THE NFL DRAFT's NO. 1 PICK

You might say the countdown clock on Trevor Lawrence getting selected No. 1 began the night he walked off the field in New Orleans on New Year's Day.

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In our mind, it began in the spring of 2018 before he'd taken an official snap as a college quarterback.

Thursday night conversation with Trevor Lawrence

The clamor over Lawrence was massive to begin with given his status as the top prospect in the country, and given that Dabo Swinney said before his arrival that he'd be more ready-made than Deshaun Watson at the same point because of his physical development.

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But you never really know until you see them out there doing it against the best competition in practice, right before your eyes.

C.J. Spiller did that once upon a time, back when 5-star prospects didn't grow on the big trees outside of Death Valley. Sammy Watkins did it too, showing right away in August of 2011 that everything was going to be different from that point forward.

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What was wild about Lawrence's presence that spring was that people were still marveling over the throws he made in high school.

Around that time we came upon this clip showing Lawrence making a throw we'll never forget.

The next day, we asked co-offensive coordinator Jeff Scott to recall the best throw he'd ever seen Lawrence make.

"The one you posted yesterday," came his reply.

It all seemed academic at that point to anyone who was paying close attention: Lawrence was going to give Clemson what it had missed the year after Watson's departure and was going to put the Tigers right back in contention for the national title.

It's easy to forget the knock on Clemson from some voices after Watson walked off the field as a Tiger for the last time in Tampa that January night in 2017.

The kid who wore the No. 4 jersey was just Superman in the way he brought Nick Saban and plenty others to their knees. It didn't seem all that unreasonable to suggest it might be a while before Clemson would claim another national title.

Lawrence made a mockery of that thinking right away. At Georgia Tech, as his head coach was still holding on to Kelly Bryant as the starter in the fourth game, Lawrence made it a slam dunk by rolling to his left and firing a touchdown pass to Hunter Renfrow that looked a lot like that high school clip.

Chase Brice came to the rescue after Lawrence was knocked out of his first college start against Syracuse. A quick return for a bludgeoning of Wake Forest on the road, and then came a visit from plucky N.C. State.

The Wolfpack had been a nuisance for Clemson the previous three years even though the Tigers won all three. There was reason to think this one might be close too.

The final score was 41-7 and it felt worse. That was the day it felt like the team became Trevor's team, as he tossed rainbows to Tee Higgins and others, as he looked like he could be better than most NFL quarterbacks right freaking now.

Then there was the trip to Florida State when Lawrence came out early in the massacre and looked almost embarrassed to be that good as he flipped his hair and smiled on the sidelines while joking with his teammates.

And of course the way it ended that year, with Chris Fowler saying there was no way this kid could be 19 years old as he effortlessly took apart Nick Saban's Alabama defense in California.

Those are some of the images you thought about as Lawrence was going through the interminable draft-evaluation process.

Officially, he had his Pro Day on campus back in February. But shoot, essentially he put forth his Pro Day when he made that throw in high school.

As brilliant as his college career was -- he never lost a regular-season game as a starter -- in a way the team success fell a bit short of all the stratospheric expectations produced on that joyous night against Alabama.

For months after that epic dismantling, it became impossible for some inside and outside the football offices to avoid looking into the distant future and asking themselves:

45-0?

Could Lawrence make it a clean sweep for his college career with an undefeated record and three consecutive national titles?

Sure, some out there can poke fun at that talk now and say how ridiculous it was given how much Clemson has been undressed in the past two playoffs by LSU and Ohio State.

But the mere fact that it was being thrown around as a real possibility is a testament to the greatness of the kid who's off to the Sunshine State.

Lawrence has never lost a regular-season game in his life, so unquestionably playing for a ragged Jaguars franchise will take some getting used to.

And for that matter, the same could be said of Urban Meyer as the Hall of Fame college coach tries to deal with losing on a far more regular basis than he did at Ohio State and Florida.

With the Buckeyes and Gators, how many times did Meyer walk onto the field looking at a more talented team on the other side? Not many.

Same for Lawrence at Clemson.

So the circumstances and dynamics are much different for Lawrence as he tries to put not just a team but an entire community on his shoulders.

It's been well documented that there's no such thing as a sure thing when it comes to quarterbacks in the NFL.

But it's also been well documented that this No. 1 pick is as close to a sure thing as you're going to get.

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