Peyton Manning clarifies misunderstanding over C.J. Stroud, passing academy

In hindsight it looks like Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud was destined to become a star in the NFL. His performance during the 2023 season was as impressive as any rookie we've seen in league history and he's clearly the best QB in his class.

None of this was guaranteed, though - including being taken at No. 2 overall in the draft. During the pre-draft process a lot of mud gets slung around intended to hurt a player's draft stock. Stroud can ask his teammate Laremy Tunsil about that, or he can rely on his own experience. Now it seems like a distant memory but during draft season there were a couple of negative narratives going around about him.

For one thing, Stroud received a very low score on his S2 cognition test , which have replaced the equally problematic Wonderlic scores. That raised questions about his ability to perform at the NFL level, which proved to be absurd. There was also a story making the rounds that Stroud blew off an appearance for Peyton Manning's Passing Academy, which apparently brought up the old character concerns for some teams.

Turns out that was not only blown way out of proportion but also completely untrue. Here's Manning on the Pat McAfee Show explaining what happened - that Stroud had a prior commitment with Ohio State. He says he has apologized to him for the misunderstanding.