied more than Ewers. I have watched his games over and over for a few years now. I doubt I will discover anything new that I don’t already have in this laptop. If I try to watch 200 snaps of each prospect, I think it is safe to say he is over 1,000 already.
Let’s talk strengths and weaknesses:
Strengths: For me, Ewers is a guy where we start with traits. He seems very familiar with good decision making and how an offense should operate. He is well-schooled in the football classroom, if you will. He delivers a very catchable ball and can really throw it with zip and accuracy to a certain distance. At times, he has proven he can function outside of structure and, as crazy as it sounds, those moments produce some of his very best passes. If he could throw it every time like he is just working off his instincts and training, I believe he would be a better QB. Also, and this is no small thing in both Sarkisian’s offense and the NFL, he delivers a near-perfect ball to the flats almost every single time. His screen, swings, flares, etc are all on a perfect spot where the receiver catches it in stride and goes. I like his reasonable athleticism and his ability to work in the pocket, even if his clock seems a little slow in terms of knowing when to say “when” and just get the ball out. He also wins a ton of games by staying out of lethal mistakes. He may have issues, but I really do value a QB who understands he cannot make the lethal error that costs a team a game that it probably should win. He stays out of turnover-decisions pretty doggone well. So, we think he can make all the throws with NFL-level arm strength and athleticism. We think he makes very sound decisions almost all of the time. So, what is there not to like?
Concerns: Well, there are quite a few, to be honest. But let’s not nitpick. Let’s stick to the elephants in the room that won’t leave.
- While he can make every throw, it seems, the deeper ones have never been easy for him. Sometimes he overthrows a wide-open post pattern. Sometimes he puts too much trajectory on a throw that needs to be fired tightly into the Cover 2 hole. Sometimes he underthrows a fade. While he has every club and probably hits great shots at the range without fail, when he takes it to the course and everyone is counting on him, the pass always seems to lack the expert touch that the job demands. This leaves plays on the field and points off the board.
- He seems programmed to not make mistakes, and it is making him a worse prospect. I am sure Sark could tell you a story or two about how we got here, and Quinn could give you a story that keeps him up at night, but I don’t know all of that. All I know is that he seems incredibly reluctant to pull the trigger when a throw is available. This reluctance leads to both missed opportunities and sacks. Now, again, we like a guy who isn’t firing “YOLO balls” into coverage and killing the team with absurd gambling, but this seems like the total opposite. What does it profit a QB to have a big arm and big-time weapons if he cannot just free his mind and fire the ball to where the play leads?
- He seems like a wonderful young man who handles things with a lot of class and smiles, but I think the last few years have worn him down. You almost see his play suggest – in certain bigger games and stages – that he looks jittery and nervy. I recognize that it isn’t all the time. He has gone to Alabama and Michigan and looked comfortable, so this third item is certainly anecdotal. But he looks – if I may go back to golf – like he can make all the putts except the biggest ones. The guy we saw against Georgia had very little help, but also, it made perfect sense that he would be the worst version of himself in that game because of the stakes, pressure, and eyeballs.
Risk aversion is a smart coaching strategy, but it’s almost impossible to play QB if you are always seeing danger. This is what people mean when they say “a guy is seeing ghosts.” He has convinced himself why every throw is too risky.
Sometimes, you have to trust your training and let it rip.
The Sunday stage gets tougher. The stakes get higher. And yes, the instincts of the home college fans being loyal and defending you quickly disappear when you get those huge contracts. There is no strong pack mentality in the pros quite like the college fan defense system, where we fight for our guy because he went to our school. Not like the eternal energy of Longhorn, Sooners, Aggies, Tigers, or Tide fanbases. In the pros, your home fans might be the first to declare you a failed bit. And, of course, the competition gets tougher, and expectations grow for you to fire that ball into that small hole before it disappears.
Let me show you some tape. The first is what I considered to be some of his best tape I had ever seen. I thought his Michigan game was phenomenal and here are many of those moments:
Three Thoughts - Texas Beats Up Michigan
Bob Sturm
·
Sep 8
Read full story
But, then here is the Georgia tape. This is maybe his worst tape. This game featured zero “big time throws” and SEVEN “turnover worthy plays” and he played like a guy who was nowhere near a NFL starter.
From that piece:
Three Thoughts - Georgia Beats Texas
Bob Sturm
·
Oct 20
Read full story
And then last Saturday, you had something in the middle of Michigan and Georgia as he played at Arkansas and seemed to channel back and forth between his good version and his bad version:
Here are five really strong NFL-level plays from Ewers.
And then here are five very poor plays from Ewers that would suggest that Texas might not be starting their best QB in 2024:
I mean, those deep balls are touchdowns. You simply cannot miss those and expect to win a national title. Then, the Cover 2 shot is looped in when it needs to be fired.
The Arkansas game was some good and some bad.
The bottom line on Ewers is that you can find audio of me saying he can do it all, and you can also find audio of me saying he may never realize his full potential.
He is as complicated as it gets and a frustrating prospect to analyze. Yet, I plan to try to forget all of this and use 200 new snaps for his Sturm 60 evaluation this spring.
He still has time. Nothing that has happened to this point will matter if he can go and win six more football games in a row. I say six because if he wins the first three, Texas will get a bye and then be three wins from winning it all.
If he does that, he will quickly be placed back near the very top of the 2025 NFL Draft, and everything else will be called “his development” along the way.
But for now, he is consistently inconsistent and, perhaps worse, in his own head and his own worst enemy. And those QBs don’t last long as QB1 in the NFL.
He might need to clear his mind and let it rip. That might be the only way to become the guy he was once said to be.
