Scot Mcloughlan: “My first year I took Alex number one overall, and of course everyone says I should have taken Aaron Rodgers. I understand that and whatever, but I totally disagree… I asked him one question and I’ll never forget this. I asked him ‘What will make me draft you?’ He said ‘Scot, I don’t know, but today is what you’ll see in 10 years from now.’ I was like ‘WOW’… I’m not going to get into it, but I asked Aaron Rodgers the same question and it was a totally different answer. I made the right pick in my opinion. Aaron is a phenomenal player, first-ballot Hall of Famer, MVP probably this year – that’s great, but for the situation I was in at the time Alex Smith was the perfect choice.” (Audio Above)
Former San Francisco 49ers general manager Scot McCloughlan said on Jason McIntyre's ‘Straight Fire’ podcast on Thursday that he doesn’t regret selecting Alex Smith with the no. 1 overall pick in the 2005 NFL Draft, which infamously included Aaron Rodgers falling all the way to the Packers at pick no. 24.
McCoughlan was a first-year Vice President of Player Personnel with San Francisco at the time and says that he was so blown away from Smith’s pre-Draft interview that he fully committed to Smith over Rodgers, who was widely acknowledged as the second-best QB prospect in the Draft at the very worst.
Smith would go 38-36-1 in seven years with the 49ers, make one NFC Championship appearance, and zero Pro Bowls, while Rodgers would sit behind Brett Favre for three years, and then obviously start an illustriously successful career that would propel him into consideration of being perhaps the greatest quarterback of all time.
Check out the segment above as McCouglan details why he still doesn’t regret taking Smith over Rodgers despite their careers both yielding successful, yet vastly different results.
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