Colts and the Stanford QB connection

After an NFL Draft in 2011 that saw four quarterbacks taken in the first 12 picks of the first round the 2012 draft is shaping up nicely with four teams that obviously need a first round quarterback pick and, coincidently, four potential franchise quarterbacks with the ability to influence Football betting expected to be available. There’s just one problem. The Colts, who will have the first pick, don’t need a franchise quarterback yet, but they are not expected to pass on the opportunity to select Peyton Manning’s eventual successor in Indianapolis.

While technically owning an additional year of eligibility no one is expecting Stanford’s Andrew Luck to return to Palo Alto and instead the presumptive No. 1 overall pick will head to Indiana the second time that the Colts will have selected a can’t miss QB prospect out of Stanford with the top overall pick in the draft. Those that Bet on NFL will remember that the first time, of course, was John Elway who never played a down for the Colts when the franchise was in Baltimore giving the excuse that he didn’t want to play in a cold weather city. The issue, years later now acknowledged, was that Elway was never going to play for Frank Kush, then the head coach in Baltimore but previously in college at Arizona State where his methods were known to, and disapproved by Elway’s father, Jack.

Elway would be traded away to Denver, the Colts receiving offensive lineman Chris Hinton, a 1984 first round draft pick and QB Mark Herrmann, a poor haul in retrospect for a Super Bowl winning quarterback. These days the Executive Vice President of Football Operations in Denver for the Broncos, Elway has his own QB problems where Tim Tebow is winning, but certainly isn’t an NFL ready quarterback from a throwing standpoint. It would be a surprise if Denver doesn’t take either Landry Jones from Oklahoma or Matt Barkley out of USC in the 2012 draft unless Washington, Miami or Seattle addresses their needs first.