I must say between the late Saturday night Oregon games, hearing him speak in post game interviews, watching him just enter and ace every pre draft test thrown at him (between measurables and performance). . . Justin Herbert has just flat out impressed me.
I am not here to push him above Tua/Burrow, but he is an impressive kid that has done everything asked of him in 2020 . . . and I just don’t buy the “lacking leadership and love of football” narrative some have thrown out there.
The thing that stuck out to me with Herbert in 2019 (honestly didn't watch much of him prior) was that he would hold the ball too long in certain situations waiting for guys to get open and it would lead to a bad sack or mistake.
But it didn’t feel like Tannehill though, with Tannehill you never really felt that he was a guy that could improvise or have decent pocket presence at all until at least 2016.
With Herbert, he has a good sense of pocket presence and he can improvise rather well already. . . . but he just seemed to let a conservative offense cause unnecessary hesitation, and combined with lesser skill positions around him, it caused most of the issues he had. That . . . and he didn’t always have that killer mindset/attitude that you wanna see with any QB you are drafting to be your franchise guy. That part of it is not something you have to worry about with Tua or Burrow, but it is Herbert’s biggest similarity/negative when compared to Tannehill (Ironically I have seen Ryan make tremendous strides in this area, especially in 2019, so it is coachable to an extent).
How much of all that was system/scheme/coaching and how much of that is just who he is as a QB will ultimately determine how good Herbert can be in the NFL.
I do believe Miami is a very good setup for him. Between the system and having a gunslinger like Fitzpatrick as a mentor already on the roster . . . I would be on board with the selection if that is where our conviction takes us.