I've watched so much Washington Huskies tape in the last month and the half-dozen times I watched them on college Saturdays that I could recite play sequencing from week to week. Some of you are thinking, 'Weird flex, Giardi.' To which I would respond, 'It's no flex. I have no life. What else is there for me to do?'
Now that we have that cleared up, I thought we'd take a deeper look at Michael Penix. He's not as polarizing a prospect as Drake Maye has somehow become or J.J. McCarthy now that he's firmly on everyone's draft radar as a legit first-round pick, but Penix's primetime performances have convinced a legion of casual college football fans here in New England that he should be the guy. So, should he?
CASE FOR PENIX
The dude has played a lot of football — six years in college, to be exact. The first four were at Indiana before transferring to Washington.
- Consistency once on the left coast. Penix's stat lines are practically mirror images of each other during his two years with the Huskies.
"He's played in a lot of games and a lot of big games in hostile environments," said an NFC assistant coach. "That matters."
- He's got giant mitts (10 1/2"), and you can see that play, especially in some of the bad-weather games that Washington invariably had to deal with (that stadium is right on the water)
- No worries about the arm on Penix. He lets it rip but isn't just a one-speed thrower (McCarthy has a little too much of that in him right now).
- Excellent pocket presence. He generally knows what he's looking at and where the pressure is coming from, and he rarely takes sacks (31 in nearly 1800 collegiate snaps. Impressive).
"I love how composed he is," said one AFC scout. "The only time I can recall him looking a little flustered was in the Championship game, and honestly, I get it. He was under siege."
The Denver Broncos, who need a quarterback, put Penix through the wringer during an interview, showing him bad plays from that game and asking him to explain his thoughts.
"I feel like, in ways, they were just probably trying to see how I reacted to those bad plays - if I can take accountability and stuff like that," said Penix at the Scouting Combine. "And I'm always going to do that."
As we know, that kind of accountability is critical at the position. Penix is considered an excellent leader who developed from his time in Indiana to what he became at UW.
"You saw it with how his teammates responded to him," said an NFC scout. "He speaks, they listen. You could see it in games, but you could also see it at his pro day. He gives off a good vibe. Alpha."
- Great, but how about his play? If you want to push the ball down the field, that's a strength for Penix. In 2023-24, he led the country in completions of 20 yards or more and was second in completions of 30 yards or more (behind only Jayden Daniels).
"Just an absolute rocket for an arm," a college scouting director told me. "But it's also the touch. His tape is littered with throws to the deep or intermediate sidelines that have just the right pace and just the right feel. It's a fun watch."
Penix tested well at the pro day, surprising some with his explosiveness (he ran in the 4.5s and had a vertical of 36.5"). However, an AFC coach I spoke with said that athleticism shows up on tape more than the casual viewer would know.
"I laugh when I read or hear someone say he can't move. He's not planting roots in the ground. He moves away from pressure and will replant and throw with power and accuracy. Hell, he rarely takes sacks. Some of that is because he escapes, or escapes enough to avoid a negative play."
CASE AGAINST PENIX
- During the first four years of his career, Penix suffered season-ending injuries — two ACLs in the same knee (right) and issues in each shoulder. His combine medicals reportedly didn't contain any significant red flags, but individual teams operate under their guidelines. For instance, the Pats picked Sony Michel in round one despite a handful of teams taking him off their boards because of bone-on-bone in one of his knees. That's just how the league works.
- Mechanically, Penix needs work. The footwork can get sloppy, and his frontside flies open, leading to scattershot throws.
-There's inconsistency in his reaction to pressure, so while he doesn't take many sacks, you can see his clock speed up to the point where his accuracy gets spotty.
- If the defense takes away his first read or muddies the waters, Penix "turns into Tua (Tagovailoa), and I don't mean that in a good way," said a scout. "You can see the doubt, and the calm, cool, collected pace you see him play at when it's all going well disappears."
- Penix is not a creative thrower in the pocket or on the move. You may laugh at this statement, but many folks in the league do not. "There aren't too many statues playing QB in the league anymore. Those days are long gone," said an assistant GM. "He doesn't want to move off his spot. He can do it to some degree, but it would be more like Baker Mayfield than it would be like Trevor Lawrence or Patrick (Mahomes)."
Good or bad, Penix knows his journey is just beginning.
"I want to write my own narrative," he said. "So I'm not chasing for somebody else's respect. I feel like the real ones know. The ones that really watch and know football, they know what I can do on the football field."