2014 NFL Draft: Six Years Later

Actually, 2014 was an incredibly strong class at the top. Seventeen first-round picks have made the Pro Bowl, compared to 12 from 2013 and 10 from 2015. Seventeen of them have started at least 60 games; 23 of them have started at least 40. That's a hit rate most draft classes would kill to have, and most teams with multiple bites at the apple found something they could be happy with in this year's class.

It was a ridiculous amount of potential. A receiver class loaded with names like Sammy Watkins, Odell Beckham, and Brandin Cooks was said to have anywhere between four and seven first-round selections waiting to go as the NFL continued to get more and more pass-happy. Jadeveon Clowney was a once-in-a-generation talent, set to be the first defensive player drafted first overall since Mario Williams in 2006 -- unless Khalil Mack stole that spot from him. Greg Robinson and Jake Matthews were guaranteed studs on the offensive line. And then, overshadowing nearly everything else, you had Johnny Manziel, the mercurial scrambler who was the runaway choice to be the first quarterback chosen in the draft. An embarrassment of riches!

And yet, despite that plethora of talent available early and often, at least four of the teams in the top 10 would give their right arms to be able to go back and re-do their selections.

Look away now, Cleveland Browns fans.

Quarterbacks

Conventional Wisdom: Entering the 2013 college football season, Louisville's Teddy Bridgewater had been considered the top prospect, with little dissent. He was calculated and football-smart, with precision and rhythm to make up for a lack of arm strength and athleticism, as well as a slight frame at just 190 pounds through the end of his college career. But after being one of the best college quarterbacks in 2012, in 2013 Bridgewater was only good, not great. That probably wouldn't have been enough to really squelch the hype around him, but then he had a legendarily bad Pro Day, and was reportedly just as bad in private workouts. Mike Mayock dropped him from a top-five pick to out of the first round, and one anonymous scout said that he was a Day 3 pick. Sports Illustrated draft writer (and Football Outsiders alum) Doug Farrar disagreed, listing Bridgewater as his top talent overall in the class, and saying that "any NFL executive who will throw multiple scouted games out the window based on a shirt-and-shorts session, whether positive or negative, is probably on his way out the door."

Still, many did throw that out the window, looking for better options. For most, that was Texas A&M's Johnny Manziel. Johnny Football won the Heisman Trophy as a redshirt freshman in 2012 and nearly repeated the feat the next season. Even those who stuck by Bridgewater were mostly forced to admit that Manziel had the higher ceiling -- an ad-libbing, sandlot-style quarterback who was nigh-impossible to gameplan against; an astonishing scrambler; a ferocious competitor, with unparalleled confidence and a knack for being one step ahead of his competition. Manziel had boom written all over him. But with the potential for boom came a potential to bust and, well, some people really, really disliked Manziel's attitude, his character, and his work ethic. He was a well-known partier and not at all well-known as a leader in college, with a "sense of entitlement and prima-donna arrogance." The name "Ryan Leaf" was being circulated as well, and that was before you mentioned his lack of discipline in the pocket. Don't get us wrong, though -- at the time, Manziel was a very, very popular choice for a top-ten pick. NFL.com's Bucky Brooks had Manziel going third to Jacksonville; ESPN Nation writers had Cleveland scooping him up fourth overall, while Walter Football had him tumbling all the way to seventh. There were even some rumors the Rams were ready to cut bait on Sam Bradford and take Manziel second overall.

With Bridgewater tumbling and Manziel showboating, some scouts leaned towards Central Florida's Blake Bortles as their preferred option. Bortles wasn't considered to be as pro-ready as Manziel or Bridgewater, but as a project with upside, his stock increased rapidly as draft day approached. Bortles had the best Pro Day of the three top prospects, and he had the most prototypical size and arm measurables. He needed to be paired with a team that could afford to develop him, but Bortles was the relatively drama-free option atop the class.

After those three, most talk revolved around Eastern Illinois' Jimmy Garoppolo, Alabama's A.J. McCarron, and Fresno State's Derek Carr, all of whom were possible Day 2 selections.

Here on Football Outsiders, the last year for the Lewin Career Forecast was ... terrible! Georgia's Aaron Murray was listed with the highest projection, because he was the only top prospect who started all four seasons in college. Everyone else fell into a sort of general mishmash, with no real red flags and no real diamonds in the rough. And so, to quote from the article, "the official position of Football Outsiders regarding the 2014 LCF is that this year the LCF doesn't mean anything. Figuring out the difference between Bridgewater, Manziel, and Bortles is all up to the scouts."

Yes. Super helpful, that. The next year, we unveiled QBASE, which at the time retroactively rated the 2014 quarterbacks Bridgewater, Carr, Manziel, and Bortles, in that order.

Highest Pick: Blake Bortles, third overall to Jacksonville.

Best Player: It strangely feels like the jury is still out on this one. Bridgewater's terrible leg injury in 2015 means he is only now regaining a starting spot, while Garoppolo only has one full season as a starter thanks to Tom Brady never, ever retiring and an ACL tear. So your winner is Derek Carr, whom Oakland took with the fourth pick of the second round. While his third-place finish in the 2016 MVP race was a product of over-hype, Carr has accumulated 3,674 DYAR in his career. The only other quarterback from this class with over 1,000 is Garoppolo (1,487), with Bridgewater's 263 and McCarron's 16 being the only other passers on the positive side of the ledger.

Don't get me wrong -- this isn't a win by default for Carr, either. He has the two best seasons of any passer in the class, and five of the top eight. While it was rumored that Jon Gruden was thinking about moving away from Carr this offseason, plenty of teams would love to have someone with Carr's quality under center; he's a top-ten quarterback when everything is going right around him. It might have been a closer race if Bridgewater had stayed healthy or Garoppolo had taken over in New England, but Carr would likely have been the best player in this class regardless.

Biggest Bust: Yeah, those Ryan Leaf comparisons weren't miles away for Johnny Manziel. Bortles actually accumulated less DYAR (-209 to -191), but that was over six seasons, and he's still in the league. Manziel went 22nd overall to Cleveland, and that was the high point of his tenure with the Browns. Every fear of off-field incidents came to pass. Manziel was pulled over by police after drinking and arguing with his girlfriend. Manziel was filmed partying in a nightclub, lied about it to head coach Mike Pettine, encouraged his friends to lie about the video, and was ultimately benched. While injured with a concussion, Manziel was spotted at a Las Vegas casino the night before the 2015 season finale. After 2015, Manziel was investigated for domestic violence, and one of his lawyers accidentally texted the media, saying "heaven help us if one of the conditions [for a plea bargain] is to pee in a bottle." Manziel also spent time in rehab dealing with drug addiction.

Perhaps if he had been better on the field, some could have turned a blind eye to all of his off-field woes, but the one year he did qualify for the passing leaderboards, he had a -18.4% DVOA, so that's no good. Manziel was released after the 2016 season and has since spent time as a backup in both the CFL and AAF. He has stopped drinking and gotten help for his bipolar disorder, and is by all accounts turning his life around off the field, so at least his story seems to be heading in a positive direction. Just not for the Browns. Manziel remains one of the all-time biggest busts.

Best Value: Derek Carr. None of the quarterbacks drafted after the second round have amounted to anything in the NFL, and Jimmy Garoppolo hasn't done nearly enough yet to knock Carr off of this perch, despite being selected 26 picks later.

Linebackers

Conventional Wisdom: A trifecta of linebackers topped the class. Your most traditional inside man was Alabama's C.J. Mosley, a two-time All-American who won the Butkus Award as the nation's top linebacker. There was no questioning his instincts, his tackling ability, or his play strength, and he was the best pass defender in the class, but he was sliding down draft boards as the big day approached. There were worries about a knee injury, and about how much of his production came from playing for a great Alabama team. Charging up fast to meet him on draft boards was Ohio State outside linebacker Ryan Shazier, an agile three-down player and aggressive (perhaps overaggressive) tackler. Running a 4.4-second 40 at 237 pounds didn't hurt either. The third final early-round prospect was UCLA outside linebacker Anthony Barr, who was completing the transition from nondescript fullback to pass-rushing dynamo.

After that, you had to go a long way down your draft boards before you found a class of players that included both Telvin Smith and Christian Jones from Florida State, as well as Chris Borland from Wisconsin. It was really the top three or bust at the linebacker position.

Highest Pick: Anthony Barr, ninth overall to Minnesota.

Best Player: I'm inclined to go with C.J. Mosley, who only fell to the Ravens at No. 17. Mosley has become a perennial Pro Bowler for Baltimore, and was good enough to get a massive deal from the Jets last offseason … just before tearing his groin and going on injured reserve. He'll be worth it when he gets healthy. It's not that Barr hasn't been good; Mosley has just been a touch better.

Biggest Bust: With all three of the top linebackers paying off to one extent or another, I'm not sure we really have a bust, per se. I'll massively reach and pick Arizona State's Carl Bradford, who went 121st overall to Green Bay. Bradford fell from a projected second-round pick to the fourth, was inactive for his entire rookie year, spent 2015 and most of 2016 on the practice squad, and then appeared in six games late for the Packers and 49ers, with five career tackles. He was last been seen on the AAF's Arizona Hotshots and XFL's Houston Roughnecks. That's disappointing from a fourth-round pick, but when that's the worst bust of the class, you know it was a solid group.

Best Value: It's C.J. Mosley -- the best players in 2014 all went high, it seems. Anthony Barr was quite valuable at No. 9 too. Louisville's Preston Brown went to Buffalo in the third round, and he has had a very solid career. But if you want some nice late-round sleepers, you have to go to Day 3. That's when Dallas took Iowa's Anthony Hitchens 119th overall, Jacksonville took Telvin Smith 144th overall, and Tennessee took Kentucky's Avery Williamson 151st overall. Smith's the only Pro Bowler of the three, but his future is in question after he took 2019 off. Williamson and Hitchens have just been very solid starters, which is always a pleasant surprise on Day 3.