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The Eagles signed QB Matt Barkley to a 4 year deal earlier this week. ESPN's Adam Schefter was among those that reported this fact. However, he also did a little editorializing that Matt Barkley himself decided to respond to.
@AdamSchefter yeah, because my signature has changed. Duhhhh #thanksforthecommentaryAdam
— Matthew Barkley (@MattBarkley) June 13, 2013
Schefter's gist is that had Barkley come out a year earlier, he would have been a first round pick rather than the 4th rounder he was this year.
There's no doubt Barkley's stock was much higher prior to his rough 2012 campaign and it is true that a lot of draftniks had him rated as a first round pick. Then again, a lot of them had Geno Smith rated as a first round pick this year. Some even had Matt Barkley there.
Fact is the draft is an extremely inexact thing to predict as anyone who compares pundit predictions with reality can attest. Did Matt Barkley probably cost himself some money by staying in school? Yeah he probably did... But it's not something he can obsess over and I think his playful tweet back to Schefter shows that he's not.
In the end, if he shows he can be a starting QB in the NFL it won't matter where he got drafted or how much he got in his first contract. He'll be rich beyond his wildest dreams either way...