“How the h-ll do people not like you as the No. 1 quarterback in the draft?” Often, fans find themselves at a crossroads of 2 different narratives. One path leads to “This QB is average and will only amount to a good backup,” and the other leads to “This is a franchise QB right here.” The case for Will Howard, though, is a bit different. At the core of it, Buckeyes fans ride hard for Howard—and rightfully so. The guy helped Ryan Day steamroll some legit squads. But the moment someone slaps that Combine stat sheet on the table during a ‘How good is Will Howard?’ debate, you can practically hear the crickets from the fanbase. Let’s be real—this whole debate boils down to one question: do Combine numbers mean everything?

‘Cause if they did, Tom Brady would’ve been bagging groceries as a Tier 4 backup somewhere instead of winning seven rings. “But Will Howard’s kind of guy not getting chatted about much at all? I think, after his combine, people are like, yep, that’s exactly what we thought. He can’t throw an NFL ball, then I think I saw him with Gruden… And then it’s like Will Howard’s a dawg,” Pat McAfee expressed. Watching Jon Gruden’s QB Class series made one thing crystal clear—people are seriously sleeping on Will Howard. He’s got that same raw, overlooked fire that Josh Allen had coming out of Wyoming.

Compare dual-threat capabilities, and you will find Howard almost toe-to-toe with Allen. Yeah, Howard can’t match Allen’s arm cannon or NFL polish just yet—but neither could college Allen. Right now, Howard is an offensive coordinator’s dream.

He doesn’t have a high ceiling, but he has that high floor, and that alone is a big game-changer. And if you don’t believe us, the Rocky Top game should be more than enough evidence to change your mind. The whole “Howard got carried by OSU’s run game” take crashes and burns fast when you remember he torched a Vols squad stacked with elite SEC linemen and the top cornerback in college football.

They were cooked vs Ohio State, and it wasn’t because Will Howard threw his guys open. And the Notre Dame game? 99 QBR against the #2 team in college football, and people call Howard a fluke. You have to be insane not to see the potential this guy has.

Thankfully, McAfee continues to be the rightful hype man for the Buckeyes quarterback. But unfortunately for him, someone from Boulder did not like it.

Warren Sapp slamming the claims

If you’ve followed McAfee long enough, you know his “stories” have a habit of going off the rails—in the most McAfee way possible. Pretty much the same happened on his podcast back in March. McAfee pointed out, “They look into a hotel parking lot. It was a little chilly in Indianapolis and there’s one guy taking dropbacks and throwing a football over a parking thing to the other side and there’s somebody catching it.”

All in all, Pat was just stirring up some classic hype for Will Howard ahead of the Combine, but Warren Sapp? Yeah, he wasn’t having any of it. “Then you hear these wild stories about the quarterback from Ohio State out at the parking lot throwing the ball – oh stop it! Just stop it, just stop the lie… ain’t nobody out 11 o’clock throwing no ball in Indianapolis.” Sapp did not waste a second calling out McAfee.

Maybe McAfee’s pitch was a bit too much? Like, if you check post-Combine stats, it’s easy to figure out that Howard did not do that well. Regardless, McAfee hasn’t gone back on his take. He remains a Howard faithful, and something makes us think that many others will do the same.

Now, we don’t know if he will be the next Josh Allen or not, but we are sure Howard can easily be the next Jacoby Brissett with a ceiling of like Brock Purdy.