NFL Offensive Coordinator: Desmond Ridder can be 'a low-level starter in our league'

CINCINNATI — The dissecting of Desmond Ridder's game continued this week as Sports Illustrated's Albert Breer caught up with voices from inside the NFL for their evaluations of the greatest quarterback in UC history.

“I love Ridder,” said a quarterback coach. “He’s a competitor, a leader, really smart. He’s been exposed to dropback concepts that translate, he can process, he’s tough. He just has the accuracy issue. It shows up on tape—he misses throws you can’t miss. It’s really my only knock on him. The mental makeup, the arm, athleticism is there. But the biggest thing, and it’s the easy one with him, is the inaccuracy, and it’s not just missing throws, it’s ball placement, putting the ball on the receiver’s back pad, things like that."

“He’s robotic, and he tries so hard, but the fatal flaw is the accuracy. He’s a good athlete, but it’s sort of a linear speed, a build-up speed. You don’t see the athletic splash plays,” said an offensive coordinator. “He’s a great kid, he wins, so you don’t want to kill him, he’s a big part of building that program. And he improved a little with the accuracy. But it’s not like Josh Allen where there’s inaccuracy, but he’s so physically dominant that he makes up for it. It’s not like that.”

“If you ask him, he’ll tell you Marcus Mariota and Ryan Tannehill are the two guys who play-style-wise are similar to him,” said a quarterback coach. “And those are good quarterbacks, but they’re kind of athletes that learned to play quarterback. Tannehill was Texas A&M’s leading receiver. Marcus was great at Oregon, but in Chip [Kelly’s] offense, and it hasn’t translated great. Desmond’s like that, a lot of tools, ran 4.5, even if he doesn’t play 4.5. … Big frame, huge hands, great guy, super mature. He’s an adult.”

“This is a guy, I told our guys, he’s being undervalued,” said an offensive coordinator. “He’s a better player than people think, he can be a low-level starter in our league. The accuracy thing, he misses some, but so did Josh Allen. There’s stuff you can do with him to help him.”

“There’s definitely something to the kid, he had 50 starts," a QB coach said. "You talk to people in the program, they love him, three-time captain, they swear by him, and he elevated that program. What you hear from them is you gotta get to know him. … But I don’t know about the accuracy thing. For example, his pro day, it’s Jordan Palmer designing it, fully scripted and he had about seven balls that weren’t close, let alone others that were great catches. He’s not a great natural thrower. But he’s got a quick, tight delivery, so if he’s in rhythm and on time, it can look good."

Ridder is ready to prove the doubters wrong and take his success at Cincinnati right into the NFL.

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