Who knows if whether Jalen Milroe will ever blossom into a quality NFL quarterback in Seattle, but let me throw out three names for you to mull over.

Lamar Jackson, Michael Vick, and Randall Cunningham.

Over the decades, these are quarterbacks who I have especially loved to watch play football. They are rare air stuff at the position who have threatened defenses on every single down with their legs and arm, in elite ways, that few could ever do.

Independent of the Seattle Seahawks, Lamar Jackson is my favorite football player to watch. I have told people that I would be willing to offer Baltimore five first round picks for him, if I were the Seattle GM, and that is not hyperbole.

I believe that, pound for pound, he is the most physically gifted football player on the planet given the position his plays. His legs negate a defense’s ability to function in man coverage, and he has developed the pocket talent to beat your defense whenever they are in zone. He can still dial up twenty yards on the ground at any point in the game while surveying from the pocket, even against zone when eyes are on him.

Best of all, Lamar enhances your offense’s ability to run the football independent of your offensive line, and running backs. He does this not only as a runner himself, but as a guy defenders have got to account for against read options, zone read, and any other situation where you have got to decide as a second level defender to choose targeting him or the running back with a potential hand off.

If that last sentence is a lot to chew on, let me make that more succinct. He makes your linebackers and DBs more tentative on run plays, and therefore, makes it easier for any running back to run the football. Look at what 30 year old Derrick Henry was able to do as a player last year as soon as he went to Baltimore. He could have easily been made league MVP with the rejuvenated he had paired with Lamar.

Now, let’s talk about former Alabama quarterback Jalen Milroe finding his way to Seattle during the NFL draft. There is a lot of meat on this bone to chew on for Seahawk fans who cannot help but daydream about what Milroe could become for their favorite team down the road.

It would be highly presumptive to assume that Jalen Milroe is going to be the second coming of Lamar Jackson a few years down the road for the Seahawks. It would be equally presumptive to make an assertion that Sam Darnold is set to be the Matt Flynn to his Russell Wilson, and Milroe is going to light training camp on fire and steal the QB1 job out from under Darnold’s nose this Summer; that is highly unlikely that will happen, and I cannot stress that enough.

That said, Jalen Milroe has out of this world physical talents as a quarterback. Pound for pound, he might be the most physically gifted athlete in this entire 2025 draft class. He’s big at 6-2, 217 pounds, and jacked up with muscles. He runs at an elite 4.4 speed, and some believe he might be the best instinctual running quarterback to ever come out of college (I can see that). He has a cannon arm that effortlessly launches beautiful deep passes downfield with pretty good accuracy, actually.

He also has a ton of work to do in order to develop as a functional passing quarterback. Whenever his mechanics would get sloppy in college, it would lead to some horrendously inaccurate throws. He has got to learn to properly marry up his feet to his arm with consistently in order to deliver reliable short to mid range passer. This will be his first step towards becoming a dependable starting quarterback in the league, and it isn’t impossible for him to clean this up, but it could take time.

This is why he fell all the way to pick 92 for the Seattle Seahawks.

He has tape that will absolutely excite you as a talent evaluator both as a runner and passer when his feet are set right, but he also has tape that will turn you off. His ceiling is through the roof in terms of what he can be as an overall QB1, if he develops properly, but his floor suggests he’s coming into the league as guy who can do some truly special things on the ground with his legs, but it is going to be an adventure with him as a passer if he is forced to start right away.

The clay that he has is really good stuff but the mold is not ready to bake in the oven yet.

Due to this, I cannot say, with any sort of certainty, whether the Seattle Seahawks just drafted an exciting quarterback of the future, or an exciting career backup who will come into games for a hand full of plays, and offer a spark with his legs a la Taysom Hill, or Cordell Stewart. Time will tell, but I can say that I am incredibly excited to find out.

Either way, his traits will bring immediate value to Seattle’s transforming offense, and that matters. Milroe gives Klint Kubiak something few other coordinators in this league have; a young developmental quarterback who will see the field now in certain packages, and will work to develop his game for starting down the road.

Gun to my head, if I had to choose whether Milroe develops as a starter for the Seahawks or stays a career backup, I honestly would not bet against his development, eventually. I don’t say this as a hopeful Seattle Seahawk fan, either.

For as much as we can get excited about his physical potential as a player, it is the inner intangibles that Milroe possesses that make me leery to ever bet against him. For as impressive of a physical talent as he is on a football field, it is what rests inside the young man that makes me think “yup, go ahead and take a shot on that guy.”

It has now come out that through the draft process, NFL front offices absolutely fell in love with Milroe, the person. Teams loved the way he conducted himself in interviews answering hard questions about what happened to him in Alabama during the final stretch of games that saw his mechanics erode. He gave straightforward responses, assuring GMs and coaches that he was very aware that he will need time to develop.

This is why, in the final days leading up to the draft, there was a positive growing buzz around Jalen Milroe. Teams fell in love with the quality of the person over the rawness of the player. Who knows if Vegas was waiting in the weeds after Seattle’s pick at 92 with two late third round picks, but one would think that Pete Carroll, especially, would had a fondness for him as a developmental player behind Geno Smith.

I will also admit that when I saw that Seahawks had brought him into the VMAC a couple weeks before the draft, I got nervous. I didn’t want to see Seattle draft a quarterback high this year after they signed Darnold in free agency. I was good with taking a mid round flyer on someone, but I wanted to see an early and often selection of offensive linemen like most fans probably wanted.

When it got to Seattle’s pick at 18, I got really nervous when Grey Zabel was still on the board, but so was Milroe, and Jaxson Dart. That is why I exploded with excitement when the pick was made, and Zabel’s name was called, but I gotta be honest, in early day two, when Seattle moved up from 52 to 35, I thought it was going to be for Milroe, and it was stressing me the fuck out. I didn’t want him there, either.

When the pick finally happens at 92, later in round three, I was more than fine with it all. My heart sank a bit for Darnold, but I was fine with the selection. The third round felt like ideal value for Jalen Milroe, a passer with unbelievable natural talents, but who will need a lot of developing.

As the dust has settled on this pick, and the overall draft for Seattle, I have gone from liking the Jalen Milroe selection a lot to being head over heels in love with it. It is, by far, my most favorite selection the team made, and I needed that Zabel pick, and I loved the value Seattle found later on in the draft with receiver Tory Horton, and running back Damien Martinez.

Let me quickly break down the two fundamental areas of Milroe’s game that have made me come to love this pick as much as I do, and why I think it all matters greatly for Seattle.

Jalen Milroe the running quarterback

There is hype around Milroe that suggests he is perhaps the greatest pure running back to ever come out of college. Personally, as a Lamar fan, I am hesitant to put my stamp of approval on that take, but I can see why some people say it.

If you look at his tape, it is not just the blinding speed he has as a runner in the open field that impresses. It is that coupled with his instincts inside the muddiness of a pocket, when the pressure breaks down, and he can squirrel between the creases to find open space past the rushing defensive line, forcing the linebackers to come up for the tackle, cutting against them, making them miss, and then hit the jets towards a bunch of DBs who aren’t strong enough tacklers to haul him down with any sort of ease.

This is the stuff that you want to see your starting running back do as an inside runner in a zone blocking scheme. Go look at Milroe’s highlight tape when he keeps the ball and runs. He is just an incredibly gifted, instinctive runner. This is what makes him different.

He is built powerfully to run this way, too. He is a young man carved out of granite. I don’t think it is hyperbole to say that if he came out as a running back, he would have absolutely gone in the first round with the way offensive coordinator’s love to be creative these days. He could be a RB1 with a skillset to launch gorgeous deep balls down field.

But that is not what Jalen Milroe wants to be, and that is not how the Seattle Seahawks see him.. at all.

Jalen Milroe the passing quarterback

His running traits are very obvious, but what he is as a passer, and what he could develop into is where there is real meat on the bone when discussing Jalen Milroe. The best way I could probably describe Milroe, right now, as a thrower of a football, would be Jekyll and Hyde.

When, he’s Jekyll, and he’s in the pocket, keeping his mechanics clean, surveying through his progressions, he can layer gorgeous accurate passes downfield with the best of them. This is why it is a very lazy narrative saying he’s an inaccurate passer. To the contrary, he has shown a good ability to play action out of shotgun, hang tight inside the pocket, and deliver impressive strikes downfield while surveying the field.

When things get clunkier for him, and it leads to Mr Hyde like throws out of him, is when his feet aren’t set, and he still tries to strong arm it downfield, and the pass sails over his open receivers head. When you see that come out of him, that’s when you’re like “whoa, that was pretty bad.”

The problem with him right now, in terms of fitting this new scheme, is that it appears as though his mechanics stay cleaner inside the pocket than when he rolls out, and has a to throw an accurate dart on the move. It looks as though he hasn’t figured out how to tie his feet to his arm yet when he has to throw this way, and that is a big reason why Sam Darnold has a have big leg up on him in this offense right now.

To become a QB1 in a Klint Kubiak system, you have got to do two things fundamentally really well. You have got to play a lot of football directly under center, which Jalen Milroe did not do a lot of in college, and you have got to throw accurately on the move.

Therefore, these are probably the two biggest areas that he will need to clean up a lot before he can truly compete for the QB1 spot. These are the two things that Darnold does really, really well based on how things finally took off for him last year playing for the Vikings.

There is also a third hurdle that Milroe will need to overcome in his development for him to step into the QB1 role, and play with good productivity as an NFL quarterback. He is going to have to learn how to anticipate his throws better.

What do I mean by that?

Kubiak runs a system that is built on timing. It requires receivers who will precisely run patterns to be open at right times in certain areas of the zone coverages, and it is up to the quarterback to properly anticipate when those receivers will break into those open windows (even if they are small windows), and then throw an accurate ball there.

Brock Purdy proved to be a natural at this despite not having a strong arm or great athleticism. There is some stuff with Milroe’s college tape that suggests it will take him time to get there.

It is not that he doesn’t read the field and go through progressions. He has shown that he can do that. It is that there were times on tape where a receiver is breaking open in an area of the field based on the way a defense is playing against the routes, and Milroe doesn’t appear to be anticipating that. That showed up more in 2024 when he was playing in DeBoer’s scheme, which asked more out of him as a passer than what Nick Saban was asking him to do in 2023.

Now, if I am being honest with you, I would say that learning to play under center, fixing your mechanics so that everything with them is second nature, and learning to throw within a timing offense with proper anticipation are all three pretty big hurdles for a young quarterback coming out of college such as Milroe to overcome. Let’s just be clear on that.

That is not to say that he cannot overcome those hurdles, however, and it appears that he has a very serious mindset to get to work on them right away. He’s a very smart kid, a great academic athlete, and he is very self aware. That is why I would never bet against his development.

I also believe that these are the combined traits within him that made Seattle target him, and it is why it feels as though Mike Macdonald is very excited about the young quarterback that John Schneider was able to acquire for him in round three. I get a genuine vibe that Macdonald believes in this guy, and he was his preferred quarterback prospect all along.

What is it that we can most likely expect from Milroe this year and beyond

Jalen is not going to compete for the starting quarterback gig in Seattle this year, but he also hasn’t been drafted to become Taysom Hill 2.0 for Klint Kubiak, and Mike Macdonald made both of these things very clear in his press conference right after they drafted him. Sam Darnold is the starter, Drew Lock is the likely QB2, and Milroe is a unique QB3 who will see the field with special packages designed solely for him to quarterback out of this season. It sounds as though they would like to get him out on the field six to ten plays a game.

My guess is Macdonald would love to use his own version of the tush push with Milroe in short yardage situations, as he was on the record a few weeks back saying how much he loves that play. I can see packages being used around the goal line, as well, where he can threaten with QB keepers and also choose to throw it.

I can also see that, at various points in a game, they might want to go tight end heavy, have Jalen work out of shotgun with run pass option plays, kinda like a wildcat quarterback, but with an arm that will absolutely torch a defense, if defenders decide to sellout versus the run. Macdonald talked about finding ways to use players that fit their special strengths, and this would be a definite strength of Milroe to catch a defense off guard for a bit.

These would be logical ways to use Milroe now while he develops as a more complete passer.

I will also say this about Jalen. If they can successfully smooth out his mechanics, and get him comfortably working under center in a play action roll out offense, I think they will likely see his short range accuracy improve to the point where they could start considering him for the QB1 gig then and there.

That third thing I mentioned in his game that needs work, the throwing with anticipation thing, yeah, I’m not too sure how much that gets fixed behind the scenes as a backup. It is entirely possible that it does, but it also might have to be a thing that improves over time after he ascends to QB1 status, and he gains more experience.

If their intention is to develop him enough to pass the baton to him as a starter in a few years, his process of development might mainly just be about fixing his mechanics. It wouldn’t be impossible for him to be ready to go with it by 2026, but it could be take longer, and if Darnold is playing well enough, they might not feel the hurry to switch out quarterbacks. This is why it is so murky to predict when an appropriate transition to Milroe would be likely, if it happens.

It is a fun thought thinking about Jalen transforming himself into roll out quarterback in this offense, though. Even if his accuracy still gets away from him, here and there, when rolling out, his genuine threat to run will place a ton of pressure on the back end of any defense, and that would allow things to open up further downfield for his receivers.

Kubiak has to be considering ways for which he can take advantage of his skillset in a manner such as this, and how he can draft up an offense that will stare the shit out of linebackers and DBs with any given play. If Milroe can just cleanup his fundamentals, Kubiak could also be the biggest benefactor as he looks to ascend the coaching ranks.

Think about it. If Kubiak does with Milroe what his old boss Kyle Shanahan didn’t achieve with Trey Lance, take a raw but exceptionably athletic college quarterback and turn him into a functionally good passer, he could be the hottest coaching candidate out there with his choice of where he wants to go to build a program.

As for Macdonald, and what he is likely hoping to see come out of this, I think that is even more clear. He spent years in Baltimore watching Lamar as he coached defense. He knows better than anyone in Seattle outside of Schneider what it means to have a true top level duo threat quarterback. He just watched the Eagles win a Super Bowl over the Chiefs with Jalen Hurts.

Macdonald’s ideal stat line for Milroe might be 15 to 25, 220 yards, 2 TDs, but also 10 carries on the ground for another 100 yards and 2 more TDs. If he gets this type of production out of him, week in and week out, it means his offense is running the snot out of the football with Milroe is being efficient and productive enough while his defense is kicking the pants off of the other team’s offense all game long.

If you want to be a physically dominant team that plays great defense, and runs the ball exceptionally well, having a developed Jalen Milroe at quarterback is probably a very good way of going about it. I mean, even if he doesn’t get quite to Lamar heights, if he’s simply a stronger armed version of Jalen Hurts, that’s still pretty damn good, as we all just witnessed a few months back. Hurts, in fact, might be the better, and more achievable pro comp for Milroe.

So there is a lot of incentive out there for Seattle to develop this guy. It would be a gigantic feather in the cap of John Schneider to have found two different franchise quarterbacks in the third round, cementing his status as an all time great NFL GM. It would be massive for Macdonald to have a guy under center who he fully believes in, and plays the game how he appreciates it, and it would be a huge thing on Kubiak’s resume to see him developed.

But for Jalen Milroe, it would be achieving everything that he thought he could be, and should be. A bad ass QB1 in the National Football League.

Time will tell if this happens for him and the team, but they are going to try. This is why he was drafted, and I would not bet against him to figure it out. The more I sit with this pick, the more confidence I have him Milroe’s character to stay grinding and figure it out for him.

If I were to compare him to a big named athlete, in terms of where he is now, and what he can be, I wouldn’t use Lamar or Hurts. I would comp him to former Mariner ace Randy Johnson.

When Johnson came into Seattle, he had incredible rare stuff with his arm and physical traits, out of the atmosphere upside, but he was raw as could be, and some of his pitches were the most wildly inaccurate stuff as you would ever witness. When he was on the bound in the early 1990’s, it was an adventure. He was Jekyll and Hyde personified.

But he loved baseball, and he was determined to figure it out, and he did.

Jalen Milroe loves football, and he has strong inner belief in himself to improve. You can get excited about that intangible and comparison to Randy.

I really hope it happens for him. He will be an easy guy to root for on Sundays, just you wait. I am here for it.

Temper your expectations of him, though, if you believe Seattle just landed a guy ready to jump into the role of QB1, and is going to grow into Lamar 2.0. That is a gigantic expectation to have for him.

At the same time, if you did not like this selection of him at 92, try to have an open mind. It is okay to daydream some about him, and be excited about these special packages that Seattle is intending for him this year. Those packages, alone, could be well worth this selection, and could be the difference in wins, and getting back to the post season again.

Fun stuff to think about, indeed.

Go Hawks.