After being selected by the Arizona Cardinals with the 10th overall pick Thursday night in the NFL draft, Rosen told reporters that he was “pissed” and “really angry” he fell outside the top three.
“There were nine mistakes ahead of me,” Rosen said.
But when the Cardinals finally selected him after trading three picks this year to the Oakland Raiders to move up and snag the former UCLA quarterback, Rosen was relieved and inspired yet still unhappy all at once.
“I thought I should’ve been picked at 1, 2 or 3,” Rosen said. “I dropped, and I was pissed. I was really, really angry. I wasn’t really showing it. I was trying to keep calm, cool, composed. But I thought I was going to get picked, and I thought I was going to have to put on a face and try and fake happiness. But for some reason, right when I got that call, that’s not what happened. I got really happy and really motivated.
“All I wanted to do was basically get on a plane right then and go straight to Arizona and start working. It was definitely a surprise when I got that phone call in terms of the emotions I was feeling. But I think everything happens for a reason.”
Rosen, who developed a reputation in college for speaking his mind, doesn’t plan on changing now that he is in the NFL.
“Maybe if I shut up these last three years, I could’ve been picked higher, but I don’t want that,” he said. “I want to be me. The Arizona Cardinals know what they’re getting. They’re not going to get a kid that’s going to say stupid things and piss people off unnecessarily. They’re going to get a kid that everyone knows who they’re getting every single day that I walk in the building.”
“I don’t know, and I don’t care,” Rosen said. “It’s behind me. I’m an Arizona Cardinal now, and I hope I will be for many, many years.”
Josh Rosen acknowledging he was “pissed” after he fell to the No. 10 pick means he’s going to be playing with a chip on his shoulder, this could be good news for Cards fans.
