JUSTIN HERBERT HOPE: WILL THE NFL TRASH ANOTHER OREGON QB

Justin Herbert image via KCBY, Coos Bay, Oregon

Oregon quarterback Justin Herbert joins a long green line of Duck signal callers headed to the NFL.

How long a line? Who is in that line?

Please proceed.

The NFL trashes Oregon quarterbacks the same way the big time trashes anyone coming out of college: They go to the wrong team.

At the wrong time.

How can Justin Herbert avoid the NFL trap?

Start with Joey Harrington.

He left Oregon for the Detroit Lions a couple of years after the great Barry Sanders retired because the organization wasn’t committed to winning, or drafting lineman to block for him.

Harrington showed up when the team was run by the awful Matt Millen. How awful?

From wiki:

Millen was the Lions’ CEO for seven full seasons, from 2001–07; during that time, the club compiled a record of 31-81 (with at least nine losses each season). Detroit’s .277 winning percentage was among the worst ever compiled by an NFL team over a seven-year period; only the Chicago Cardinals of 1939-45 (10-61-3, .141) and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers of 1983-89 (26-86, .234) were less successful.

He is generally regarded among the worst general managers in the history of modern sports.

His first professional coach was The Mooch, Steve Mariucci, a West Coast Offensive guy from the Bill Walsh coaching tree who couldn’t figure out a way to win with Harrington.

Mariucci was named the Detroit Lions’ 22nd head coach on February 4, 2003, and was fired on November 28, 2005. In his abbreviated three seasons in Detroit, he compiled a disappointing 15–28 (.349) record. Mariucci’s troubles in Detroit were partially attributed by many fans and experts to poor personnel evaluations by then Lions’ general manager Matt Millen, who had signed Mariucci to a five-year $25 million guaranteed contract, the NFL’s highest coaching contract at the time. 

The West Coast Offense was propelled by players like Joe Montana and Steve Young, guys with mobility and timing, which wasn’t Harrington’s strong points.

A quote attributed to Joey: “I’m not an athlete, I’m a quarterback.”

He also enjoyed playing the piano.

If Justin Herbert succeeds in the NFL, it will be with a team NOT run by a GM more tuned into sucking up to the team owners, and not coached by a one-trick-pony ‘professional.’

Akili Smith And The Bengals

A few years before Harrington, Akili Smith shined for the Ducks. He showed enough to be drafted #3 by Cincinnati.

Yes, the same Cincinnati looking at Justen Herbert; the team owned and run by Mike Brown, son of Paul Brown.

The 1990s and the 2000s were a period of great struggle. Following the 1990 season, the team went 14 years without posting a winning record, nor qualifying to play in the NFL playoffs. The Bengals had several head coaches and several of their top draft picks did not pan out. Mike Brown, the team’s de facto general manager, was rated as among the worst team owners in American professional sports.

It’s hard to blame teams for players’ failure to rise, but joining a rancid organization the stinks from the top down makes it a harder climb.

At least Smith joined a team where GM Brown wasn’t sucking up to owner Brown, not that it made much difference.

Marcus Mariota To Tennessee

Shade from the careers of Harrington and Smith fell on Mariota with the Titans.

Mariota and the Titans agreed to a contract on July 21, 2015. This made Mariota the last first-round pick to be signed and for the second straight year, the Titans were the last team to sign their first-round pick.

Does this sound dysfunctional?

Mariota deserved better.

He joined every football player who finishes their last collegiate season and finds themselves on a problem team.

The big leagues are a merciless mix of manliness, money, and mojo.

Don’t forget the mojo.

No quarterback in the NFL is going to succeed with four offensive coordinators in five seasons. First off, that means there’s a new scheme each season. After you’ve spent months working on mastering one system, one language, one voice, now you’re switching to another system, language, and voice.

Now he’s a part of Raider Nation, the same team another washed up Heisman Trophy winner joined after a horrible career start.

That quarterback was named Jim Plunkett, two time Super Bowl champion, one time Super Bowl MVP. He lost his mojo with the Patriots and found it with the Raiders.

Mariota has that path to follow and lay down his own footprints.

Help For Justin Herbert

He could go to Miami, or the Bengals, from early talk.

Some of the talk includes the warning that Herbert lived and played in Eugene all of his life, from Sheldon High School, to the U of O campus across town.

Do experts think he’ll get homesick in the middle of the season and pack his bags for home?

From all appearances, Herbert is not Matt Leinart. He’a not JaMarcus Russell, or Ryan Leaf, either.

If Herbert was going to be a problem, it would have shown up after the championship window for Oregon closed during the loss to Arizona State. In that game he took direct snaps in the shotgun that looked like he was fielding pop-ups. The ball got to his hands just before the defense.

He didn’t point a finger, or hint at blaming his center. He was a team guy who took on the burden, instead of running away to escape.

After the dust settles on this year’s draft, and Justin Herbert wears the third uniform of his football life after high school and college, my hope is that he lands on a stable team and starts the climb.

In a business that promises a career is Not For Long, Herbert could be one that bends that curve.

If he makes the grade, I’ve got just the thing to celebrate.

If you’re looking for a towel to wave, you could do worse than this, lost worse.