On3

● By Andy Staples

Accuracy: 31.97%18th Place
The NFL Draft is the strangest event to predict because unlike nearly any other situation, no one has an incentive to tell the truth. Teams don’t want to give away their strategies and will deliberately distribute bad information to throw other teams off the scent of certain players. Agents, meanwhile, want to make their clients look as good as possible — especially if they know their clients may not fare so well once the draft actually starts. This year, it feels as if the misinformation machine is in overdrive with regard to quarterbacks. Stories claiming that one or another is surging up draft boards feel oddly coordinated. And this makes it impossible to believe anything. There was chatter Monday about Washington’s Michael Penix Jr. cracking the top 10. Oregon’s Bo Nix has been mocked frequently in the first round. Could six quarterbacks get chosen in the first round? It’s certainly possible, but I suspect some teams that seem desperate for a QB at the moment will look at the available options in the middle-to-late first and feel comfortable that some of those players might be around in the second.

Top Players Not Included

These players appear in the top 32 of our

Consensus Big Board

, but do not show up in this mock.