When the 49ers drafted Alex Smith in the 2005 NFL Draft, I was incredibly sure that my favorite team had just made a serious mistake. Seemingly everyone in the Bay Area, from sportswriters to fans to homeless guys in Union Square, were calling for the 49ers to trade down and leave Smith for some other team to take. But the 49ers didn't do that.

And, as we all know now, we were all right and the 49ers were completely wrong.

But here's the funny thing. Pretty much everyone who was vehemently against drafting Smith was equally mad that Matt Leinart decided not to come out for the 2005 Draft. In fact, one rumor for why Leinart went back to school for his senior year was so he wouldn't get drafted by the 49ers.

Regardless of why Leinart returned to school for one more year, one thing was clear in the Bay Area. Everyone wanted Leinart over Smith, and some people were even talking about how if the 49ers had a horrible season in 2005 and wound up with the first pick in the 2006 Draft, they should take Leinart even though the team already had Smith. That's how much people in the Bay Area, including myself, wanted to see Leinart in a 49ers uniform.

But with Leinart scheduled to start this season sitting on the bench in Arizona, it now appears many of us in the Bay Area, who were so right on Smith, were so wrong on Leinart.

The Sporting News's Greg Cosell even painfully breaks down for us why both guys are such poor quarterbacks. First Smith:


And now Leinart:



As a result, the undrafted Kurt Warner will be starting in Arizona and 2002 sixth round selection JT O'Sullivan will be starting in San Francisco. So what does this information tell us? Well, it's really quite simple. Drafting an NFL quarterback is a complete crapshoot, and always will be. That's not something that's fun to admit, but it's true.

If you disagree with that assesment, then why are there so many guys in the league starting at quarterback who came from rounds where you shouldn't be finding a starting quarterback? I'm talking about guys like David Garrard (Fourth Round), Matt Hasselbeck (Sixth Round), Tom Brady (Sixth Round) and Derek Anderson (Sixth Round). Then you have undrafted quarterbacks like Kurt Warner, Tony Romo, Jeff Garcia and Jon Kitna.

In fact, in a post I wrote a long time ago on my old blog, there was a point during the 2007 season in mid-November where there were as many sixth round or undrafted QBs leading winning teams in the NFL as there were first round draft picks leading winning teams.

The other thing is, look how many high first round QB picks since 2000 have been mediocre to horrible. You've got Smith, Leinart, David Carr, Kyle Boller, Byron Leftwich, Joey Harrington, etc. Heck, even Vince Young seems to be on that path. Even worse is that Smith and Carr were #1 draft picks. If it weren't for Ryan Leaf, they might be fighting for the title of worst QB draft bust ever (I know Leaf wasn't a #1 draft pick, but he's still the biggest QB bust ever).

It's scary to think that even though a team has a high draft pick, they can screw up so royally on drafting a QB. But just by taking a good long look at who's succeeded and who hasn't at the quarterback position in the NFL, it's apparent that teams have little idea - despite all the scouting they do - who will in fact make it as a pro quarterback.

Leinart, Smith just aren't good enough [Sporting News] via [Fanhouse]