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The many quarterbacks up for grabs have been the central focus of the discussion surrounding the 2023 NFL Draft, and plenty of guys have seen their stock rise and fall in the months leading up to the event.
As things currently stand, it appears Anthony Richardson is the odds-on favorite to be scooped up by the Panthers with the first overall pick. With that said, some reports have suggested some teams don’t think the Florida product (as well as Will Levis) is even worth taking in the first round.
There’s also been plenty of hype surrounding Alabama’s Bryce Young and Ohio State’s CJ Stround—although one of them may have suffered a major setback thanks to one pre-draft evaluation that seems like it could be a major cause for concern.
Most NFL fans are likely familiar with the fairly infamous Wonderlic test that was used to assess the mental acuity of players at the combine before the league decided to move on from the somewhat controversial exam in 2022.
It didn’t take long for an alternative to come around and fill that void in the form of the S2 Cognition Test that’s been embraced with open arms by franchises around the NFL due to its supposed ability to weed out players who perform poorly (a high score doesn’t necessarily guarantee success, but the company that designed the evaluation asserts a low score is linked to an inability to thrive at the pro level).
Bob McGinn was able to obtain the scores posted by a number of QBs in this year’s draft class, and while Young (98%) and Levis (93%) were able to hold their own, the same can’t be said for Stroud thanks to the fairly concerning 18% he reportedly posted when everything was said and done.
McGinn spoke with an unnamed NFL exec who summed up the potential fallout of the score by saying:
“The benchmark is 80. Eighty and above is good. Stroud was 18. It’s incredibly terrible. He’s going to be off [some team’s] boards. He will not be picked by those teams.”
Based on the nature of this year’s draft, it’s pretty hard to predict what will ultimately unfold, but Stroud could’ve really cost himself here.