ORLANDO, Fla. -- This year's quarterback draft class is presumed by many to have three players who stand out above the rest -- three that could be candidates for the Houston Texans' No. 1 overall selection.
But that's not how Texans coach Bill O'Brien sees it.
"I think the thing is, to me, there's not a lot of separation," O'Brien said during an interview with NFL Network that aired Monday morning. "And there are more quarterbacks than just three. Obviously the three guys that everybody talks about -- Blake [Bortles], Teddy [Bridgewater] and Johnny [Manziel] -- they're good players. They've had great college careers.
"But there are other guys out there. You've got [AJ] McCarron. You've got [Zach] Mettenberger. You've got [Logan] Thomas. You've got [Tom] Savage. You've got [Jimmy] Garoppolo. I mean, I can go right down the list. To me, you've got 10 to 12 guys you've got to do a great job of evaluating and make the best pick possible wherever you pick these guys. So I just see a lot of good quarterbacks."
The Texans have the top selection in the draft for the third time in franchise history. They took quarterback David Carr in 2002 with the first pick as an expansion franchise and selected defensive end Mario Williams with the first pick in 2006.
Houston has three quarterbacks on its roster -- Ryan Fitzpatrick, a veteran signed last week, Case Keenum, who started eight games last season in his first season on an active NFL roster, and T.J. Yates, who began the 2013 season as Matt Schaub's backup and ended it as Keenum's backup.
Schaub was traded to the Oakland Raiders on Friday for a sixth-round pick.
"I don't think there's any question that we'll draft a quarterback," O'Brien said. "Where we draft that quarterback, I don't think we know that yet. We don't even know that yet."