Cam Ward could be the most unlikely No. 1 NFL draft pick ever

Cam Ward had just one college offer coming out of high school. Now he's set to be the top overall selection in the NFL draft.

To Steve Van Meter, it seemed obvious that the high school sophomore had every quality a college coach would want in a quarterback. 

Academically, Cam Ward was near the top of his class. Athletically, he was his high school’s leading scorer in basketball and a naturally accurate passer in football. When Van Meter, a retired coach who specialized in coaching quarterbacks around the Houston area, asked him to tweak his throwing mechanics, Ward could process the information and make the change by the very next rep. 

And then there was his explosive right arm. The first time he watched Ward throw, the ball rotated so fast that it whistled.

“I was a head Texas high school head coach for 28 years, and coached 38 years in high school and I’ve had Division I quarterbacks,” Van Meter said. “The ball didn’t come out of the hands like that on anybody I’ve ever coached.” 

Yet when Van Meter evangelized about Ward’s skill set to the network of college coaches he’d cultivated over the decades, all he heard was pushback. Ward played in a small town and in an offense far from the norm and that offered few opportunities to pass. It was enough to scare off recruiters. He entered the summer of 2019, just weeks before his final high school season, without a single college scholarship offer.

https://www.nbcnews.com/sports/nfl/cam-ward-nfl-draft-miami-titans-rcna199363

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