The 2018 NFL Draft Prospect series breaks down draft-eligible players, highlighting their college production as well as their NFL potential. Daily fantasy players should know about NFL rookies before they’ve played a down of professional football because they are among the most misvalued assets in all of DFS. People who know NFL rookies have a significant DFS edge. The draft will be held at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, TX, from April 26-28.
This piece is on Western Kentucky quarterback Mike White.
For more on all the other passers in the class, see our 2018 NFL draft quarterback rankings.
Updated as of Mar. 5.
Redshirt Senior | 6’5″ and 224 Pounds | Projection: Rounds 4-6
Combine numbers: 40-yard: 5.09 sec | bench reps: DNP | 3-cone: 7.4 sec | 20-yard shuttle: 4.4 sec | vertical: 27 in | broad: 96 in
White is bound throughout the draft process to be compared to his highly productive Western Kentucky predecessor Brandon Doughty, who was drafted on Day 3 two years ago and has been a practice squad-caliber third-stringer type ever since. White has good size, and he reportedly flashed good arm strength in Senior Bowl practices, but he may struggle to adjust to the NFL after playing in WKU’s spread system. With his physical profile and production history, White looks like a low-ceiling “maybe this guy won’t lose this game for us?” NFL backup.
A three-star recruit, White got offers from Group of Five and Football Championship Subdivision schools but not from the Power Five. He signed with South Florida shortly after Willie Taggart was named head coach, and he ended up starting the five final games of his true freshman campaign. As a sophomore he made 10 more starts, but he failed to progress. After the season Taggart informed him that the offense would be switching to more of an up-tempo and run-option scheme, which meant that he would probably lose his starting job to SFU quarterback Quinton Flowers. As a result White decided to transfer to WKU, and he finished his time at SFU with a lowly completion rate of 51.6 percent for 5.3 adjusted yards per attempt (AY/A) and a ‘rushing average’ of -3.0 yards per carry (including sacks).
After redshirting for a year (per NCAA rules), White tore up Conference USA in 2016 under offensive-minded HC Jeff Brohm. He was still immobile in the pocket (-2.6 yards per carry), but he completed 67.3 percent of his passes for an outrageously high 11.5 AY/A. Last year, though, after Brohm left WKU for Purdue and was replaced by Mike Sanford, White saw his numbers slip as he completed ‘just’ 65.7 percent of his passes for a 7.7 AY/A and rushed for -4.0 yards per carry. White still played well, but ultimately his 2017 performance suggests that he’s a product of his system and specifically his former coach. White will most likely be a Day 3 pick although some experts are hyping him as a Day 2 player.
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Matthew Freedman is the Editor-in-Chief of FantasyLabs. He has a dog and sometimes a British accent. In Cedar Rapids, Iowa, he’s known only as The Labyrinthian.
Photo Credit: Reinhold Matay-USA TODAY Sports
