Packers team historian Cliff Christl has assembled an oral history series on the NFL Draft, highlighting significant and noteworthy years as a prelude to Green Bay hosting the 2025 draft in late April. For access to the full series thus far, click here.
2017
The 82nd NFL Draft was held in Philadelphia from April 27-29, 2017. The nerve center was the Franklin Institute, a science museum located at N. 20th St. and Benjamin Franklin Parkway. The picks made by club officials back home were relayed to representatives there and announced on the main stage at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, a short distance away.
The first round started at 8:05 (EDT) and ended at 11:39 the first night. The second and third rounds on the second night started at 7:08 and ended at 11:35. On the 29th, the final four rounds started at 12:07 p.m. and ended at 6:36. The total time over the three days was 14 hours, 30 minutes.
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Ranking QBs: A forever fateful crapshoot
Entering the draft, there were three quarterbacks among the dozen or so top prospects, at least on some and perhaps most of the 32 NFL teams' draft boards.
In alphabetical order, they were Patrick Mahomes, Mitchell Trubisky and Deshaun Watson. All had played three seasons of college football and declared early.
Mahomes (6-2, 225) played three years at Texas Tech in Kliff Kingsbury's "Air Raid" offense with its predetermined reads and quick passes. While he wasn't trained in a conventional pro offense and his record as a starter was only 13-16, Mahomes posted some dazzling stats, especially in his final season when he threw for 5,052 yards and 41 touchdowns in 12 games.
What also might have offered a clue about his arm strength and natural delivery was that he doubled as a baseball pitcher and had been drafted by the Detroit Tigers as a high school senior.
Trubisky (6-2, 222) played behind a middling Marquise Williams for two years at North Carolina before compiling an 8-5 record as a starter in his third season. Although Williams went undrafted after four years with the Tar Heels, Trubisky had played sparingly as his backup. Add to that, he ran a half-field, read, spread offense when he took over in 2016, again, not the ideal training for a pro QB.
But there was one number that jumped out on Trubisky's stat line that season: his lack of interceptions. He threw only six compared to Mahomes' 10 and Watson's 17.
Watson (6-2, 221) won a national championship for Clemson in 2016 and had led the Tigers to a runner-up finish the year before. Playing in a spread offense with many predetermined throws, he, too, would need grooming in a pro attack. But his record as a starter was a lights-out 32-3.
On the downside, Watson threw 30 interceptions over his final two seasons. Then again, that stat might have called for an asterisk in front of it. Watson had a green light to throw 50-50 balls down the field, a freedom a lesser quarterback might not have been given.
In the eyes of scouts and others, there seemed to be no clearcut No. 1 among them.
Clemson coach Dabo Swinney in reference to the Cleveland Browns, owners of the No. 1 pick (Senior Bowl media interview, Jan. 24, 2017): "If (the Browns) pass on Deshaun Watson, they're passing on Michael Jordan."
Jon Gruden, former Oakland Raiders and Tampa Bay coach on Watson (media conference call following Gruden's QB Camp, April 19, 2017): "His body of work impressed me the most. He was in back-to-back national championship games. He beat the best teams in college football. I love the poise that he plays with. He plays his best football when they're behind and all the chips are on the table. … He's got thick skin. … I like his mental toughness. And I like his overall game. He's athletic. He's a dual threat."
Ellis Johnson, scouting analyst for South Carolina who had broken down every one of Watson's games and a former longtime collegiate defensive coordinator with stints at Clemson, Alabama, Mississippi State and Auburn (Boston Globe, April 19, 2017): "Everybody is hot and cold on the Clemson kid (Watson). I think he's a hell of a player. But he'll get a little erratic with some of his throws, especially the intermediate or short throws. When it comes to dropping back and throwing the ball between the hashes 12-15 yards, he wasn't real good at that."
San Francisco coach and quarterback guru Kyle Shanahan on Trubisky (Cleveland Plain Dealer, April 2, 2017): "He's got 13 games on tape, and he had a great college year. Yeah, of course, the more games that are out there the more coaches like because there's more to study. But that's not his fault."
Arizona Cardinals coach and another quarterback guru Bruce Arians on Trubisky (Cleveland Plain Dealer, April 2, 2017): "A really talented player. The growth potential is obviously there. The question is why wasn't all that talent starting for the last three years? That's always bugging me. So you have to go and answer those questions with him, with his coach, but the physical talent is there."
Gruden (media conference call, April 19, 2017): "Mahomes is the most intriguing player in this draft. His arm talent is special. He can really rifle the ball, not only with velocity and accuracy, but he can do it from awkward positions. He can throw the ball sidearm, off balance and under duress. He can really rip it. … He's got a huge upside. It's going to take a little time to make the transition as he was a true junior. You can't forget that."
NFL Network analyst and former NFL player and scout Bucky Brooks on Mahomes (Cleveland Plain Dealer, April 2, 2017): "He's a second-round pick to me because, I get the talent – my friends have told me he's a rare talent at the position. However, he's a gunslinger, and I don't know if you can coach some of that bad stuff out of him that you need to play winning football."
Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback and Denver general manager John Elway (Boston Globe, April 19, 2017): "Obviously, there is not a surefire guy – at least not one that has come to the head just yet."
Chicago Bears general manager Ryan Pace (Chicago Tribune, Feb. 19, 2017): "You want to look for a player who has lifted his program for the most part. Drew Brees, for example, when he was at Purdue, he lifted that program. That's one of the things we look for. That's definitely a factor."
Chicago, Cleveland, Houston were desperate for a QB
There were four teams, for certain, that were looking to draft a quarterback and had spent countless hours evaluating them.
Three were obvious.
The Bears, over the previous 67 seasons, had only three quarterbacks who survived more than four seasons as a starter: Ed Brown, Jim McMahon and Jay Cutler. Another was Houston. The Texans were a 15-year-old expansion franchise coming off three straight 9-7 seasons with three different journeymen quarterbacks: Ryan Fitzpatrick, Brian Hoyer and Brock Osweiler. The third was Cleveland, which in the 14 seasons since it had come to grips with the fact that it had blown the 1999 No. 1 overall choice on Tim Couch, had 12 different No. 1 QBs.
The fourth team wasn't as obvious to the outside world. Kansas City, with Andy Reid entering his fifth season as coach, had Alex Smith, owner of a 41-20 record as its starter for the past four seasons. But Smith also was about to turn 33 and was 1-3 in the playoffs there.
With at least a handful of teams eyeing up quarterbacks, the result was a flurry of draft-day trades.
The Bears gave San Francisco the third overall choice and three additional picks just to move up one spot to No. 2. The Chiefs leaped 17 spots to 10th through a trade with Buffalo, where they relinquished the 27th choice, a third-rounder and a No. 1 in 2018. And the Texans acquired the 12th pick from the Browns for two first-rounders: No. 25 in this draft and another in 2018.
By then, at least three of the teams had targeted a specific quarterback without leaking which one.
The wheeling and dealing started minutes into the draft, when the Bears, having fielded calls from teams interested in trading up for their pick at No. 3, concluded the 49ers also were receiving calls for their choice at No. 2.
Not wanting to risk losing the top quarterback on their board to a team that jumped ahead of them, the Bears offered the 49ers a deal that smacked of impatience if not desperation. They also showed their hand to 49ers general manager John Lynch.
The 49ers had Stanford defensive tackle Solomon Thomas at the top of their draft board and correctly assumed the Bears weren't giving up that much draft capital for anything but a quarterback.
Meanwhile, the Chiefs rated Mahomes as their No. 1 quarterback but were convinced they'd have to pay a steep price to get him. Therefore, general manager John Dorsey started looking for a trade partner several days in advance. That also allowed him to gauge what the cost would be on draft day.
"I felt to get this player, I had to be at 10," Dorsey said after it all worked out on draft night. "I know there were three teams that wanted this player very badly."
Those teams, he believed, were New Orleans, which held the 11th choice; Houston, which wound up with the 12th selection; and Arizona, which sat at 13.
In Buffalo, newly hired coach Sean McDermott had been given more authority in the draft than his predecessors and was prepared to stick with seven-year veteran Tyrod Taylor, despite his 14-14 record in his first two years as the Bills' starter. Taylor had re-signed for the 2017 season, and it wouldn't be until a year later that Buffalo realized it needed to change course and drafted Josh Allen.
Consequently, Dorsey was able to follow up on trade talks he had with Bills general manager Doug Whaley a few days earlier and make Mahomes the second QB to go. Two picks later, the Texans grabbed Watson with Cleveland's second of two first-round choices. Hence, it wouldn't be until 40 picks later that the Browns got their quarterback and the fourth to go that year, Notre Dame's DeShone Kizer.
As background, Watson had turned down a chance to play for Cleveland coach Hue Jackson in the Senior Bowl. Therefore, the Browns weren't interested in him at No. 12. They reportedly considered taking Trubisky at No. 1 but eventually settled on Texas A&M defensive end Myles Garrett.
Lynch, who was conducting his first draft for the 49ers said Shanahan was the one who correctly read the Bears' tea leaves (Sacramento Bee, April 29, 2017): "(Shanahan) is pretty bright and I think you can see his offensive bias. He said: 'That's not for a defensive lineman. That kind of a trade, that's for a quarterback.' And he was right."
Pace on trading up for Trubisky (Chicago Tribune, May 21, 2017): "There are times when you have to be aggressive. And when you have conviction on a guy, you can't sit on your hands. I just don't want to be average around here. I want to be great. And these are the moves you have to make."
Reid on trading up for Mahomes (Kansas City Star, April 28, 2017): "Everybody liked this guy. Couldn't find a guy who didn't like him. (Former Green Bay Packers general manager) Ron Wolf taught me a long time ago, when that happens, you go get him. And Dorse attacked that."
Texans coach Bill O'Brien on trading up for Watson (draft night media conference, April 27, 2017): "One of the things that stood out to me was how well he played in clutch moments, in big games, in games that really meant everything – national championship games, big ACC games, the guy came through. When the chips were down, he was able to lead the team to victory. And I think that says a lot about a quarterback. In the end, one of the things that we always look at is: Is the guy a winner? I don't think anyone can argue with that."
Three franchise-defining outcomes
The upshot of it all was that those three QB choices had seismic consequences on each of the involved franchises like few other decisions in NFL Draft history.
Here it is, eight years later, and Mahomes already has won three Super Bowls for the Chiefs and twice been named the NFL's Most Valuable Player by the Associated Press. At the other end of the spectrum, the Bears have had one winning season since and the Texans have endured four seasons where they didn't win more than four games, although they seem to have finally fixed their QB woes with C.J. Stroud.
The three people in the Chiefs' organization most involved in the Mahomes selection were Reid, Dorsey and then co-director of player personnel Brett Veach.
Veach was the one who had taken an early liking to Mahomes and incessantly beat the drums for him around the office for more than a year. And thanks, in part, to Brett Favre he had the ear of both Reid and Dorsey.
Given that they were with the Packers when Favre was at his helter-skelter best, they weren't resistant to drafting a quarterback with an inclination to freelance and attempt ad-lib throws from unlikely launch points.
In fact, when one of Mahomes' flaws was pointed out to Reid in a pre-draft meeting, he confidently answered, "I can fix that."
Much like Favre, Mahomes also was blessed with what Kingsbury described as an "absolute freakish arm."
On the other hand, Pace, then the Bears' third-year general manager, fixated on Trubisky. Pace liked his accuracy, footwork and poise, according to the Chicago Tribune's Dan Wiederer and Rich Campbell, who wrote an in-depth article in 2019, looking back at the quarterback prospects from two years earlier and the Bears' decision-making process.
But Wiederer and Campbell also suggested that Pace was overly influenced by Trubisky's humility, family support system and even the fact he drove a high-mileage 1997 Toyota Camry.
Given that the quarterback the Bears were looking to replace was Cutler, it's not surprising if character and other such virtues were prioritized by Pace to a fault.
On one hand, Cutler also had some of the same physical traits as Favre. Yet, on the other hand, Cutler didn't possess Favre's mental toughness, leadership skills and other intangibles that commanded widespread respect from his teammates and opponents across the league. Most importantly, Favre was a winner; Cutler owned a 51-51 record as a starter.
Considering the Bears had finished last in the NFC North Division the previous three seasons with Cutler, Pace could hardly be blamed if he was looking for a more grounded QB. Perhaps he even digested Brooks' quote following Mahomes' pro day in late March.
"To me, (Mahomes) kind of reminds me of Jay Cutler (of Vanderbilt)," said Brooks, "a guy that had to carry the whole program on his back, had to be a one-man show but never really learned how to play the right way to win at a high level."
Reid on drafting Mahomes (Kansas City Star, April 28, 2017): "I've been around the best gunslinger ever with Brett Favre. I'm not into comparisons – they're different players. Brett's a Hall of Fame player and this kid has a long way to go before that, but I think when you have an opportunity to talk to him and be around him, he had an energy and a certain intensity you like."
Dorsey comparing Mahomes to Favre without mentioning the latter's name (draft night media conference, April 27, 1987): "I saw a guy who used to flip it into coverage too, sometimes. He made it into the Hall of Fame. I'm not comparing him, but I'm just saying. Those things happen."
Chris Cabott, who co-represented Mahomes with Leigh Steinberg, on his pre-draft relationship with Veach (Yahoo!Sports, Sept. 21, 2018): "For like 94 straight days, we literally communicated in some way, shape or form. We established a rapport where Brett was like, 'Anything about Patrick I want to know?'''
Pace on Trubisky (Chicago Tribune, May 21, 2017): "And the way he was raised, he's not full of himself. He's more about his team and sharing the glory."
By all accounts, Pace had zeroed in on his eventual choice more than a month before the draft and was committed to Trubisky thereafter. In fact, the Bears reportedly cut off communication with him after a mid-March trip to Chapel Hill, N.C., where he had all but sold them on being their pick. It was done purely as a surreptitious act.
Something else to keep in mind was that Pace was overseeing only his third draft as general manager. When he was hired by the Bears in early January, 2015, at the age of 37, he was the youngest GM in the NFL. Coupled with that, he had worked for just one NFL team – New Orleans for the previous 14 years – spending most of that time as a pro scout.
Pace and coach John Fox also were on shaky ground following 6-10 and 3-13 finishes in their first two seasons together. Plus, Pace already had whiffed on a top 10 pick. With the seventh overall choice in 2015, he had selected wide receiver Kevin White. In his first two seasons, White had played in only four games.
Pace had to know that if he blew another high choice, Chicago's caustic fans and pundits would be mercilessly skewering him around the clock on talk shows and in print.
All of the above might explain why he was predisposed to playing it safe, micromanaged the search and created what Wiederer and Campbell said was "an unusual barrier between the personnel department and the coaching staff."
They reported, for example, that neither Fox nor quarterbacks coach Dave Ragone were on board with the Trubisky pick. Both had ranked Watson No. 1 among the QBs. What's more, Fox wasn't informed that Trubisky would be the choice until draft day.
Conversely, the communication lines in Kansas City were open and free of mistrust. There, those in charge had a track record of success and more of a comfort level with each other – at least at that point.
Reid ranked second in wins among NFL coaches and owned a regular-season winning percentage of .602, counting his years in Philadelphia. Dorsey had worked under Wolf in personnel for seven years while Reid was an assistant coach.
The 2017 draft was their fifth working together in Kansas City. Additionally, Veach had started working with Reid in 2004 in Philadelphia before joining him with the Chiefs in 2013.
The three together had experienced their share of misses but also had selected three players who have blossomed into sure-fire Hall of Famers: Travis Kelce, Chris Jones and Tyreek Hill.
The Chiefs also relied on a methodology and followed a pre-draft schedule that Dorsey and Reid had learned under Wolf. It included long, multi-week evaluation meetings, where scouts and others grinded through video and were encouraged to speak their mind. The focus was on one objective: To reach a consensus on a final grade for each player.
Veach (Kansas City Star, Aug. 19, 2017): "I think when you do a 17-day process and you watch everybody all at once, then you go out on the pro-day circuit and come back and watch tape for 14 more days, then take a break and come back for three or four days to put your board together, it really enables the room to develop that buy-in and say, 'This is our guy.'"
Reid on Veach's conviction that Mahomes was destined for stardom (Kansas City Star, Aug. 19, 2017): "He kind of brought him to John and I's attention – he was all in on this guy. That was his guy and he said, 'Hey, you've got to look at this guy and just see him.' He wore John and I out about him."
Quincy Avery, one of Watson's private quarterback coaches, on the Bears tunneling in on Trubisky and paying little attention to his guy (Chicago Tribune, Nov. 17, 2019): "Honestly, I thought that either they had some kind of wild process where they were going to try to sneak under the radar and grab Deshaun … Or it was an organization with a bunch of dysfunction … I thought they were trying to make something that wasn't there. … The Bears were trying to make Mitch Trubisky into a winner. You're trying to create something that hasn't necessarily been seen."
Dorsey (media conference, April 27, 1987): "Listen, Watson is a great kid. He's the senior who battled for the title last year (and) won the title this year. That's very special. But at the end of the day, we had Mahomes rated above Watson. That's how we saw it."
Eight years later, there's no telling how many Super Bowls and MVP awards Mahomes might win before he retires. But the jury is pretty much in on Watson and Trubisky.
Watson enjoyed three Pro Bowl seasons with the Texans before his career unraveled in Cleveland due to off-the-field issues, as well as injuries. In four years with the Bears, Trubisky had a 29-21 record as a starter but only an 85.5 passer rating. When his rookie contract expired in March 2021, he signed as a free agent with Buffalo to be Allen's backup.
T.J. Watt lasts until 30th pick
Although J.J. Watt, an 11th overall selection in 2011, had been named the NFL's AP Defensive Player of the Year three times, younger brother T.J. Watt, whose college career had followed a similar path, somehow slipped to the bottom of the first round, where Pittsburgh grabbed him at No. 30.
Much like J.J., who started at Central Michigan and then had to walk-on when he transferred to Wisconsin, T.J. also was a late bloomer. He started out as a tight end at UW, suffered through two knee injuries and played sparingly when he was first moved to outside linebacker in 2015.
Then overnight, Watt (6-4½, 252) emerged as a defensive playmaker with 11½ sacks and 15½ tackles for losses during the 2016 season.
Heading into the next spring's draft, the Steelers had a need for an outside backer having recently parted ways with their 2013 first-round choice, Jarvis Jones. And Watt was one of them on their wish list.
What remained to be seen was whether he would still be on the board when the Steelers picked. After all, Green Bay owned the choice before them and Watt was both a Wisconsin native and a prospect some scouts were comparing to Clay Matthews, who had been drafted by the Packers 26th overall in 2009.
As of the 2016 season, Matthews had been selected to the Pro Bowl six times in eight years and ranked second among their all-time sack leaders. Nevertheless, on draft night, the Packers traded their first-round pick, 29th overall, to Cleveland for the top choices in both the second and fourth rounds, and the Steelers jumped on Watt.
Packers linebacker Clay Matthews on T.J. Watt being compared to him (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, April 20, 2017): "Obviously, everyone's going to expect big things out of him with how well J.J. has been playing in this league. I think (T.J.) just wants his shot, and I know some of the mock draft boards have him potentially coming here, which would be great if he's even half the player his brother is, but I'm sure there's pressure on him. But I'm sure if he's anything like his brother, he'll have a drive and work ethic that can't be matched."
Steelers GM Kevin Colbert on T.J. playing only one full season at UW (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, April 28, 2017): "It was really a remarkable one-year production. We don't think he's a complete product at this point but we're excited. This kid is a solid football player and really only scratching the surface as a defensive player. … T.J. Watt is somebody we've had our eye on really since early in the fall."
Steelers coach Mike Tomlin (Post-Gazette, April 28, 2017): "(T.J.) has a lot of upside. At the same time, we saw some things that were exciting to us, his hand use in particular. His size, his production speaks for itself."
