The New Orleans Saints felt like they got a steal in the 2024 NFL Draft when they selected QB Spencer Rattler in the fifth round. Rattler was a top high school QB prospect who was once regarded as a future 1st overall selection in the NFL. However, he lost his starting job at Oklahoma to Caleb Williams before transferring to South Carolina. Saints head coach Dennis Allen has already starting talking up the rookie signal caller ahead of training camp.
According to Allen, Rattler will be able to compete right away with entrenched starter Derek Carr.
“I think the plan is that he comes in and really basically competes and we’ll let the cards kind of play out as they do,” Allen said. “We were excited about the fact that we got into the fifth round and he was still there. I think you know from where we had him graded on our board we felt like this player was probably more of a second or third round talent, and the fact that he was still sitting there in the in the fifth round I think a lot of that has to do with the fact there were six quarterbacks already taken in this draft uh and that’s a little bit of a unique position in terms of the draft. So the fact that he fell all the way to us to the fifth round we’re really excited about that, he’s got tremendous talent.”
It is promising to hear that Rattler will immediately compete with Derek Carr in training camp. That doesn’t mean that Rattler is automatically elevated off the bench, but he will have his chance to win the starting job away from Carr.
This quote also highlights how high the Saints are on Rattler as a prospect. The NFL does not have a good track record of 5th round QBs succeeding, but it helps to know that the Saints valued him as more of a 2nd- or 3rd-round talent.
