Brandon Weeden, the 28-year-old from Oklahoma State who is expected to be the fourth quarterback taken in this year’s NFL draft, says that when he talks to NFL teams, he tells them that age is just a number.
Asked on the Dan Patrick Show if he thinks he’d be a first-round pick comparable to Texas A&M’s Ryan Tannehill if he were five years younger, Weeden said he thinks he would be.
“I believe so,” Weeden said. “I try to tell teams when we’re going through the interview deal, ‘Treat me like I am 22. Try to go through this process and evaluate me as if I’m a 22-year-old. . . . I don’t believe my age should even affect it. Obviously people are out there saying it should, we’ll find out in ten days and we’ll go from there, but really and truly, 22 or 28 it shouldn’t matter. I don’t think many people play 20 years in the NFL, but if I can play eight or ten years, that’s a pretty good NFL career.”
Still, Weeden knows his age makes him different. He just thinks it makes him different in a good way.
“I’ve already been a pro,” Weeden said. “From a maturity standpoint, I think I’m able to handle more thrown on my plate, quicker than the next guy. When I make the transition to the NFL, being a starting quarterback in the NFL is obviously extremely tough, but I think everything I’ve been through, my age, my maturity, is definitely going to help me make the transition to the next level. There’s a lot more positives than negatives, for sure.”
So Weeden doesn’t want to be viewed as a 22-year-old. With the life experience and maturity of a 28-year-old.