I love a good story. And any story that features a guy taking multiple chances on himself and succeeding each time is a good story in my book.
Enter Baker Mayfield. A recent profile from Robert Klemko of SI.com has generated headlines because Mayfield admits to not being fully prepared for a meeting with the Chargers. But there’s a reason for Mayfield’s lack of attention to that team’s playbook in advance of the meeting: Mayfield believes he’ll be long gone before the Chargers put a name on the card that will contain the name of the 17th overall pick in the draft.
Mayfield, when meeting with the man he’d hire to represent him and reviewing a list of 2017 draft picks and the contracts they signed, drew a line after the Broncos at No. 5 and said, “I’m not going later than this.”
I’m not about to doubt the guy. And not just because the Jets seem to be smitten with him at No. 3. If not the Jets, it will be someone else, potentially by trading up to get him.
Mayfield’s current status marks the culmination of a journey that began when, at the urging of his father, he decided to pass on scholarship offers from Texas Tech and Washington State and walk on at Texas Tech. He instantly became the starter. Then he transferred to Oklahoma, walking on again. And he instantly became the starter, again.
He’s short. So what? He can play, and he can play well. And he seems to have the quality that so many of the great quarterbacks have, a confidence that from time to time crosses over into delusion but that never really is delusion because he backs up what he believes. He believes he’ll be a top-five pick, and so he will.
And then we’ll see what happens when he commences the process of making other things he surely believes comes to fruition, in the same way he previously has.