‘Humble and hungry’: A Vacaville phenom takes aim at NFL draft. But key question persists
It is anyone’s guess where Carson Strong will land in the NFL draft, which starts Thursday, and that’s what drafts are all about: subjective guesswork.
This much we know: Strong is the strong-armed quarterback out of the University of Nevada, the pride of Solano County from Vacaville. He’s known for his superlative sporting efforts at Will C. Wood High School from 2015-17. As a prospect who has been scrutinized and examined by NFL brass for months, Strong has hours of intriguing game film for coaches and general managers to examine. The footage shows Strong making all the throws. He is stout at 6-foot-4 and 215 pounds. He is bright. He is a leader.
But that knee, right? Is that what will cause the greater Sacramento-area’s top prospect to freefall through the draft? He was projected as a first-rounder last fall; does he hold steady? Does he go in the third round? The fifth? Lower?
No one questions Strong, the player. Just how strong is Strong’s right knee?
The knee first concerned Strong when he could hear it click as he ran in summer basketball tournaments in 2017, weeks before the start of football season. Knees and any measure of clicking resonate as troubling. The discomfort ultimately required unique surgery. Strong underwent a procedure that reattached cartilage in the knee with eight biodegradable nails.
The surgery cost him his senior year of competition in high school in football and basketball. Strong had another knee operation in college. He wore a bulky knee brace at Nevada but ditched it for workouts to show NFL folks he was not reliant on it.
For all of his career collegiate yards and touchdowns — 9,379 and 74 — it’s the number of knee surgeries that could hamper him in the draft, though no one doubts Strong’s commitment. He once said, “Unless my leg snaps in half and my bone is sticking out of my skin, I’m gonna play. Unless I can’t walk, I’m going to play. I’ve always said, if I can walk, I can play.”
Researching a future NFL quarterback
I caught up to two coaches who have known Strong since he was a little lad hustling through basketball drills or playing youth quarterback in Vacaville. They remain in contact as mentors and friends. In separate phone calls, they detailed examples of Strong’s desire to excel, and they said Strong checks off on all the boxes of good guy and good character.
Carlos Meraz coached Strong in football at Wood High. Mark Wudel used every bit of Strong’s efforts to win in basketball at the same school.
“I know this about him,” Wudel said with a laugh, “Carson’s a never-quit kind of guy, a never-give-up guy. He was a ruthless competitor, and he is down to Earth, a considerate person. His friends from high school are still his friends now. He’s good-natured, a kid with so much gratitude and grace, an outstanding person. We’re all excited for him.”
Meraz has heard from NFL folks for insight on Strong, the intangibles that are not clear in the stat sheet or game film. Was he coachable? How was his knee in high school? Did he live to compete?
“There is no exact science on this as far as where Carson will go in the draft, but he’ll get drafted for sure,” Meraz said. “He’s not worried where he’ll go, what round, but he wants to go somewhere he can prove himself, get an opportunity, and that’s his stance. That’s really Carson Strong to a T.”
Missed his senior year
Strong grew up around football, the son of the Wood’s then-principal, Chris Strong. Sports are what he was going to do.
“I’ve known Carson since he was a young kid,” Meraz said. “He’s been around athletics and schools his whole life. Ever since he was a little guy, he was always working to get better.”
By his junior year at Wood, Strong looked the part of prospect. He was already 6-4 and 210 pounds. In 2016, Strong passed for nearly 3,000 yards and 27 touchdowns in 10 games. He made an impact in basketball as well as a tough-minded thinker. He led the Wildcats in scoring and rebounding as a junior under coach Wudel, averaging 18.1 points and 12.8 rebounds — he had two 20-rebound games and five 17-rebound games — for a league-championship squad. He gutted out games with that tender knee. He would ice down but he wasn’t going to sit down.
Wudel saw for years Strong’s will to be the best. Wudel’s son, Michael, grew up playing sports with Strong, right on through high school.
“The boys would be at our house, playing games, and if Carson lost to Michael, he had to get a rematch right away,” Wudel said. “It didn’t matter what the game was. Couldn’t take a time out to get something to eat. Had to play again right now, in anything: video games, one-on-one hoops, in the pool. Carson was just that way.”
But no senior season. It pained the coaches but not nearly as much as it pained the kid.
“I’ve talked to him about that over the years,” Wudel said. “I’m sorry he didn’t get to play as a senior. It still bugs him. He’d say, ‘Coach, my last game in basketball, we lost in the playoffs.’ That’s the kind of competitor he was. He didn’t want to end with a loss. He needed that surgery and it cost him his senior year, but he knew he had a future in sports. He and my son worked out a lot in the morning back then, up at 5 to work out before school. That was his way of competing.”
Finding a home in Nevada
Despite not having a senior campaign, Nevada offered a scholarship. But it wasn’t from game film or the good word from prep coaches that sealed the deal with the Wolf Pack. It was cell video of Strong firing laser passes to his father in a Vacaville park in the spring of 2017,
Strong sent the cell video to Matt Mumme, then the offensive coordinator at Nevada (and now coaching at Colorado State). Nevada never wavered on its commitment to Strong, and vice-versa. He went on to earn two Mountain West Conference Offensive Player of the Year honors.
“If he didn’t miss his senior year, wasn’t hurt, every Pac-12 school would want him,” said Meraz, Strong’s Wood coach. “Sitting out was definitely hard on Carson. He did the right thing by getting surgery. He had a future in football. To his credit, Carson was always around the program, like another coach. He attended every practice and game, helping out, coaching. He was like that coming into high school, wanted to be a coach, a student of the game, always eager to learn.”
What stood out especially as an athlete, coach Meraz?
“That arm,” Meraz said. “Even in high school, it was there. Just a great arm that jumps out.”
That arm will earn Strong a chance to play for pay. Fortunately, one doesn’t throw with his knee. NFL draft guru Mel Kiper Jr. wrote recently on ESPN, “Strong’s biggest issue is how teams view his medical reports. A team has to be comfortable enough with his long-term outlook to take him. If his knee is OK, he could be a quality backup. There’s a drop-off after the top quarterbacks, and Strong is No. 6 on my board. I have a fifth-round grade on him, but he could go a little earlier. Again, the medical reports are extremely important, and only teams have access to those.”
Meraz said Strong has no regrets. He dealt with his knee admirably as a teenager and now.
“Carson accepted the first scholarship that came his way,” Meraz said. “It’s another notch in his belt, a tribute to his character. He was up front with Nevada about his knee, and the coaches stood by him. He believed in them. All he wanted was a chance. That’s all he wants now. He is humble and hungry.”