2023 NFL Draft: Best Landing Spot for Tennessee's Hendon Hooker
Analysis 4/13/23
This is part of a series on the best fits for the 2023 NFL Draft’s top quarterbacks.
>> Others in Series: Anthony Richardson, Bryce Young, C.J. Stroud
When it comes to first-round hopefuls, this year’s quarterback class has been all about “The Big 4.” Pretty early in the pre-draft process, C.J. Stroud (scouting report), Bryce Young (scouting report), Anthony Richardson (scouting report) and Will Levis (scouting report) separated themselves from the pack and dominated the quarterback chatter.
The real “decisions” within the quadrant had to do with whether you saw Young or Stroud as the top guy (Young gets my vote) and if you preferred Richardson or Levis in the next pairing (Richardson here). If you wanted to keep the conversation going, you could debate if Richardson and Levis — mostly viewed as talented developmental projects — belonged in the top 5 or top 10 or if they’d be better suited for picks later in Round 1.
But just as teams have to be open to evolving with their quarterback evaluation as March becomes April and the familiarity with each prospect grows, the rest of us should be open to changing as well.
When this series started — and as recently as when I finished my feature on Richardson a couple of weeks ago — I fully intended to focus on Levis here as the fourth. Although I see Levis' potential and talent, I believe Hendon Hooker (scouting report) is the fourth-best prospect in this class.
Why Hooker Passed Levis
In January and February when these quarterbacks’ evaluations started to become headline material, it was easy to get wrapped up in the massive upside to Richardson and Levis and just group them together. It was also easy to put Hooker a standard deviation behind them due to his age (25) and recent injury (torn ACL in late November). His credentials were always there, but there were reasons to view behind the top four.
Then, there was a two-pronged shift in my evaluation of Hooker and where he belongs in the top end of this quarterback class.
First was the realization I’m not sold on Levis. His physical gifts are clear: strong arm, strong kid, tough, big upside. Those traits could translate to a helluva NFL career. But the bouts of inaccuracy and questionable decision-making are concerning and led to too many stretches of games where he played more like a middle-round project than a first-round slam dunk. I don’t have to strain to see what there is to really like, I just can’t ignore that I don’t see enough.
It comes down to this: when a quarterback’s strong arm and potential are the best two compliments you can pay him after two seasons of starting experience, it’s a bit of a red flag. Accuracy, anticipation, pocket feel, touch and decision-making shouldn’t trail too far behind.
While I was tapping the brakes on Levis, Hooker started accelerating in another lane.
Slowly, I became more comfortable with the two off-field knocks attached to Hooker's evaluation. The first is his age of 25. I just don’t see that as a reason to remove a quarterback from first-round status. Is it ideal? No. But is it a deal breaker? Not at all. If it doesn’t work for Hooker in the NFL, it’s not going to be because he entered the league at 25 instead of 22.
As for the November ACL injury, there’s no way around that it will negatively affect his draft status. That’s reality. But unless there were unusual challenges associated with Hooker’s rehab discovered during the extensive combine medical evaluations, his recovery shouldn’t deprive him of first-round consideration. It’s an unfortunate hurdle, not an immovable roadblock.
Hooker Has Strong Film
That brings us to the second part — and most important part — his film. The more I watched him, the more I liked him. Three things stood out: Results matter, consistency counts and down-the-field accuracy is significant.
It's results vs. potential for quarterbacks. Quarterback potential is a real thing, and it’s on NFL general managers to recognize it. It’s what makes drafting an art more than a science and what makes success in that game so slippery. But the projection of upside shouldn’t dominate the recognition of results, and Hooker’s production in two years at Tennessee was tremendous.
A first glance, his numbers from this past fall force a double-take. He completed 69 percent of his passes with a 27:2 TD:INT ratio. Those are close to video-game-like. His yards per attempt of 9.5 are excellent. Then, you look at the 2021 season, and it’s nearly a carbon copy. Hooker didn’t struggle out of the gate and slowly figure it out. He didn’t get hot for a stretch or two and then dip. He didn’t go crazy vs. the worst teams on Tennessee’s schedule to piece together a gaudy stat line.
His time at the helm was impressively steady, and a high level of steady at that.
Hooker put in two seasons as a full-time starter in the SEC and came out the other side with a 69 percent completion percentage and a TD: INT ratio of better than 11:1. That demands respect. So does the major role he played in the Volunteers going from seven wins in 2021 to 11 this past season, which was Tennessee’s first double-digit win campaign in 15 years.
Then you see the throws he made a living on, and the numbers pop more. Hooker showed a knack for delivering the ball with good accuracy and velocity on intermediate routes in the middle of the field, a variety of deep in-cutting routes as well as downfield seem patterns to tight ends. He also routinely hurt defenses with deep shots, impressing with the touch and feel required to win in that part of the passing game.
His read progressions will be more expansive in the NFL. Also, his pass catchers won’t be running as free as they did at Tennessee, but Hooker’s tape shows him accurately and consistently working the areas of the field he’ll be looking to access on Sundays. NFL quarterbacks show a pension for cutting the ball loose 20+ yards downfield and having it routinely find an accurate home, and Hooker will enter the league with a good amount of this quality intact.
It all brings us to the money portion of this feature, and that’s choosing Hooker's ideal fit in the NFL.
Vikings Are Best Fit
This fit, and its potential for success, rings true to me for a number of reasons.
Let’s start with the reality of the Minnesota Vikings' quarterback situation. Kirk Cousins is playing at a nice level and would outperform Hooker, or any rookie quarterback, on the field this fall. Yet, Cousins will be 35 when this season begins, and the Vikings restructured his contract this winter in a way his sixth season as the team’s starter could be his last.
>> READ: Cousins Has Murky Future With Vikings
It feels like their next big quarterback move wouldn’t be to re-invest in Cousins for the long term but to locate who will succeed him when the time comes.
Being on the developmental end of such a succession plan would be advantageous for any young quarterback. This season will be Cousins’ ninth consecutive as a full-time starter; he’s gathered a wealth of experience, had more success than failure in his 11 NFL seasons and seems like the kind of person who would at least be a pro about sharing all of that with a younger player.
Consider how invested coach Kevin O’Connell would be in a rookie, first-round quarterback. O'Connell's five years as an NFL quarterback preceded seven seasons of coaching them in the NFL, and now enters his second season as the Vikings’ head coach.
He has duties way beyond the daily growth process of a rookie quarterback, but his years of playing the position and learning how to coach it — the final two with the Los Angeles Rams coordinating the offense for Sean McVay — would undoubtedly lead him to invest energy into Hooker’s development. That’s a good thing.
Vikings Can Replicate Chiefs' Model
Minnesota's situation would be such fertile ground for learning, it reminds me, conceptually, of how the current best quarterback in the NFL started his career. Kansas City not only plays host to this year’s draft, but they also set the quarterback development example the rest of the league should try and emulate.
Patrick Mahomes came into the league in 2017 as an incredibly talented but raw first-round pick. So he sat for a year, and he sat in the best possible seat a rookie quarterback could have. Andy Reid had a world of quarterback and offensive wisdom to share and used it in a hands-on role with Mahomes from day one.
Alex Smith had more than a decade of NFL experience and was happy to let that sit at the wheel of a quasi-teacher-student relationship with Mahomes. The Kansas City Chiefs were already a playoff team with a successful offense, so the franchise wasn’t in need of a rebuild, just an enhancement. An enhancement Reid felt could be provided by taking a B+ quarterback situation and turning it into an A.
That’s how the Chiefs landed on top of NFL quarterback situations. Reid and Mahomes set the pace for the other 31 teams to follow, and it started with a well-thought-out, well-executed plan to sit Mahomes and let a quarterback-savvy coach and quality veteran quarterback show the way. Kansas City’s offense already being one of the better ones in the league, and the Chiefs winning double-digit games took Mahomes’ rookie situation from business class to first.
I realize placing Hooker as Mahomes and O’Connell as Reid is quite a stretch. Mahomes is as gifted as any quarterback since Dan Marino and John Elway and has the mental side of the game to match. Reid is the best quarterback whisperer in the NFL and a sure first-ballot Hall of Famer. Please take my Chiefs example as more abstract than specific.
The bottom line for this exercise is Minnesota has a strong coach-veteran quarterback structure any first-round quarterback would be fortunate to inherit. The potential for patience, mentorship and coaching, all within a winning atmosphere, is there. Let’s see if a new quarterback, one named Hooker, will be on his way to Minnesota on the evening of April 27.
Paul Burmeister, a former starting quarterback at Iowa, is a studio host with NBC Sports and the radio voice of Notre Dame Football. For a decade he worked as a studio host at NFL Network. Follow him on Twitter at @PaulWBurmeister