With 2,560 spots on the current roster, the third overall pick in the 2014 Draft currently has none.
Quarterback Blake Bortles remains a free agent after his one-year contract with the Rams expires. His trainer in 2019 is surprised by this result.
“I’m surprised, just because he’s played a lot of good football in this league,” McVay told reporters on Friday. “You hope for the best. I haven’t talked much about him with anyone, but I’m surprised he’s not on a team at the moment.
The fact that McVay didn’t tell the others about him suggests that the other teams aren’t even doing their due diligence on Bortles, who almost drove the Jaguars to the Super Bowl in 2017. The fact that McVay went for a trio of backups for Jared Goff who has no NFL experience (John Wolford, Bryce Perkins, Josh Love) isn’t exactly a resounding endorsement.
He has 17,659 career passing yards, 103 touchdowns, 75 interceptions, a completion percentage of 59.3 and a passer rating of 80.6.
The Jaguars left Bortles after five seasons as a full-time starter. Some (like Chris Simms, co-host of PFT Live) have regularly criticized Bortles for not being, as Simms said, “not put down to throw a soccer ball”.
It sounds harsh (because it is), but the point is, as Simms sees it, someone early in Bortles’ career looked at the big, strong kid and said, “You should play the quarterback. ” Even when the Jaguars were thriving, Simms had Bortles ranked 70th among all quarterbacks.
Whether or not Simms’ assessment is accurate, the league as a whole seems to agree with her. It will be interesting to see if that changes, especially once quarterbacks start getting injured during the regular season or don’t play well.
