Colts Select QB of the Future in Mel Kiper's Latest Mock Draft

The Indianapolis Colts are rolling with Philip Rivers at quarterback in 2020. He is on a one-year deal worth $25 million in what could be his final NFL season, and behind him is Jacoby Brissett, who is also on the final year of his deal and may choose to leave in free agency if the Colts truly have no intention of rolling with him as a starter again.

The team must now look elsewhere for a new quarterback of the future after the franchise was given a shock when Andrew Luck retired before the start of last season. What would perhaps have been most of a decade still to come from Luck was gone in an instant, and Mel Kiper's latest mock draft has the Colts focusing on a quarterback to take the long-term reins in due time: Washington's Jacob Eason, who could be the next Pac-12 quarterback to lead the Colts to success.

Eason stands 6-6 and threw for 3,132 yards and 23 touchdowns in his lone season at Washington. He spent the first two years of his college career at Georgia before transferring in 2018. The Colts own picks No. 34 and No. 44 overall, and Kiper believes the latter will be used on the Huskies quarterback.

This would be a smart pick by the Colts if he indeed falls all the way to No. 44. Eason is a pro-style prospect and would spend at least one year learning behind both Rivers and Brissett. Drafting him to understudy for those veterans in 2020 would cement Eason's pole position in the race to be Indy's quarterback of the future.

In Rivers, the Colts have a nice short-term plan in place for the 2020 season. Drafting a pro-style quarterback like Eason eases the transition for the long haul, and as a second-round pick, there will be no hurry to declare him a bust if he doesn't set the league on fire from the jump.