Socci’s View: After Thursday’s Q-and-A, another question Eliot Wolf and the Pats must answer before next week’s draft
A week from tonight, 42-year-old director of scouting Eliot Wolf will have the final word on what the Patriots decide to do at the top of their first post-Bill Belichick draft.
Until a few months ago, Wolf was a relatively anonymous figure to New Englanders, who came to Foxborough as a consultant about the time the most famous Patriot was leaving in March 2020. He was also, and perhaps still is, best known elsewhere in the NFL, including Green Bay and Cleveland, where he previously worked, as the son of Pro Football Hall of Fame general manager Ron Wolf.
On Thursday morning, Wolf spent 20 minutes with reporters in his final public Q-and-A before we know the answer to whether the Patriots will take their second shot at a first-round quarterback to succeed Tom Brady in the last four drafts. We heard from Wolf they’re comfortable doing just that, now that Mac Jones, the 2021 first-round hopeful, has been jettisoned to Jacksonville, and that they won’t see themselves as “settling” by taking a quarterback with the third overall choice.
In a another breath, Wolf also made it clear the team is “open for anything” and that potential trade discussions are ongoing. And when asked about two quarterbacks, specifically, he told us that this is “a unique year” featuring as many as six “top guys” at the position. Posturing, perhaps. Smart, nonetheless.
Wolf was an assistant to Browns G.M. John Dorsey when they selected Baker Mayfield first overall in 2018. He was a pro personnel assistant under Packers G.M. Ted Thompson when they landed Aaron Rodgers to be Brett Favre’s heir apparent with the 24th pick in 2005. And he watched his father trade a first-rounder for Favre in 1992.
Whoever the Patriots choose, whether at third or following a trade back, words from another past G.M. have been ringing in my ears as my head has filled with video clips, sound bites and opinion pieces regarding this year’s class of prospects.
Ernie Accorsi was the public relations director for the Baltimore Colts when a breaking-down Johnny Unitas was still leading comebacks. He ascended in their front office and, as G.M., took John Elway first in 1983. Accorsi then chose Bernie Kosar for Cleveland in the 1985 supplemental draft.
When it was his turn to find a QB for a third team, as G.M. of the New York Giants, Accorsi identified Eli Manning as his guy, and acquired him through a draft-and-trade scenario with San Diego. After the Chargers took Manning against his family’s wishes in 2004, putting them in the same spot Accorsi occupied upon selecting Elway 11 years earlier, he tabbed Philip Rivers at No. 4 and engineered a swap.
Accorsi’s evaluations were framed through the view of a long-ago defensive back and scout in a far-flung setting, He shared it with New York Times reporter John Branch in February 2008, a week after Manning, ahem, rallied the Giants to their Super Bowl XLII title.
As the Colts practiced at the Colorado School of Mines in Golden, Colo., Accorsi stood beside Milt Davis, a former All-Pro player for Baltimore, and wondered aloud if Unitas still had what it took to win.
“‘Ernie, let me tell you something,’” Accorsi said, repeating Davis’s words to Branch. “‘This is how you judge a quarterback: Can he take the team down the field with the championship on the line and get it in the end zone?’”
The Patriots appear years away from championship contention, even if they have, as Wolf said on Thursday, a better roster currently than conventional narratives assert. Still, it’s a good question — the most important — to ask about this year’s top quarterback prospects; whether you believe there are three, four or six of them.
In recent days, Wolf, head coach Jerod Mayo and their staff have reportedly met with North Carolina’s Drake Maye, LSU’s Jayden Daniels, Michigan’s J.J. McCarthy and Washington’s Michael Penix in Foxborough.
Maye and Daniels have been consistently projected, in either order, as top-three picks behind Caleb Williams by network draft analysts. If the Pats stay put, the easy choice ostensibly is either one, assuming the other is selected by the Commanders after the Bears draft Williams. However, each player offers plenty of reasons to like him, and enough reasons to question him.
McCarthy and Penix drove their teams to this year’s College Football Playoff Championship. Penix has a thick medical folder, filled with serious injuries, and more athletic limitations than the others. Still, he showed a lot of moxie in tense moments of big games: twice vs. Oregon and in the national semifinals against Texas.
The same was true of McCarthy, who rallied the Wolverines to force overtime in a semifinal win over Alabama. He protected the ball, was excellent on third downs and, late in close games, generally made winning plays with his arm and legs. He also played for a demanding, once and again NFL head coach, Jim Harbaugh. But McCarthy passed less and is shorter than Maye and Daniels. He also played in a far more talented and better-coached offense than Maye.
Taking McCarthy as soon as third overall, even after his stock soared lately, would be a surprise, if not a reach. At the same time, if the Pats move back via trade, they’ll likely wind up out of position to choose him. Therein lies the rub. Or, depending on your point of view, the blessing.
In February, new offensive coordinator Alex Van Pelt noted toughness and leadership as key attributes in his ideal quarterback. Wolf amplified the same thought at the NFL Combine, adding: “someone that can elevate teammates.” I asked him Thursday how those traits present themselves to his staff of evaluators.
“I think when you watch the film, you’re looking for it and you see it,” Wolf said. “Obviously, our scouts have been compiling information on these guys from their colleges for years, some of these guys from two different colleges. And that information is consistent, lines up, which always makes it easier. So, we have that amount of information from the colleges, and then you can kind of see how they act, how their body language is on tape.
“And then when you bring them in, it’s really, do the people that are here, do the players that are here kind of gravitate to them while they’re walking around the building? What type of personality do they have? And I would say I’ve been impressed with all the quarterbacks that we’ve talked to, in that regard this year.”
The quarterback who answered those questions best may be the answer to the best question one can ask: Who can take the team down the field with the championship on the line and get it in the end zone?
