The chance to draft Trevor Lawrence with the No. 1 pick was a huge selling point for Urban Meyer in taking the Jaguars’ head coaching job.
But one NFL Hall of Famer isn’t so sure the head coach-QB marriage will be as good for Lawrence.
“Outside of Alex Smith, this man [Meyer] hasn’t developed a quarterback that’s playing in the NFL right now,” Marshall Faulk told TMZ Sports.
“I’m worried for Trevor Lawrence.”
Meyer had plenty of success at the collegiate level, winning three national championships — two at Florida and one at Ohio State — before stepping away after the 2018 season. But Faulk pointed to the quarterbacks that Meyer had playing for him on those college teams that later struggled to establish success in the NFL.
Smith is Meyer’s top quarterback product in terms of staying power in the NFL, after playing for him at Utah from 2003-04. Since then, Meyer’s college quarterbacks include Chris Leak, Tim Tebow, Braxton Miller, J.T. Barrett, Cardale Jones and Dwayne Haskins — none of whom are currently on an NFL roster.
“He had some really good attempts with, I’m talking, top, four-star, five-star guys when he was at Ohio State and at Florida,” Faulk said. “There’s something to that.”
Meyer did land Joe Burrow at Ohio State, but chose Haskins as the starter over him in 2018, leading to Burrow’s transfer to LSU, where he blossomed and became the No. 1 pick of the Bengals in 2020.
While Lawrence to Jacksonville won’t become official until April’s draft, it is all but a lock to happen, even if Meyer played it coy at his introductory press conference.
“You see Trevor, you see Justin [Fields], you see Zach [Wilson],” Meyer said. “Whoever takes that snap, we have got to be right on… Who we pick at the quarterback spot, that’s going to be one of the most important decisions I’ve made in my lifetime.
“The ones that are out there, I have been studying a lot, I like to use the term ‘elite.’ I see some elite quarterbacks right now.”
