Confessions of a No. 1 Pick Gone Bust

EPISODE 151: Alex Smith, man.

For a long time, back when I was hosting ESPN Daily, I’d stay up late every Sunday night and dissect the full slate of NFL games with our own Monday morning quarterback: Alex Smith.

Alex was the former No. 1 overall pick in the 2005 NFL Draft, taken by the San Francisco 49ers. And he’d go on to have one of the most impressive 14-year careers in NFL history, in terms of not just on-field success but also injuries overcome.

Alex has been both the upstart and the incumbent, the new guy and the old guy that Patrick Mahomes, in Kansas City, would ultimately replace.

But Alex arrived in the league with the highest possible expectations.

And he was… in a word… horrible.

Which is also how America has been describing Caleb Williams, the would-be rookie savior of the Bears and allegedly the next Mahomes. And Bryce Young, the second-year savior for the Panthers, who lost his job last week and had to watch his former backup cruise to Carolina’s first win. And Trevor Lawrence, selected first in 2021 by the Jaguars, who currently looks like he’s in hell.

All three, like Alex, are members of the No. 1 overall pick club. All three, simultaneously struggling, are the story of this season thus far.

And so what I wanted to find out is the stuff that this club of would-be leaders cannot say publicly, while they’re going through it.

I wanted to find out what it’s really like when the NFL eats its young.

DKN/YOUTUBE SPOILER ALERT:

Cyclically,

Pablo