Dear Andrew Luck,
I know you just announced that you're going to come back for another year at Stanford, but I've got to ask you, are you sure?
I understand why you would want to stay another year at Stanford. It's college, it's a great time! I'm in college too, so trust me, I get it. Plus, if you stay, you've probably got a chance to compete for a national championship next year. That's great, it really is, but you're not even going to have your same coach next year, as Jim Harbaugh has just signed a 5-year $25 million contract to go just down the road and be the 49ers head coach. Do you really think it's going to be the same?
I mean, you are pretty much a lock to be picked #1, and your draft stock is probably never going to be as high as it is right now. Think about it, you just crushed Virginia Tech in the Orange Bowl, going 18/23 for 287 yards and 4 touchdowns. Sure, you threw one interception, but that's not what everybody is focusing on.
Then, when teams look at your stats for the season, they'll see that you threw for 3338 yards and 32 touchdowns. Not only that, but your completion percentage was 70.7. Andrew, that just doesn't happen very often. There was only one game where you threw for under 190 yards, and only 3 games where you were under 70% completion. You had a special season, it's time to capitalize on it.
ESPN analysts just can't say enough about you. Everybody around the league thinks you could step in and be "The Guy" for a team right away. Maybe you just don't want to go to the Panthers, I can understand that. But, they've got a good core of young running backs that could easily help you adjust to the league. They're going to get a good head coach who can come in there with you, and you guys can help get the Panthers out of the basement of what has become a highly competitive NFC South division.
Just think about it, okay? I mean, ask Matt Leinart. If he hadn't stayed for another year, he would have come out and been at the top of the draft board for a whole bunch of teams. Who knows, he may still be the starting quarterback somewhere. But I'm sure you know what happened, he was drafted after Reggie Bush by the Arizona Cardinals to be their backup, and now he's the 3rd string on the Texans. Do you want that to happen to you?
The only thing that can happen now is that your stock goes down. If you don't declare now, who knows what could happen in a year? You could get hurt, you could have a terrible year, someone else could emerge as a better quarterback than you.
Do yourself a service, change your mind and declare for the draft. It's okay to be a flip-flopper. When you said you'd come back, you didn't know if coach Harbaugh would be there.
Don't be the next Matt Leinart.
~MAS
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