Jaxson Dart goes to the NFL.
Dart’s draft stock is one of the most fascinating stories of the NFL 2025 Draft season. If you look at its trend line in NFL draft database” Dart was a selection of the day of the day Fringe so recently in early January.
Since then, he has shot dress tables, and in the hours in front of the first round many simulated drafts had the second QB out of the board. For example, both Daniel Jeremiah and Dane Brugler had Dart and QB2 in their simulated draft finals.
Now, these predictions have proven to be correct, since the New York giants returned to the first round to take DAFT with selection No. 25. New York executed an exchange with the Houston Texans, sending to Houston a second round of 2025 (No. 34), a third round of 2025 (No. 99) and a third -round selection of 2026 Houston at number 25.
And the rights to the draft of the dart.
This is what Dart does well and where he will need to improve to meet expectations.
A QB that will receive the blow
Many features enter a quarterback evaluation. The talent of the arm, accuracy, foot game, decision making and athletics appear prominently in exploration reports. Questions such as the character and leadership of the figure in the equation.
Then there is a feature that often boiled over low heat, but in many ways, there is no substitute for it.
The will to stand in your pocket, accept that a much larger, stronger and faster human being is about to get into the kingdom of shadow, and even in front of that threat of making a release.
Quarterback is a position with so many complexities, which make the qualification the position one of the most difficult things to do in the evaluation space. Beyond what the features matter, there is the factor of how these traits are weighed in the evaluation. If a field marshal does not have an elite level arm, can they compensate for that through decision making and processing speed? If they lack elite athletics, can they balance that with the talent of the arm?
But there is no substitute for being willing to stand in your pocket knowing that the pain is approaching.
It is perhaps the most unnatural feature in sports, up with the boxing ring or immersed in the corner of Indianapolis Motor Speedway 245 miles per Hor with a wall in front of you. Every natural human thought in your brain tells you to run. Flee. The response to the flight kicks.
But, instead, will you fight?
Or when I study Quarterbacks, writing about them, or both I turn to the words of people much smarter than me. People who have a leg in the ring, apart, when it mattered.
Terry Shea’s work stands out absolutely, and his book Look up It contains a lot of knowledge about the field marshal position obtained from decades of experience.
The subtitle of that book is also instructive here: Train with the nerve to play the most challenging position in football.
Take this passage from Eyes up:
It can be argued that mental and physical hardness is as important as talent or self -confidence. One of the most challenging factors about the field marshal is to adapt to mental and emotional pressure. The pressure can be huge in games at all levels. As the game develops, the mental hardness of a field marshal is very proven. Hold on when you wear down and your body hurts. Possess the nerve to release the ball in advance. To continue getting up after each blow. To keep back. Refuse to lose. This is how mental strength is defined. A mentally hard field marshal produces the balance to play well in the pressure situations and that is a defining virtue of the field marshal game.
The best field marshal are not necessarily the best football pins. Winning quartbacks tend to be those people who call calls that operate with precise fields of field seafood, fed by a complete tank of trust and hardness.
That is the part of Jaxson Dart’s game that really stands out for me. The will to stand in your pocket in front of the pressure and make a launch, knowing that the work asks you to do that, and that the pain can be very good results. Take this example of the Dart Bowl game against Duke:
Note: Readers in Apple news You must click on the previous link to see the clips.
The Blue Devils exert pressure here, while Dart works on this constant concept at the border between its closed wing on the corner route and the runner underneath. He knows that the great success is coming, perhaps multiple great hits, but hangs in his pocket and makes the shot, fighting the pressure.
Or take this launch against the state of Mississippi in the egg bowl:
Consider the situation here: Mississippi faces the third and 5 in the red zone, in the fourth quarter or in a game of a score. The bulldogs bring a 0 blitz cover, and Dart knows that they don’t have the numbers in protection to block everyone. Someone is free.
He hangs in his pocket and throws a penny on a sewing route, receiving another blow to the process.
But then it is celebrated.
Let’s look at another example of this trait in action. This play comes from the Dart game against South Carolina. One of the most disconcerting things you can experience as a field marshal is to look at a free corridor that has a complete sprint on your chest, when you need to stop in your pocket, receive the blow and make a throw.
That is exactly what Dart does in this work:
Certainly, there are questions about Dart’s general evaluation, beginning with how good the offensive in Mississippi will translate into the NFL, and how well that offensive for that transition prepared it.
But when it comes to one of the most unnatural parts of playing the position, Dart has that for Pat.
That says a lot about what can be the next level.
Can you reach Plan C in a consistent way?
The biggest question that Dart faces while preparing for life in the NFL?
Can you graduate from operating Lane Kiffin’s offensive in Mississippi, for which life will face it on the next level?
One of the main works of any offensive game designer and/or playing player is to facilitate the life of his field marshal in the air game. Give them an answer for any coverage that will see in a given play and simplify how they get to that answer. A given route design can have two different concepts of “half field”, one designed to overcome the coverage of man and the other designed to overcome the coverage of the area. Diagnosis of whether the defense is in man or in the area, and you will get to your response.
Other game designs may have a progression reading based on which specific coverage is the defense. If it is cover 3, read a set of progress, but if it is cover 4, you read a different set.
But what happens when the defense has its first covered readings? Can you get to Plan C?
That can be difficult on Saturday.
It can be almost impossible on Sundays.
When Dart got into trouble in Mississippi, he often arrived when the defense touched his first reading or two away, and forced him to deepen progressions. Take this play against the state of Mississippi in a failed two -point conversion attempt:
Some things stand out about this work, which Dart should try to improve as he advances to the NFL.
First, Mississippi uses the movement before the click, taking the outer receiver to the right in a battery alignment by pointing them out to football. These two receivers are depleted on the routes, and the idea is that the movement will create traffic in high school.
However, if you observe how the defense reacts, a defender does not follow the man of movement, which is a sign that the bulldogs are in the coverage of the area. Dart … could because to put his eyes elsewhere after the click.
However, the open to the right, hoping to fit in one of the launch routes. But with the state of Mississippi in the coverage of the area, Neith is open, and he has his eyes on the excavation route. This can have a better option to start, but he makes it possible.
However, he expects a roast too long and never sees the defense of “hole” under the stalking. That defender reads his eyes perfectly and enters the launch lane for easy interception.
A branch of this is what I like to do as follows: “What works on the day of installation may not work on Saturday.”
Or Sunday, in the case of the NFL.
When you see the quarterbacks, you can often see plays where the QB has just locked on a route that has worked in the past, perhaps door of the week of duration of the “instay”, and assumes that things will click when that play is called the game duration. They look on the route and, well, you know what happens when you make assumptions …
Take this play against the state of Mississippi:
Kiffin marks a charming design here, with a false smoke screen to the right. Dart pumps on that false screen, hoping to influence the secondary descent to release the vertical route on the medium.
Solo, the state of Mississippi does not bite.
Even so, Dart launches that vertical route, anyone in double coverage. While the pass fell incomplete in this example, it is likely to be a turnover in the NFL.
So, well, there is the play probably showing the prominent package when this choice was made:
This comes in a 1st and 10 afternoon situation against Florida. Mississippi Trails 24-17, has the ball in the territory of Florida and is 1:47 Remaking.
Almost anything would have a better bone than throwing triple coverage, in this situation. The consequent loss of Mississippi eliminated them from the playoff content.
Dart is as difficult as it is in the QB position, but you will need to clean errors like this, and do a better job when planning C – at the next level.