Every few years, a blue-chip quarterback emerges from college football who gets the generational talent tag. What started with John Elway in 1983 saw many like Jeff George, Peyton Manning, and Trevor Lawrence among others receive such treatment. USC star Caleb Williams is the latest generational talent to enter the NFL draft picks. Caleb has been unanimously declared as the number one overall draft pick.
The hype which started healthily has now gone overboard with the lines getting blurred between overhyped and overrated. Chris Broussard and Rob Parker, hosts of The Odd Couple on Fox Sports today discussed the Caleb Williams ‘overhype’ claims. Chris Broussard at the start of the episode asked his co-host Rob a simple question. “Is Caleb Williams being overhyped?” Rob instantly agreed with the sentiment and said, “absolute” with utmost conviction.
Before delving into the reasons why he feels so, Rob cleared that it’s no fault of QB that he is getting overhyped. He instead blamed it on the nature of the draft picks and the excitement of the fans. Parker then made some critical analysis of Caleb and pointed out how he had a dip in performance last year after an incredible Heisman-winning season in 2022. The analyst acknowledged that the USC defense let Caleb down big time.
But even when the chips were down, Parker believed that Caleb did a decent job. But he still maintained that he is getting overhyped based on his performances as it is the nature of the quarterback hype.
“Absolutely. But that’s where we are now. And it ain’t nothing that he did. It’s just the nature of it. This guy was the Heisman two years ago. Last year got off to a great start and then that team you know took a nose dive. Bad defense and you know and I’m not saying that he played particularly well either; But the defense was awful last year and I think he had a good year. He wasn’t as good as the year before the year before. He was unbelievable in the Heisman Trophy year but I’m saying last year. But then again you know when you’re down and you got to come back sometimes, everybody knows you’re throwing and putting yourself at a disadvantage even when you’re good. But this is the nature of the quarterback talk; the quarterback hype.”
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“Everybody Thinks They’re Getting A Franchise Quarterback” – Chris Broussard On Caleb Williams Hype
“I mean chances are one of these quarterbacks in this draft, they’re talking about five or six going in the first round. Chances are one of them will be very good or great and that three to four of them will end up being kind of career backups.”
Rob Parker also picked up this point and shared that he was also not a fan of the way the media portrayed Caleb’s father. Parker opined that he didn’t like the fact that the media put Caleb above the Bears and inserted his father to create an Archie Manning and Eli Manning parallel. The analyst wasn’t a fan of the media pushing the narrative that if Caleb with his father’s advice ditches the Bears, it will be a once-in-a-lifetime event when it’s not.
“I don’t like this idea that he’s any different from a lot of these guys. With people talking around him like his dad ain’t the first dad to talk stuff about their kid, like that’s the only thing I don’t like. The way they they’re painting him a little bit you know like Chris. All the stuff of dad being involved, that’s you know like like we talked about how Archie Manning was involved the way they came out and forced their way out of San Diego, I don’t know why that’s okay and you trying to make it like Caleb’s dad is doing something that hasn’t been done like this has been done before.”
