ICYMI: Throwback to Wall Street Journal's outrageous take on Patrick Mahomes' NFL career
In just his first five years in the NFL, Patrick Mahomes already has a league MVP, a Super Bowl MVP, an NFL Offensive Player of the Year, and All-Pro honors. He also has multiple Pro Bowl appearances and the NFL record for career quarterback rating (minimum 1,500 attempts) at 105.8.
At the age of 26, it is presumed that Mahomes has not yet hit his peak, so it's enticing to see what else this young Kansas City Chiefs quarterback will achieve.
His NFL career projections have not always been rosy or overly optimistic. In 2017, The Wall Street Journal published a pre-draft article on Mahomes. The report projected that his career would be like Jay Cutler's.
In the WSJ article, NFL Network analyst (and former Seattle Seahawks scout) Bucky Brooks compared Mahomes to Cutler:
"I liken [Mahomes] to what I saw from Jay Cutler when he was coming out of Vanderbilt. Because [Cutler] played loosey-goosey at Vanderbilt, he never developed the management skills [needed] to play winning football.”
Mahomes had a strong arm and solid physical qualities but lacked a successful college career to translate into the NFL. The former Denver Broncos and Chicago Bears quarterback Jay Cutler possessed a powerful throwing arm, but his college resume at Vanderbilt was underwhelming, with a 5-6 overall record.
Mahomes had a college record of 13-19 at Texas Tech, which was also an underwhelming career, given Texas Tech's reputation for high-powered offenses and the teaching of former Tech quarterback Kliff Kingsbury, who is the current head coach of the Arizona Cardinals.
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Vanderbilt and Texas Tech are not extensive college football programs, so much of their success would ideally rely on a star quarterback recruit to lead the team to success. The WSJ article made this presumption and projected Mahomes to go on a similar NFL career path as Cutler: strong arm but losing record.
The article even quoted Hall of Fame former NFL coach Bill Parcells regarding the poor track record of college quarterbacks:
“Teams are so desperate to find quality at the position that they will take chances like this, and frankly, I can’t blame them. But if you are going to be a very good pro quarterback, not even elite, you should, at least, have won most of your games in college.”
Patrick Mahomes' college career at Texas Tech
Patrick Mahomes arrived at Texas Tech with high expectations. He chose the university based in Lubbock, Texas, over other schools such as Oklahoma State and Rice.
In 2014, Mahomes was ranked as the No. 398 overall prospect in his recruiting class, also coming in at No. 29 pro-style quarterback prospect and the No. 82 overall player in Texas. While Mahomes went 13-19 at Texas Tech over three seasons, his best season in Lubbock came in 2015 when the Red Raiders had a 7-5 season with a bowl game appearance against No. 22 LSU in the Texas Bowl.
In 2014, the Detroit Tigers drafted Mahomes in the 37th round of the MLB Draft, taking a chance that the duo-sport athlete might change his mind about football and pursue a baseball career.
Mahomes' incredible arm strength and atypical throwing angles on the football field are often attributed to his baseball background. Another notable NFL quarterback, Tom Brady, was also drafted by an MLB team (Montreal Expos).
The next time Patrick Mahomes doesn't make the AFC Championship Game will be the first.
In the end, Patrick Mahomes made the right choice by sticking with football, and he landed in the perfect situation to allow him to succeed.
Kansas City had an offensive guru for a head coach in Andy Reid. The franchise was patient with Mahomes in letting him sit out his rookie season so that he could learn behind the veteran quarterback and former No. 1 overall draft pick, Alex Smith.
At pick 10 in the first round of the 2017 NFL Draft, Patrick Mahomes proved to be the best pick that changed a franchise forever.