One would think that after spending two and a half days demanding that Shedeur Sanders be drafted, ESPN draft analyst Mel Kiper Jr. would be happy once Sanders was drafted.
But that’s not the case.
Kiper, who screamed into the cameras and at his fellow hosts in unbridled rage that Shedeur Sanders had fallen out of the first four rounds, found no solace in the Browns using the 144th overall pick to take a chance on the young man.
Instead, he saved his most vitriolic tirade for the end, when he blasted the NFL, calling them “clueless” about drafting quarterbacks.
Kiper asked co-host Louis Riddick why Sanders had not been taken earlier.
“This is not about, ‘Can you play the position?’ This is about, ‘Do we want you to play the position for us?’” Riddick attempted to explain.
“Why wouldn’t they?” Kiper fired back.
“That’s a whole ‘nother discussion that we’ve had in many different ways for weeks and months now.”
Kiper shot back, “Is he not one of the toughest quarterbacks you’ve ever seen?”
Rece Davis attempted to intervene and provide a voice of reason.
“That’s the key, Mel. It’s not putting a value judgment on who passed were right or wrong. They did,” Davis said. “Whether you like them, whether you don’t like them, whether they’re fair or whether they’re unfair, you might have to deal with them.”
Rece added that the adversity put Sanders in a good position to prove himself to the league. This argument did nothing to assuage Kiper, who doubled down by insisting the league had no clue how to evaluate quarterbacks.
“The NFL has been clueless for 50 years when it comes to evaluating quarterbacks!” Kiper replied. “Clueless! They have no idea what they’re doing in terms of evaluating quarterbacks, there’s proof of that!”
Kiper added, “The NFL gets it, they know everything. No, they don’t!”
It’s important to note that Kiper himself has made some mistakes in his quarterback evaluation over the years.
In 2010, Kiper promised to retire if Notre Dame QB Jimmy Clausen didn’t have a successful NFL career. Spoiler alert: he did not. In 2007, Kiper compared notorious draft bust JaMarcus Russell to John Elway and said he could be a top-five quarterback. Russell ate himself out of the league in a very short time.
Kiper also said that Ricky Stanzi would have the best career of any QB in the 2011 draft class. That also did not happen.
