What's All The Jaxson Dart Fuss About?
Dart looks primed to be a first-round pick, but should he be?
The worst draft cycle tradition is the quarterback prospect who gets first-round hype despite lacking first-round tape.
Last year, I felt that way about Bo Nix and J.J. McCarthy. The jury is still out on both, but I’m not afraid to admit I should’ve been higher on Nix. In the past, I’ve focused too much on whether a quarterback could be a top-10 passer, leaving me to undervalue “good” starting quarterbacks.
Although I was right about passers like Malik Willis, Desmond Ridder, Hendon Hooker, and Daniel Jones, I decided to change my process a bit this year. I’ve decided to factor positional value into my rankings and bump quarterbacks who I think can be average starters.
That brings us to this year’s surprising first-round hype quarterback, Jaxson Dart. The Mississippi product started getting major first-round buzz following the Senior Bowl.
Since then, Dart has cultivated a passionate following, similar to Willis, McCarthy, and Jones during their respective draft years. Many analysts will have Dart as the second-best quarterback in the class, and I imagine he’ll continue to appear in the first round of mock drafts.
So, the question becomes whether Dart should be a first-round pick. Does his film and stats live up to the hype? Or are we propping up an average player in a bad quarterback class?
Dart Plays on Easy Mode
The biggest hiccup in grading Dart as a first-round quarterback is justifying what his tape looks like in the context of the offense he plays in. Mississippi’s offense is designed to create easy throws and get the ball out of the quarterback’s hand quickly.
They use wide splits, heavy play-action, too many RPOs, and lots of half-field reads. The offense is designed to take the thinking part of playing football out of the quarterback’s hands.
When a quarterback gets to spend this much time throwing with play-action and behind the line of scrimmage, it’s hard to grasp how good they are at running NFL-caliber concepts. None of the numbers in the chart above account for RPOs, either.
Because Dart plays on easy mode so often, he should be tearing it up. Again, his offense is completely set up with scripted throws. When Dart gets to the line of scrimmage, he is told which receiver should be open on every play.
That should lead to decisiveness for Dart, but somehow, he is still consistently late on throws. This has also led to Dart lacking the ability to throw with anticipation, especially in the middle of the field.
Dart has to see his receiver come open before he lets the ball go.
Watch his tight end running down the seam on this play. Dart is staring at that route but refuses to throw it into the middle of the field window, leading his tight end into open space. Turndowns like this are littered throughout his film.
The other problem is Dart will get stuck on reads. He has trouble making adjustments post-snap because he is told who should be open before the snap. This leads to a lot of brutal throws into coverage.
Dart decided he was throwing to the outside receiver before the snap and refused to come off of it, even though there were two deep safeties and a cornerback properly leveraged to take away that route.
If Dart comes off that read quicker — he should’ve known that route wasn’t open before the snap — he could’ve attempted to drive the ball to his tight end coming across the field. It’s a tight window, but at least it’s a little open.
This makes Dart incredibly predictable. One way teams solved Dart this past season was by playing Quarters coverage. Dart saw Quarters 127 times last season, completing 57 percent of his passes (the lowest vs. any coverage he saw more than 10 times) and threw five of his six interceptions. He also took more sacks (7) against Quarters than any other coverage.
Those looks were often post-snap rotations, which muddied the picture for Dart. He had few answers for these looks because he doesn’t go through progressions.
Now, in Dart’s defense, the offense doesn’t afford him too many answers to problems. If the scripted route doesn’t open, Dart’s other receivers are often running “love of the game” routes to clear space for the scripted route.
There are many reps where, even if Dart tried to go through a full-field progression at a reasonable speed, he wouldn’t have any real routes to target.
Still, Dart is so far behind most quarterback prospects on the mental side. Mississippi’s offense makes his life so easy, and he still struggles with simple reads and adjustments.
Dart vs. Pressure
Besides how much he needs to learn on the mental side, Dart’s reaction to pressure is probably the area where he needs to take the most growth.
Dart is constantly creating his own pressure. Sometimes, it’s because he gets stuck on reads or because he turns down open receivers. However, Dart also tends to drop his eyes to the rush instead of keeping his eyes up.
On this play, Dart is looking to the bottom of the screen, where he’s got a smash concept. His running back is running the hitch, and his receiver is running the corner. Duke blitzes a linebacker who loops around to get a free run at Dart.
However, Dart has plenty of time to drive either of these throws. The spot route is open when his back foot lands, and the corner route is open the whole time, but it’s really open once he ducks the initial pressure.
Instead of sticking with the concept, Dart panics and tries to escape the pocket, leading to another sack. For reference, Dart’s pressure-to-sack rate is 19.2 percent, barely higher than Shedeur Sanders’ 20.1
Sanders is getting dragged through the proverbial mud for how many sacks he takes, and frankly, Dart isn’t much better at managing the pocket or avoiding sacks. What makes Dart’s number more concerning is how little he was pressured last season.
He was pressured on just 145 dropbacks compared to Sanders’ 203. Mississippi’s offensive line wasn’t an iron wall, but they were far better than Colorado’s line.
Dart’s Inconsistent Deep Ball
If you look at Dart’s volume passing numbers, it looks like he has one of the best deep balls in this class. According to PFF, Dart completed 37 of his 88 passes beyond 20 yards. That 42 percent completion percentage is quite good, and some of Dart’s deep balls are beautiful.
The problem I noticed is that most of Dart’s good deep balls came early in the season against Furman, Middle Tennessee State, Wake Forest, and Georgia Southern.
Of Dart’s 37 completions of at least 20 air yards, 20 came against non-conference teams. That includes the four teams listed above and Duke, who Mississippi played in its bowl game.
Upon entering SEC play, Dart struggled to add adequate touch to his deep balls. He was overthrowing a lot of them into deep coverage, like the INT we discussed above, or leaving them short, like this one against South Carolina.
Against South Carolina, LSU, Kentucky, Georgia, and Florida, Dart completed just eight of his 40 attempts beyond 20 yards. There were a few drops, but his saving grace was beating up on the SEC’s worst in Arkansas (5-of-6) and Oklahoma (2-of-3).
The minute coverage got tight, Dart’s deep ball accuracy fell off a cliff. He can hit the easy ones, but asking him to throw receivers open downfield isn’t wise.
What Dart Does Well
I’ve been hard on Dart, but he does have redeemable qualities worth developing.
For starters, while he’s overly reliant on the quick game, he is good at running an efficient ship in that area. He does a solid enough job setting up YAC opportunities and is willing to eat up easy yards throughout games.
The ability to win on RPOs isn’t an overly valuable trait, but it’s a nice box to check. As is quick-game accuracy.
He’s got solid arm talent, too, allowing him to generate velocity from different angles. This allows him to flip the ball outside the numbers around defensive linemen closing on him. His arm strength is also above average.
The ball can float on him when he’s trying to drive tight windows outside the numbers, but those plays are rare. Generally speaking, he has no issues accessing all three areas of the field and throwing with velocity off-platform.
I wouldn’t call his arm elite, but it’s definitely above average.
Probably my favorite thing about Dart is his toughness. He was willing to stand in and deliver some shots down the field throughout the season. This throw against Wake Forest with a defender bearing down on him is wildly impressive.
This toughness translates to how Dart scrambles, too. He rushed for 495 yards and three touchdowns last season, which is pretty good. Now, I think his decisions to scramble are pretty bad, but he’s a capable runner and more than willing to lower his shoulder.
Dart’s above-average arm talent, general accuracy, quick-game prowess, and toughness do create an interesting profile. When it’s combined with some of his high-level flashes, it’s not hard to see why he’s getting propped up in a bad quarterback class.
The Final Word on Dart
Dart received a Late Day 2 - Early Day 3 grade on my board. This is the area reserved for developmental quarterbacks with some starting upside.
In previous seasons, I slotted quarterbacks who I thought would be average starters—at best—here. That’s where Bo Nix and Michael Penix Jr. ended up last season, so Dart’s raw grade looks similar to theirs.
However, with the adjustments I mentioned at the top, Dart would actually grade out at least a whole tier lower than Nix and Penix Jr.
My primary issue with Dart is that I don’t see a player prepared to play quarterback in the NFL. Setting aside his actual effectiveness, this is a player who did not read defenses, did not take snaps under center, and was given zero pre- and post-snap responsibilities.
He was told when and where to throw the ball, and he did it — for better or worse.
Dart has so much work to do, even on the simplest of concepts. Here’s one of Dart’s few under center snaps from last season. This is an NFL-bread-and-butter play-action concept with an obvious read to the tight end running to the flat.
Dart’s eyes are wrong the whole way, as he spends the rep trying to hit the stop route behind the play before ultimately taking a bad sack. Now, I’m not saying Dart can’t be taught to make the correct read on this play — I’m sure he can.
I’m only bringing this up to emphasize just how far he has to go. Before we can fix problems like his deep ball accuracy or reaction to pressure, he needs to learn about things like Quarters coverage. I’ve also ignored issues like how he’s allergic to the middle of the field or how his out-of-structure play is average.
All of that development is a lot to ask from a player and coaching staff, especially when reps are at a premium.
The best possible outcome for Dart is something close to the Hendon Hooker model. Hooker was drafted by the Detroit Lions 68th overall in the third round of the 2023 NFL Draft.
Like Dart, Hooker played in a Mickey Mouse college offense that prevented him from making reads, handling pre-snap responsibilities, and solving problems post-snap. Since being drafted, Hooker has sat behind Jared Goff while being coached by Ben Johnson.
We haven’t seen Hooker hit the field in a real way yet, but giving Dart multiple years to sit behind a quality veteran quarterback while being coached by a top-tier offensive mind is the correct vision.
What makes Dart more appealing than Hooker is that he’ll be 22 as a rookie (Hooker was 25) and won’t be coming off a season-ending injury.
Ultimately, the issue with Dart is less about his traits or abilities. A team using a mid to late Day 2 pick to stash and develop him is a completely justifiable strategy — a good one, even.
But I don’t see anything close to a first-round quarterback. Perhaps Dart goes in the first round. I’m not saying that’s impossible.
I am saying that he shouldn’t, and that’s OK. Dart has traits worth betting on. We just have to be more realistic about where he’s at in his developmental journey.