What If We Were Right About Drew Allar and Carson Beck the First Time?
Two quarterbacks once viewed as potential top NFL Draft picks fell all the way to the third round. Maybe Pittsburgh and Arizona should be thrilled they did.
I watched a lot of preseason football Thursday night.
Yes, I know.
It’s preseason.
It doesn’t matter. Defenses are vanilla. Coaches are experimenting. Half the guys playing in the fourth quarter won’t be on an NFL roster in three weeks. Preseason performances have been fool’s gold since the beginning of time.
I get all of that.
But I still couldn’t stop thinking about something while watching Drew Allar play for Pittsburgh and Fernando Mendoza make his debut for Las Vegas.
Quarterback evaluation is absolutely insane.
And I’m starting to wonder whether a couple of NFL teams may have accidentally lucked into their quarterbacks of the future.
What happened to Drew Allar?
Let’s start with Allar.
The Steelers took him with the 76th overall pick in the third round of the 2026 NFL Draft.
Thursday night, he didn’t look like the 76th-best player in a draft.
He looked like a quarterback who belonged.
Allar completed 10 of 13 passes for 153 yards and two touchdowns in Pittsburgh’s 28-9 win over Green Bay. He also ran for a touchdown.
Three touchdowns. Three incompletions.
More importantly, he looked comfortable.
There was command of the offense. There was confidence. There was calm. Nothing about the moment appeared too big for him.
And watching it made me think back to where we were with Allar not that long ago.
There was a time when Allar was being discussed as a potential high first-round NFL quarterback.
Then 2025 happened.
The statistical difference between his final two seasons at Penn State is striking.
In 2024, Allar completed 66.5% of his passes for 3,327 yards, 24 touchdowns and eight interceptions, averaging 8.4 yards per attempt. He also ran for 302 yards and six touchdowns.
In his injury-shortened 2025 season, he completed 64.8% for 1,100 yards, eight touchdowns and three interceptions in six games. His yards per attempt dropped from 8.4 to 6.9 and his passer rating fell from 153.5 to 135.7.
But here’s the question:
Did Drew Allar suddenly become a significantly worse quarterback?
Or did everything around him change?
He didn’t have Tyler Warren anymore. Warren had been an absolute security blanket in 2024 and developed into a first-round NFL Draft pick. Penn State’s receivers struggled to consistently create separation. The entire season started unraveling around him. James Franklin was fired in October.
Then Allar’s season ended after six games because of injury.
That’s a pretty lousy laboratory for evaluating a quarterback.
Maybe Allar regressed.
Or maybe we occasionally make the mistake of evaluating quarterbacks as though they exist independently of everything happening around them.
Now look at where he landed.
Pittsburgh. Mike McCarthy. Aaron Rodgers.
That’s not a bad place to spend your first NFL season.
Rodgers famously spent three years sitting behind Brett Favre in Green Bay before taking over. Jordan Love later spent three seasons sitting behind Rodgers.
I’m not suggesting one year watching Rodgers automatically turns Drew Allar into a franchise quarterback.
But if you’re Pittsburgh, wouldn’t you love the idea of letting a 22-year-old quarterback with Allar’s physical ability spend a season learning the position from one of the greatest quarterbacks ever to play it?
Especially with Mike McCarthy overseeing his development?
McCarthy coached Rodgers for more than a decade in Green Bay. The Steelers themselves talked after drafting Allar about his intelligence, arm talent and high ceiling, with quarterbacks coach Tom Arth pointing specifically to McCarthy’s track record developing the position.
Thursday was one preseason game.
But you could see why Pittsburgh took the swing.
And then there’s Carson Beck
This one may be even more interesting to me.
Remember what people thought Carson Beck was going to become?
Before his final season at Georgia, Beck was legitimately being discussed as a candidate to become the No. 1 overall pick in the NFL Draft.
That wasn’t some obscure projection, either.
After throwing for 3,941 yards, 24 touchdowns and six interceptions while completing 72.4% of his passes in 2023, Beck looked like the next prototype NFL quarterback coming out of Georgia.
Then something changed.
Brock Bowers left.
Ladd McConkey left.
And Beck’s numbers went backward.
In 2024, his completion percentage dropped from 72.4% to 64.7%. His passing yards fell from 3,941 to 3,485. His interceptions doubled from six to 12.
Then Beck injured his elbow in the SEC Championship Game. Gunner Stockton took over for Georgia in the College Football Playoff, Beck underwent surgery, and Beck ultimately transferred to Miami for his final college season.
And what happened when Beck got healthy and found himself in a different situation?
He flourished.
At Miami in 2025, Beck completed 72.4% of his passes for 3,813 yards and 30 touchdowns, leading the Hurricanes all the way to the national championship game.
Read those numbers again.
72.4%.
3,813 yards.
30 touchdowns.
Arizona still got him with the 65th overall pick in the third round.
And we’ve already gotten a glimpse of why that might turn out to be ridiculous value.
Beck didn’t play Thursday against Las Vegas because of minor rib discomfort, but in Arizona’s Hall of Fame Game against Carolina the week before, he completed 15 of 19 passes for 188 yards and a touchdown.
That’s a 78.9% completion rate and nearly 10 yards per attempt in his first NFL action.
Again: preseason.
I know.
But it makes the larger question fascinating.
What if the original evaluations were right?
This is what I can’t stop thinking about.
What if NFL evaluators weren’t wrong about Drew Allar and Carson Beck when they initially viewed them as potential high-end NFL prospects?
What if we were wrong when we downgraded them?
Quarterbacks don’t play in laboratories.
Their offensive lines matter.
Their receivers matter.
Their tight ends matter.
Their coordinators matter.
Their head coaches matter.
Their confidence matters.
And in modern college football, where rosters can change dramatically from one season to the next because of the transfer portal and NFL departures, the environment around a quarterback can change almost overnight.
Allar lost Tyler Warren and played on a Penn State team that imploded badly enough for James Franklin to be fired during the season.
Beck lost Brock Bowers and Ladd McConkey, struggled through a more difficult 2024 season at Georgia, got hurt, changed schools and then immediately looked like an elite college quarterback again at Miami.
Maybe that’s coincidence.
Maybe both guys really did have flaws exposed.
And maybe neither one ever becomes a successful NFL starter.
That’s entirely possible.
But consider what Pittsburgh and Arizona paid to find out.
The Steelers got Allar at No. 76.
The Cardinals got Beck at No. 65.
Two quarterbacks who, at different points in their college careers, generated legitimate first-round — even potential No. 1-pick — discussion were available in the third round.
Now neither organization has to rush them.
Aaron Rodgers isn’t Pittsburgh’s long-term future. He’s 42 years old.
Jacoby Brissett isn’t Arizona’s long-term future, either.
Eventually, there is going to be an opportunity.
And maybe we’re going to look back a few years from now and realize Pittsburgh and Arizona didn’t discover anything the rest of the NFL couldn’t see.
Maybe they simply remembered what everyone thought they saw in these quarterbacks before everything around them changed.
That’s what makes quarterback evaluation so fascinating.
Sometimes a quarterback gets better.
Sometimes he gets worse.
Sometimes we were simply wrong about him.
And sometimes the player never really changed at all.
Everything around him did.
Show Pony Media is presented by AR’s Hot Honey
A big thank you to AR’s Hot Honey for continuing to support Show Pony Media.
And after having founder Ames Russell on Show Pony Live yesterday, I have an even greater appreciation for what makes AR’s different.
The secret is really no secret at all: honey and peppers. That’s it.
No unnecessary additives. No junk. Ames explained how they blend wildflower and clover honey to create the flavor and consistency they want, then bring in the peppers for that perfect balance of sweet and heat.
It’s incredibly simple — and that’s the point. Great ingredients treated the right way make a great product.
If you missed my conversation with Ames yesterday, go check out the full episode of Show Pony Live. And if you want to try AR’s for yourself, use promo code SHOWPONY15 for 15% off your order.
AR’s Hot Honey: honey, peppers and nothing you don’t need.
Do you think the Steelers and Cardinals found their QB’s for the future? Drop comments below.