General manager Andrew Berry didn’t mean to make a pun when he said quarterback Dillon Gabriel was on the “short list” of players the Cleveland Browns were considering for their third-round pick in the NFL Draft.
Still, funny man. Gabriel was measured at 5-foot-11 during the NFL Combine, and seems like we ought to trust the yardsticks in Indianapolis. But danged if Gabriel ever seemed that tall in his two years in Norman. Seemed closer to 5-9 than 5-11.
So no one ever thought of Gabriel as a budding pro. But the Browns’ belief in Gabriel was a startling reminder of the quality quarterbacking Gabriel provided in his two OU seasons, and the massive mistake Brent Venables made in letting Gabriel scoot off to Oregon to make room for Jackson Arnold.
The Monday ScissorTales decide whether Nuggets or Clippers would be the better opponent for the Thunder in the NBA playoffs, check in on Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers and list who might be the next quarterback to make it big in jumping from a mid-major. But we start with Dillon Gabriel’s journey to third-round draft pick.
You can’t pay two quarterbacks, and the Sooners chose to pay Arnold. Big mistake. Colossal mistake. Season-turning and career-defining mistake.
By late September, Arnold had lost his job to true freshman Michael Hawkins, and though Arnold got it back by late October, it wasn’t his to keep. Arnold is off to Auburn. Gabriel? All-American at Oregon. Third in the Heisman Trophy voting. Quarterback of the top seed in the College Football Playoff.
The Sooners hope they’ve got their next Dillon Gabriel, in Washington State transfer John Mateer, but for a school that’s known mostly-fabulous quarterbacking the last quarter century, 2024 was a cold shower and harsh reality.
Gabriel was not as spectacular as Kyler Murray or Caleb Williams; not as efficient as Jalen Hurts; not as dashing as Baker Mayfield. But man, Gabriel was a good quarterback. Great quarterback, turns out.
Worthy of a third-round pick, considering his vertical challenges? True, the Browns are not the best witnesses. Truth is, they’re a joke of a franchise and proved it Saturday, taking Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders in the fifth round.
Sanders was projected as a first-round QB, and his fall was as precipitous as any in NFL Draft history. If someone wants to say that Sanders trumps Gabriel as a pro prospect, fine.
But who knows what the Browns think? We just know what they did, and the best guess is they picked Sanders two rounds after taking Gabriel, because their owner, Jimmy Haslem, told them to. It’s a clown show to take them both.
Still, NFL quarterbacks are getting more out of the box, physically. Mayfield was the overall Number 1 pick, despite standing 6-foot ⅝ of an inch. Murray was the overall Number 1 pick a year later, standing 5-10⅛. Russell Wilson has been an NFL star at 5-10⅝. Tua Tagovailoa is 6-foot even. Drew Brees was 6-foot and is Hall of Fame-bound.
Gabriel’s height “hasn’t held him back in his career,” said Berry. “You know, he’s been that height for a long time. He finds a way to get it done … There’s quarterbacks, different shapes and sizes.
“You have to feel the pocket, you have to find throwing lanes, you have to change arm angles. All that comes innately, I think, to players based on how they’ve kind of played the game their whole life.”
Gabriel quarterbacked Central Florida for two years and change, before the Knights were in the Big 12. Then two years at OU, plus one at Oregon. That’s a lot of high-level football.
He ranks second in major-college history in career passing yards (18,722), first in total touchdowns (passing, rushing, receiving) with 189 and first in career quarterback starts (63).
“We spent a lot of time with Dillon throughout this process, brought him in right after the combine, did obviously the private visit and workouts out in Eugene,” Oregon, Berry said. “Decorated college career, very accurate, very poised, throws with anticipation, good mobility. We just thought he had a really well-rounded game.”
You don’t have to tell us here in Oklahoma. We never really saw Gabriel as an NFL quarterback, mainly because we saw him as a worthy Sooner quarterback, then a oh-no-what-did-they-do former Sooner quarterback.
I don’t know if Gabriel can make it in the NFL. I don’t know if Gabriel is better than Sanders. I just know if the Sooners ever get another quarterback as good as Gabriel, don’t let him go.
