When an NFL team invests a top-five pick in a quarterback, it is making the declaration the player it has chosen is going to be positioned as the future of the franchise. That's what the Indianapolis Colts did when they selected Anthony Richardson fourth overall out of the University of Florida in the 2023 NFL Draft.
Richardson, who stands at 6-foot-4 and weighs 244 pounds, possesses all the physical tools that NFL front offices drool over. However, he needed time to put it all together since his 13 starts in college were tied with Mitchell Trubisky for the fewest by a first-round pick in the 21st century, per CBS Sports Research. Following a 4-4 start to 2024 after a 23-20 road loss at the Houston Texans in Week 8, Indy pulled the plug on the Richardson project for now, benching him in favor of 39-year-old Joe Flacco, a 17-year NFL veteran.
After the Colts lost Flacco's first start with the team 21-13 on "Sunday Night Football" at Minnesota in Week 9, Vikings head coach Kevin O'Connell made a point to find Richardson and encourage him. The 39-year-old head coach is a former NFL quarterback himself: He was a third-round pick of the New England Patriots in the 2008 NFL Draft. O'Connell retired after five seasons as a backup and went into coaching, so he has a fairly good idea of what it will take to actually last as an NFL quarterback.
"Hey, do me a favor and remember something: You're a bad dude," Vikings head coach Kevin O'Connell told Colts quarterback Anthony Richardson, via "Inside The NFL," after their Week 9 matchup. "And you're going to play a long time in this league. Go to work every day. Good things will happen for you. I still believe in you. I know these guys do. Shane [Steichen] does, too. Man, this organization love you. Go to work."
The Colts made this decision likely because of Richardson's boom-or-bust nature. His 44.4% completion percentage this season would rank as the second lowest in a season since 2000, ahead of only Bengals quarterback Akili Smith's 44.2% rate in 2000. Richardson's 16.2 yards per completion, on the flip side, would rank as the highest in a season in the 21st century, nearly 2 whole percentage points higher than Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb's 14.7 yards per completion back in 2006.
O'Connell could be right that Richardson has what it takes to play in the NFL for a while, but statistically the odds are against him doing that with the Colts. There were 66 quarterbacks selected in the first round of the NFL draft from 2000-2022, and 25 of them were benched at some point while on their rookie contract. Trubisky is the only one who started a playoff game or was selected to the Pro Bowl with the team that drafted him after being benched, according to ESPN researcher Evan Kaplan.