I Love The Spin Zone That Anthony Richardson's Lack Of Quarterback Experience is Actually Good

The development of today’s young quarterbacks is trending younger all the time, with the proliferation of quarterback camps and with private quarterback coaching now common among elite high school passers.

And then there is Anthony Richardson.

The Indianapolis Colts’ first-round pick and potential franchise quarterback has ascended to the highest level of quarterbacking without the advantages that have assisted in the growth of so many of his peers. 

“Everybody has their own journey,” Richardson said. “Shout out to those guys for getting those resources and grabbing them. But I didn’t know much about all that. I was just playing football because I love playing football. I didn’t even know there were camps and all these technicians.”

Combine that with the fact that Richardson started for just a single college season at Florida, and the contrast between his path and that of some other young quarterbacks comes into sharper focus.

For some reason I spend a lot of time thinking about the best way to develop an athlete. I was always a pretty solid athlete as a kid, but my parents very much had the, "sports aren't that serious, you're not that good, so you might as well just have fun with it" type of attitude (and they were right). So I went to practice, and played in my games, but I never put in extra work. As a kid, I loved that. I never had to stress about sports, and it was engrained in my brain from a young age that you have to be an absolute freak to play at any level beyond high school, and I certainly was not that. So I felt no pressure to perform. 

But as I got older, especially before I had my dream job at Barstool, I used to think, "Damn, I wish my dad would have been a psycho sports dad. I wish my dad would have shoved sports down my throat, made me practice 8 hours a day, and made my childhood nothing but 3 cone drills and throwing footballs into trashcans across my backyard. Not that I would have amounted to anything, but then I at least would have known what my full potential was. 

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However when you hear these stories about players like Anthony Richardson, you realize that shit doesn't matter. I suppose if you're a borderline D1 athlete, and you dedicate your life to the game, then it might get you over that hump and you'll work your way into a scholarship. But stories like Anthony Richardson just go to show that if you have it, you have it. If you're fast enough, and strong enough, and smart enough to be a professional athlete, then someone is going to discover you.

Anthony Richardson's story, although it is a bit of an anomaly, spits in the face of the idea that in order to make a career as an athlete, you need to put a million hours into it from a young age. That's not necessarily true. You simply just have to be born better than everyone else. Maybe this Anthony Richardson stuff is just coming from Colts fans who are doing mental gymnastics to convince themselves that they made the right draft pick. But according to this article, Richardson's lack of experience is actually good.

Daniels makes a compelling counterargument that any bad habits Richardson might have aren't as ingrained as some who have been playing the position since elementary school.

“It’s easier to break a kid like that of bad habits than it is to break a kid who’s been taught by so many different people over and over again since they were 8 years old,” he said.

It seems as if a quarterback who has done less quarterbacking than other quarterbacks actually makes for a better quarterback. On the surface, this really does seem like something the Colts front office is telling themselves. That they drafted this dude with very limited experience, and are justifying it by saying it makes him "more coachable". They say he doesn't have bad habits, and his brain hasn't been ruined by a fat alcoholic dad who spent ages 8-14 with his son developing a throwing motion that any legitimate football coach would tell you is complete garbage. It seems like best case scenario for a QB draft pick is an athletic freak of nature with an empty brain. Then you simply give him the best coaches in the world, and BAM you got yourself a Hall of Famer.

But again, this is all relative. Todd Marinovich's dad made his son in a lab. Even though he flamed out in the NFL, he still got to the NFL. So there is something to be said for it. But there's something so enticing about a raw athlete with limited experience because he has such a high ceiling. "The ceiling is the roof" if you will. Hopefully Anthony Richardson proves that can work.