Still, the success of the spread in college ensures it is not going away anytime soon. NFL teams, then, do not need to find better quarterbacks. They need to find coaches who have creativity and a feel for what the next generation of quarterbacks can do well.
"When you look around the league and you see people, they constantly make excuses," Franklin said. "It gets really old. 'He played in this; he played in that.' Ninety-nine percent of the time, they have no idea what they're talking about, no clue. They talk about our offense and say, 'He never went through a read progression.' That's all we do. That's all Jared did from the time he got" to Cal.
Goff, having transitioned from the spread to running an NFL team, chafes at the idea that spread quarterbacks have to learn a completely different game. Learning how to take a snap from under center, for example, was a painless process. Dak Prescott came from Mississippi State, where plays demanded he decipher only half the field, and he led the Cowboys to 13 victories as a rookie.