Report: Sleeper QB prospect provides positive medical update to NFL

Thamel relayed that every NFL team received a letter from Dr. Neal ElAttrache, Hooker’s orthopedic surgeon, which affirmed that Hooker is “on a timeline to be fully-cleared by the first weekend of the NFL season.”

Hooker was already drawing first-round interest and had been predicted to be off the board by the end of Day 2 of the draft at the latest, even without the letter -- but that medical update could theoretically give an on-the-fence team a little extra confidence in taking the plunge with the Volunteers gunslinger.

Hooker is projected to be a bit of a project on offense in the NFL, as he has plenty of tools that could greatly assist him at the next level, but also had some benefits playing at Tennessee that he simply won't have in the pros.

The signal-caller played on an extremely quarterback-friendly offense as a Volunteer under Josh Heupel. The gameplan was conducive to offensive output at the college level, but has not been known to produce NFL-ready passers. Heupel’s offense is assumed to run largely off of predetermined targets. This is likely evidenced by the rate and speed at which Hooker checked the ball down. If Hooker’s first (and only) read was not there, he would check the ball down.

One of the most difficult parts of playing quarterback in the NFL is reading pro defenses, not just before the snap but during the play itself. Because Heupel’s offense did not promote the development of this tool for Hooker, many teams doing their research on the 25-year-old expect that there will be a learning curve for him at the next level (beyond the already-steep learning curve which inherently exists in the NFL).

Because of the expectation that Hooker will sit and learn, the knee injury was probably not viewed as a huge strike against him. But it certainly doesn't hurt to be able to offer up a more concrete recovery timetable.