Arizona general manager Steve Keim said he remembers the moment he decided the Cardinals would make former Oklahoma quarterback Kyler Murray the first pick of the 2019 NFL Draft.
“When I closed my eyes and I visualized Kyler Murray running around State Farm Stadium in red and white, for whatever reason, all I saw was just fireworks, excitement, a must-see [environment] where fans have to go and show up and see this thing. Him being the architect was a phenomenal fit for me,” Keim told NBC’s Peter King.
That makes two seasons in a row that Keim has picked a quarterback in the first round, trading up in 2018 to draft UCLA’s Josh Rosen, who was dispatched to the Miami Dolphins in a trade on Friday night.
New coach Kliff Kingsbury recruited Murray, a Texas native, when he was a college coach recruiting in the state. But Keim and Kingsbury both said the coach didn’t insist on the selection.
“The thing I respect the most about Kliff is he never once interrupted the process,” Keim said, with Kingsbury sitting at the table with him and King. “He never once came down and put his fist on the table and said, ‘I want Kyler Murray. I have to have him.’ I knew that he loved him as a player, but he allowed the process to take care of itself. To me, that was the only way we were going to get it right.”
Keim said he put off watching tape of Murray until just six weeks ago. And when he did watch, he was mesmerized by the quarterback, who measured 5-foot-10 1/8 at the NFL Scouting Combine.
“I was reluctant to study him because I knew what we had in Josh Rosen,” Keim said. “As I watched the first game, I watched the second game, I couldn’t put down the controller. All I wanted to do was keep watching this kid on tape. I don’t know if I wrote down ‘wow’ 100 times, or 500 times, but my hand got tired of writing it. In the time I’ve been doing this, I haven’t seen a guy who could throw like him and run like him. I’ve seen guys who could do one of each, but I’ve never evaluated a guy who possesses the skill set to do both things at such a high level.”
