Ask Farrell: How much of a risk is it to draft Tagovailoa?
Once Tua Tagovailoa announced his decision to leave Alabama and enter the NFL Draft, the headline conversation over the next few months was started.
There are many reasons why Tagovailoa was wise in leaving college football, mainly because he’s still projected as an early first-round selection and because he did pretty much everything possible as a college football player.
But there are questions as well, especially since he’s coming off hip surgery, he’s dealt with other injuries throughout his college career and there is no doubt being a lefty quarterback could hurt his draft position, or at least make some decision-makers hesitate when looking for a quarterback.
Left-handed quarterbacks are non-existent in the NFL, partially because the ball comes out differently for receivers but also because there is just a small sample size of lefty QBs good enough to make NFL rosters.
And so here is Tagovailoa, who completed nearly 70 percent of his passes for 7,442 yards with 87 touchdowns and 11 picks during his career at Alabama, which also included winning a national championship.
LSU quarterback Joe Burrow has emerged as the probable top pick or definitely the first quarterback taken in April’s NFL Draft.
After that, Tagovailoa could go early in the first round along with Oregon’s Justin Herbert and possibly Utah State’s Jordan Love.
FARRELL'S TAKE
We ask Rivals National Recruiting Director Mike Farrell to weigh the positives and negatives about Tagovailoa’s game - the injuries versus the incredible production - and determine whether it would be smart for a team to draft Tagovailoa early or whether he should have come back to Alabama, even if that meant going in the same draft class as Trevor Lawrence and Justin Fields?
“OK, here are the positives. This year’s quarterback draft class is slightly below average and Tua should land in the first round. The bad news? He’s injury prone and will struggle in the NFL because of it regardless of whether he decided to come out this year or next.
"If I was an NFL GM, I wouldn’t take a first-round shot on him, especially with the shelf life of NFL execs these days because of his injury history.
"While personally I would have liked to see him return to Alabama for a year and show he could make it through a season without getting hurt, I can see why he is headed off to the NFL this year. It’s much better to be in this draft class than the 2021 class with all the talented quarterbacks.”