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No recruiting class is truly complete without a signal caller. Luckily for Iowa fans, the Hawkeyes’ 2019 group has a good one.
Colorado native Alex Padilla is the proverbial straw that stirs the drink in this class. Committed since June, Padilla has been a stalwart in the class. He visited with a number of other commits and targets little over a week after he verbaled.
Today, he’s officially a Hawkeye.
Slinging it from Denver to IC! Welcome our newest signal caller – QB Alex Padilla | #Swarm19 https://t.co/wAIrCXFeUH pic.twitter.com/EfJ6ZrIXLS
— Hawkeye Football (@HawkeyeFootball) December 19, 2018
As a senior at Cherry Creek, Padilla finishedhis with 1,963 passing yards and 24 touchdowns with 4 interceptions and a 68% completion percentage. He also had two rushing touchdowns.
Those impressive lines caught the attention of the Georgia Bulldogs, who offered this fall. Padilla was quick to rebuff the blueblood and reaffirm his commitment to the Hawkeyes.
What were the Bulldogs looking at when they offered? Put simply, a great combination of passer and athlete.
Padilla comes in a bit of the Peyton Mansell mold. He’s not a run-first guy, but he’s got a lot of escapability and some wheels once he hits the open field.
As a passer, he shows solid arm strength and a good ability to run through a progression. That’s something we all know Iowa will ask if any QB.
At 6’2”, Padilla has good size, though he’s a bit smaller than Nate Stanley or 2018 commit Spencer Petras. He continues what now appears to be a pattern of taking a pocket passer in one class and a more mobile QB in the next class.
Padilla is the only QB and the only commit from the state of Colorado in the class of 2019. It will be interesting to see how soon he can crack the 2-deeps.