The 2024 NFL Draft is upon us, and it looks to be one of the most important in recent memory. With six quarterbacks slated to go somewhere in the first round, the NFL landscape will look much different at the conclusion of the night’s festivities than before. I figured that given the circumstances, a ranked analysis of each first round quarterback prospect and their potential destinations is warranted.

Caleb Williams – USC

Williams is undoubtedly the number one pick, and therefore headed to Chicago. Carolina would have the first overall pick, but the Panthers gave it away in a lopsided trade in which they gave up their first round pick this year in addition to their best wide receiver, DJ Moore, in exchange for the right to draft Bryce Young with the first pick last season.

In his one season at Oklahoma and two at USC, Williams has shown Mahomes-like playmaking ability. While his 2023 campaign was not as impressive as his 2022 Heisman season, USC as a whole took a step back, which was outside of his control. The defense repeatedly struggled against high-level competition, forcing Williams to frequently play from behind and eventually leading to the ousting of defensive coordinator Alex Grinch.

I personally like the fit for Williams in Chicago. He will have plenty of weapons to work with, including the aforementioned Moore, tight end Cole Kmet, running back Khalil Herbert and offseason additions Keenan Allen and D’Andre Swift.

A lot of attention has been given to off-field concerns regarding Williams, but they all seem incredibly trivial. Crying after losing the biggest game of the season and painting one’s nails are irrelevant to how one plays the sport of football, especially when an athlete has won the Heisman Trophy.

Williams has all the potential in the world to become a franchise quarterback, but the odds are stacked against him in Chicago with head coach Matt Eberflus. Even as the third oldest franchise in the league, the Bears have never had a quarterback throw for over 4,000 yards in a season. Regardless, I believe he will quickly pass the likes of Jim McMahon, Jay Cutler and Mitch Trubisky for the title of greatest Bears quarterback of all time.

Jayden Daniels – LSU

Daniels, the other, more recent Heisman Trophy winner in the draft, will also be in the top of the first round. He started out at Arizona State for three seasons before transferring to finish out his collegiate career with two years at LSU.

In his final, Heisman-earning season, Daniels completed 72% of his passes and threw just four interceptions on 327 attempts. He is also a real threat with his legs, gaining 1,134 yards in 12 games in the 2023 regular season.

The Heisman winner had some historic performances in college, becoming the only player in FBS history to rack up 350 passing yards and 200 rushing yards in a single game in a matchup against Florida this past season.

I see Daniels as being the best rookie quarterback out of the gate largely due to his level of experience and unique athletic abilities, but I worry about his potential destination. If a team like the Minnesota Vikings does not trade up to take Daniels, he will most likely be headed to Washington or New England, two teams in a complete rebuild. If Daniels does find the right home, he will be franchise quarterback material. His entrance into the NFL could be akin to that of Robert Griffin III.

Drake Maye – UNC

Amidst the hype around Williams and the surging interest in options like J.J. McCarthy, Maye has not received nearly the attention he would in any other draft class. While the 2022 ACC Player of the Year did not carry UNC to the top of the college football landscape during his tenure (the Tarheels had a combined record of 17-10 in 2022 and 2023), Maye showed incredible potential in his two years of starting.

Maye’s best attributes are his size and arm talent, drawing comparisons to Josh Allen. Maye is over six foot four inches tall and has shown a knack for getting the ball to receivers in ways expected of an NFL quarterback.

One worrying sign for Maye is his seeming regression from 2022 to 2023. After putting up 38 TDs and only 7 INTs in his 2022 ACC Player of the Year campaign, Maye found the endzone just 24 times in 2023 while throwing nine picks. Tarheels did manage to start the 2023 season 6-0, they then collapsed by losing five of their next seven games, including the Duke’s Mayo Bowl against the Mountaineers that Maye did not participate in.

Like Daniels, I see Maye heading to either Commanders or Patriots depending on the choice of the former. I believe that Maye will come out of the gate slower than Daniels, and eventually turn it around thanks to quality coaching. However, I think Maye has the highest potential for being an outright bust out of any of the top three quarterbacks taken in the draft.

Michael Penix – Washington

Penix, of any of the top quarterbacks, has the highest “wow” factor in my view. It is unlikely that the Huskies would have made it as far as they did last season without his abilities. He is also the second most experienced quarterback in the draft, having played three years with Indiana and two at Washington.

Many have hyper focused on Penix’s injury history, which is extensive but overblown. He tore his ACL in the same knee twice, but has since played three years as a college starter without missing any more time for that injury.

Penix’s doubters cite the plethora of professional-caliber talent on Washington’s roster as a reason for his success, which I would argue is more of an asset than a hindrance. He already knows how to work with elite talent, and knows what success looks like.

As one of the second tier quarterbacks in the draft (not my opinion), Penix has had a much more active pre-draft process than prospects like Williams. Penix improved his stock more than any other quarterback in the draft at the combine, and was the only one of the top six quarterbacks to run the 40 yard dash, clocking somewhere between a 4.46 and a 4.5 on unofficial timings at his pro day.

I think Penix getting drafted later rather than sooner is to his benefit. The longer it takes to be drafted, the better the team that is drafting you is, so long as you do not drop to the second round. I think the best destination for Penix is Seattle, which would keep him in his home of the last two years, although he could end up with a team like the Raiders.

Geno Smith is undoubtedly the starter for the Seahawks for the next year, but the future is uncertain. New head coach and former Ravens defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald will most likely want to draft a prospect this year to start the development of the team’s future quarterback in his first year as most head coaches prefer to do, and Penix should be available at pick 16 when Seattle selects.

Smith would be a great role model for the Washington product, having himself been overlooked as Penix is currently experiencing. Look for Penix to outperform quarterbacks like McCarthy and Maye by the ends of their careers with a solid foundation in Seattle.

Bo Nix – Oregon

Nix’s largest distinguishing factor is his level of experience. He started for five seasons in his time with Auburn and Oregon, which is rare for a draft prospect. Nix attempted 1,936 passes in college, the most of any first-round caliber quarterback and a whopping 1,223 more than McCarthy. He has a pro-level skill set and should come to the NFL ready to start after some training camp improvements if surrounded by the right supporting cast.

One area of concern for Nix is his performance in the biggest games of the year. While the Ducks were playoff contenders throughout the season, their two losses against Washington in both the regular season and the Pac-12 championship eliminated them from competition. Nix did put up solid numbers in both contests, but not enough to get over the hump. However, a lack of college success in the biggest games is not a surefire sign of an eventual issue in the NFL, as CJ Stroud has demonstrated.

While Nix is by no means old at 24, he is a few years older than some of the other prospects. McCarthy, for instance, is 21. If Nix does not mesh well with the team that drafts him, it could be difficult for him to develop in his late twenties with a second team. With McCarthy’s rise up draft boards, I see Nix heading to Denver at pick 12.

J.J. McCarthy

Seemingly every year as of late,the NFL-media sphere runs out of topics for discussion in the post-free agency, pre-draft dead window. In this gap, a mid-tier draft prospect at the quarterback position typically shoots up the rankings as the analysts convince themselves they have found a diamond in the rough.

This year, the obsession is with Michigan quarterback J.J. McCarthy, fresh off of a national championship that came with only a metric ton of asterisks. I believe that those who see McCarthy as anything better than the sixth-best quarterback in this draft are suffering from recency bias. While McCarthy did win the last game of the season (while going 10-18 and throwing for 140 yards), hundreds of other games happened throughout the year that are just as important in terms of evaluating draft talent.

McCarthy simply has not proven himself to be a first round talent. His lack of reps at the college level is concerning, and many of the reps he did receive were lackluster. Teams without stellar defensive play (from players that allegedly knew their opponent’s calls ahead of time) and an outstanding running back like Blake Corum should be concerned about the challenge the undersized 21-year-old will face in playing for their team.

A positive that McCarthy brings to the table that cannot be denied is his ability to get things done on third down. Whenever the Wolverines needed a big play on their title run, McCarthy generally came through.

One McCarthy performance of note: the Wolverines quarterback went 8-13 for 143 yards, two touchdowns and three interceptions in a game against Bowling Green State University last season. The second touchdown he threw came on a deflected ball that very well could have been intercepted. While there are plenty of Mid-American Conference teams that can give Big 10 quarterbacks trouble, the 7-6 Falcons should not be one of them when your quarterback is a supposed first round pick.

McCarthy could very well turn out to be a solid NFL starter, but I doubt it. I think he would be a valuable addition in maybe the second or third round so he could develop on the bench, but that is not going to happen. While most analysts have targeted the Vikings and Giants as potential destinations, I see the Chargers as a potential dark horse candidate, if Jim Harbaugh truly believes that he “plays quarterback the best of any quarterback in the draft.”