AJ McCarron's decision to skip Senior Bowl may have draft day consequences

The Senior Bowl will be without hometown hero A.J. McCarron.

Alabama quarterback A.J. McCarron plans to skip this year's Senior Bowl, according to Randy Kennedy of AL.com. The annual college all-star game takes place in McCarron's backyard of Mobile and he grew up attending the contest as a child. Still, he believes his prowess at Alabama will give scouts enough to go on when deciding whether or not to draft the quarterback.

McCarron started 40 games for Alabama over three seasons and won 36 of those matchups, including two BCS national championships. He finished his career with a two-straight losses to Auburn and Oklahoma, but compiled 9,019 passing yards and 77 passing touchdowns over his four-year stint in Alabama. The quarterback only had 15 interceptions over three seasons as a starter.

While McCarron's success on the field may speak for itself from a statistical standpoint, the Senior Bowl is one of the main outlets for scouts to study a player's strengths and weaknesses. Along with the Combine and Pro Days, the Bowl serves as a glimpse into a possible future employee. It is the equivalent of an SAT for professional football players. McCarron's lack of interest in the game, may come off as either carelessness or over-confidence on the part of the former Alabama passer.

While Oregon's Marcus Mariota and UCLA's Brett Hundley have chosen to remain in school, McCarron still enters a draft with plenty of quarterback talent. The class includes Louisville's Teddy Bridgewater, Central Florida's Blake Bortles, Texas A&M's Johnny Manziel, LSU's Zach Mettenberger, Clemson's Tajh Boyd and Georgia's Aaron Murray, among others. McCarron likely falls in the middle or behind all of those passers in the selection process. Adding a lack of evaluation at the Senior Bowl and its practices, could see McCarron drop even further.

McCarron is excluded from Mocking the Draft's Top 100 players and ranks 12th on the site's quarterback countdown. He is also placed eighth on CBS Sports quarterback prospect rating list. This means that unless several quarterbacks are selected in the first two rounds, McCarron could be in for a very long weekend in May. With that in mind, it is hard to fathom why he would not want to increase his stock.

The declining of the Senior Bowl invitation is due to McCarron's apparent interest in getting a jump-start on the other offseason evaluation activities. Here is what the quarterback said on the matter:

"I really appreciate being invited to play in the Senior Bowl," McCarron said. "It is quite an honor and something I've dreamed about while growing up in the Mobile area. However, at this time, I'm putting all of my focus and energy into preparing for the NFL Combine, pro day and the rest of the pre-draft evaluation process. Therefore, I won't be taking part in the Senior Bowl."

Whether or not this move will help the quarterback will only be answered in May. For McCarron's sake, he better hope that reputation outweighs repetition in the draft process.