Scouting Report: Hendon Hooker
The prolific and productive Tennessee quarterback has been commonly linked to the Lions this offseason. Can Hooker replace Goff and raise the Lions ceiling?
Background
This is a lengthy one here, as Hooker originally committed to Virginia Tech out of high school, ranked as a low four-star prospect from North Carolina. He redshirted as a freshman at VaTech however, losing a battle for the starting job to Josh Jackson in 2017. He did not play much either in 2018, just a couple of wildcat package looks due to his athleticism and rushing ability.
Hooker’s time came in 2019 after starting quarterback Ryan Willis struggled quite mightily to begin the season. He stepped in and started the remaining nine contests, leading the Hokies to a 6-3 record and a bowl game, as well as an upset of #19 Wake Forest, and a very near upset of #16 Notre Dame in South Bend.
However, things went poorly in 2020. After throwing a highly efficient 13 touchdowns to 2 picks in 2019, Hooker and the Hokies struggled, with Hooker throwing 5 picks and only 9 touchdowns, with the team going just 2-5 with Hooker manning the offense, though he did battle through a knee injury as well.
Hooker transferred to the Univ. of Tennessee, and was initially a backup to Joe Milton there, but was thrust into the starting role after Milton was injured in the second game of the season. The result, once again, was Hooker taking off, throwing for almost 3,000 yards, 31 touchdowns and just 3 picks, while adding 5 rushing touchdowns as well. The Vols went 7-6 under Hooker’s command in 2021.
Using his additional year of eligibility via COVID to return to Knoxville for the 2022 season, Hooker was the SEC’s top player for most of the season. In the eleven games he started prior to an ACL tear, Hooker threw for 3,135 yards, 27 touchdowns, 2 picks, and another 5 rushing touchdowns, as the Vols went 9-2 under him (11-2 overall) and knocked off #3 Alabama in a major rivalry game where Hooker and Bryce Young went toe-to-toe, with Young throwing for 455 yards, and Hooker throwing 5 touchdowns, all to wide receiver Jalin Hyatt.
An interesting note I am surprised to not have seen yet: Hooker’s father, Alan, was inducted in the North Carolina A&T football Hall of Fame while Lions general manager Brad Holmes was playing for the Aggies from 1998-2001. Another fun little note: new Lions CB Emmanuel Moseley was a high school QB at Dudley High School in NC. His backup? UT QB Hendon Hooker, though the two did not overlap at Tennessee.
Hooker’s Strengths
Hooker has thrived in Josh Heupel’s offense mostly through his smooth, efficient delivery, consistently hitting guys on time and in schedule. A very clean delivery and release is part of his success.
Another big strength to his game is throwing with accuracy and zip. NFL offensive coordinators will absolutely love his steadiness in making this fairly difficult throw.
In particular, think he’s a very good outside thrower. The timing on out routes is consistently sharp, and his arm strength allows him to throw with needed speed and force to get to receivers on out-breaking deep routes outside the numbers.
Hooker shows excellent ball placement. He’s a really accurate passer who consistently manages to find the right spot for the football. He’s also very accurate on the move as well. He wins with great accuracy and decision-making.
Hooker is fairly adept at climbing and maneuvering in the pocket. With as much playing experience as he has, this is not much of a surprise. I do think there’s more consistency to be had here, but he’s mobile and shows a good deal of it. Also stands tall against pressure and is willing to take a hit to deliver a throw.
While Hooker isn’t Anthony Richardson, he is a good athlete who uses his feet to extend plays well. You can genuinely use him as a run threat, with draws likely being the best
Where Could Hooker Improve?
Arguably my biggest concern watching Hooker is not his age, nor his injury, but rather Hooker’s limited use of eyes to manipulate coverage. The Lions ask a lot of this out of Goff, and Hooker is coming from an offense with very little of it. Eyes are historically the biggest challenge in transitioning players from college to pro-style offenses.
Hooker is good but inconsistent challenging deep. Tennessee’s volume of deep shots was very high. Naturally so when you have Cedric Tillman and Jalin Hyatt out there stretching defenses vertically. Hooker hits a lot of these, but leaves a lot of throws out there.
Does not make most throws with anticipation with much consistency. Aside from the outs, which I mentioned as a strength earlier, this area is lacking. As mentioned, the primary feature of this offense is spacing, and much like Jared Goff, Hooker struggles to throw guys open, preferring to throw to already open players, which is reflected in his completion percentage. It’s great when you can do that, but tough to thrive without that anticipatory feel in the NFL.
The other issue in Hooker’s game is discomfort throwing over the middle of the field. As mentioned, he is excellent challenging teams deep and to the outside portions of the field, but lacks the confidence in throwing over the middle. Part of this is his high risk aversion that he plays with, but part of it also is just the structure of the UT offense, and a likely lack of coaching on how to break down safety alignments and linebacker depth to understand middle of the field coverage.
Above you can see the heat map from PFF for Hendon Hooker in 2022, and a clip showing just the mediocre rhythm to simple over the middle shallow throws. In that clip, he’s late, he’s throwing high, and is rushed once his first read isn’t there. Again, very good outside the numbers, and deeper, but Hooker likely reduces the effectiveness of someone like Amon-Ra St. Brown in Detroit.
Others also mention that Hooker’s age (25 years old) and his ACL tear are other negatives. They are, but only in limited capacity. The Lions would not be adding Hooker with the intention of starting him immediately, so the ACL tear is hardly a concern. The age is more understandable, as that limits your window with him and his development to a degree, but at the end of the day, good QB’s are playing into their mid-, even late-30s these days, so you can still have a solid decade or more out of Hooker.
Fit With the Detroit Lions?
From a big picture perspective, the fit with Hendon Hooker is interesting. The offense he played in and thrived in under Josh Heupel is described as a “gimmicky college offense”. What that really means is just a simple read process that emphasizes spacing over reads and decision-making. A very simplistic reduction of it is saying that Heupel’s offense asked Hooker to find the open receiver and hit him, whereas NFL defenses are too talented and complex to beat that way, and thus, pre-snap and post-snap reads becomes heavily emphasized.
However, I do like Hooker’s fit with the Lions offense. His accuracy outside the hashes and downfield would be a welcome piece to it that they don’t exploit as much as they could due to Goff’s limitations there. Additionally, Hooker loves throwing on schedule and in-rhythm, same as Jared Goff. In an ideal world, you work on Hooker’s willingness to read coverage and throw decisively and accurately over the middle, and insert him into the lineup as a superior outside and deep ball passer than Goff in 2024.
So overall, his fit schematically is very simple: Detroit would likely make adaptations to their current approach in order to ease Hooker into the offense, and take advantage of his downfield abilities and athleticism, however, he would have to meet them halfway and learn to make multifield reads in an NFL offense. The talent is there, but that is sometimes a tough ask to make.
Now, I will say this, and it will be copied-pasted into each QB scouting report: The Detroit Lions are in very good position to add a young QB to develop into Goff’s replacement if they desire. You may argue whether or not they need to, you may argue whether or not said player is worthwhile. That being said, the Lions have an elite OL that will be reasonably secure for the next 3-5 years, a quality set of running backs and wide receivers, and most importantly right now, a very prolific offensive coordinator, and quality QB coach to help teach and develop a young QB. They may not, will not, have Ben Johnson forever, but his presence running the offense this year means that any rookie QB would be in very good hands with good personnel surrounding him.
Hooker has been rising up the boards, but still remains a somewhat difficult player to project in terms of where he will land. Hooker appeared as a first-round pick in Daniel Jeremiah’s 3.0 Mock Draft, and Jeff Risdon listed him as a possible choice at #18 on a recent(ish) mock draft he produced. Similar to Levis, there’s a chance they could get him later than desired, but realistically, they probably need to take him at 18th overall if they do want him. The age and ACL injury could drop him out of the first-round, but the QB position is a premium one, and thus I do not believe that he will slide all the way to 48. Maybe a trade up into the early second round.
Final Thoughts
Overall, there is plenty to like about Hendon Hooker as a potential NFL QB. He has the arm, he’s accurate, his mechanics are sound, he has some athleticism and dual-threat ability to his game, he’s got the size, and he was more productive than a significant number of quarterbacks at the college this past season. The film really flashes overall from a traits perspective, as overall Hooker is a poised and accurate QB who checks a lot of boxes. However, teams will need to ensure they have a gameplan to develop him mentally out there. Sitting in the 2023 season would be the best case scenario for him.
And as I said earlier, I do not find much to be concerned with in his ACL tear or age, at least not relative to how it would affect his time in Detroit. What does give me some concern is the transition he would have to make from the Josh Heupel offense to an NFL one. The “age concern” is less how old he actually is, and more that he has played for six seasons in the college ranks and really only took off when given a very simple offense surrounded by NFL caliber weapons around him like Darnell Wright, Jalin Hyatt, and Cedric Tillman, and the offense certainly is more built around their talents than Hooker’s from what I saw on film.
However, this is the age of relentless criticism. And the armchair scout mafia is all about criticizing prospects with dramatic, “look at me” takes. The armchair scouts consistently hated on Justin Herbert, many of them puffed up Zach Wilson, and now a lot of them are against Hooker and Will Levis, despite both being pretty successful SEC quarterbacks. These guys are genuinely good prospects, and short of the #1 overall pick in the right Draft class, you are never getting a perfect prospect.
Overall, I really like this QB class. It has five genuinely intriguing, high-caliber options. Do each of them require a team to do a little bit of work developing and strategizing how to make them successful at the next level? Absolutely. But teams should never expect that the guys they’ll be drafting as perfect prospects to begin with.
Hendon Hooker is a very smooth, well-polished passer with a good arm and quality athleticism. That’s a great spot to be starting with. Ultimately I would probably shy away from drafting him in Detroit, however, as I do believe his ceiling is a bit more limited than some of the others. He’s good at a lot of things, master of none, and there’s a sharp learning curve ahead with NFL offenses, and ACL recovery. I actually think that Hooker probably ends up becoming a quarterback much like Jared Goff at the NFL, one who can win you plenty of games with the right set-up around him, but never really be credited as the chief proponent for that offense’s success. Hooker is a high-end ball distributor, something along the lines of a Tua Tagovailoa. I’m personally just not sure I’d want Detroit investing such high draft capital on a player who isn’t that much younger nor that much higher ceiling than the guy they already have humming along. Hendon Hooker’s a quality prospect, and I do think he can become a quality NFL quarterback for someone, but I don’t think it’s a jump that the Lions need to take right now.
Goff throws his receivers open quite a bit actually. He’s throwing to a spot where he’ll know the receivers will be - not where they are. Especially Amon Ra; those two had alot of trust