As if waiting through a three-day slog of 252 picks without seeing his name called wasn't torture enough, the Indianapolis Colts decided to add one last kick in the nuts to Case Keenum's 2012 NFL Draft experience.

With the 253rd and last pick in the draft, the Colts selected another quarterback. Just not the NCAA's all-time leader in passing yards and touchdowns.

Instead Indy went with Northern Illinois quarterback Chandler Harnish, a Mid-American Conference QB who played against Arkansas State in his bowl game. Keenum if you don't remember — and no NFL personnel men seem to — spent his bowl game, carving up Penn State's defense.

Seeing yet another less-accomplished quarterback go with the final pick had to tie a bitter bow on Keenum's draft experience. Fortunately for the man who played difference maker at the University of Houston — and let's face it, played a huge part in Kevin Sumlin landing the Texas A&M job — his experience improved once Roger Goodell's endless TV show closed.

For less than an hour after Harnish's name was called, Keenum had agreed to a free-agent deal with the hometown Houston Texans, where he'll get to learn the pro game under Gary Kubiak, one of the most gifted quarterback teachers in football. (How gifted? Never mind the wonders he and Rick Dennison pulled off with T.J. Yates. Kubiak almost managed to make even Matt Leinart look competent at times.)

It's not the stuff of storybooks — that would have been an NFL front office realizing that a guy who only threw touchdowns (48 his senior season alone) deserved to be drafted in the fifth or sixth round, no matter the concerns about height and the strength of his arm.

Case Keenum can play quarterback. Period.

It may not happen next year or the year after (it'd better not for the sake of the Texans' Super Bowl hopes), but NFL talent evaluators will eventually realize they screwed up on Keenum. College football's record breaker will at least be a good backup in the pros for years to come. And don't be surprised if he gets a chance down the road (probably in some other city) and becomes even more.

The league-wide decision to bypass UH's lifeline speaks more of what's wrong with NFL talent evaluating than it does of what's wrong with Keenum.

General managers have become so obsessed with the "measurables" that they have lost any sense of imagination. And gotten further away from acknowledging what players actually manage to accomplish on the field. Don't be so sure that NFL talent evaluation has improved since Tom Brady languished until the sixth round of the 2000 NFL Draft.

Brady might not have been picked earlier if he came out in the NFL of 2012. He might not have been selected at all.

This isn't to suggest that Keenum is going to become anything close to Tom Brady (he's not). But a team should have been smart enough to give him the chance to develop into a Matt Flynn, through the draft.

Keenum is a better quarterback than Colt Brennan, even though Brennan has a few inches on him. He's much less of a system quarterback than Brennan was at Hawaii. And yet, Brennan managed to get drafted in 2008.

It's a joke that Keenum didn't crack the list of 253, even as many guys he far outplayed in college did.

Not Your Usual UFA

On a day in Houston when the Texans smartly added another wide receiver (Michigan State speedster Keshawn Martin) to go with the one they picked up in the third round on Friday night (DeVier Posey) to put pressure on not only Jacoby Jones (who hasn't been traded quite yet) but Kevin Walter (and his 39-catch 2011 self) as well, a day when general manager Rick Smith wisely ignored the prejudice against drafting kickers to select Texas A&M's Ryan Bullock, a day when two more offensive linemen (Georgia center Ben Jones and Purdue tackle Nick Mondek) and another toy for Wade Phillips (Nebraska defensive end Jared Crick) came into the fold, it's the undrafted free agent's quick signing that most resonated with the fans.

Keenum spent his Saturday night, tweeting a picture of himself in "the first Texans hat I could find!" and accepting congratulations from well wishers.

Why more teams that don't share a city with Keenum didn't do what Kubiak did in bringing the UH quarterback in for a private workout that eliminated many of the doubts is a question that could resonate with more than a few general managers in the years to come. Do you really think Keenum doesn't have a chance to turn into at least as good an NFL quarterback as Colt McCoy?

The Texans didn't just make a smart football decision in calling Keenum first among their list of Undrafted Free Agent (UFA) targets. They grabbed some good football karma too.

A player who did as much as Keenum did at the University of Houston deserved to have his draft misery replaced with something else as soon as possible. You can bet that Bob McNair's franchise will end up selling more than a few Keenum Texans jerseys to Cougar fans too.

Keenum's not close to the star of this haul for the Texans. He'll probably never be a star — or even a starter — for Rick Smith's team. Don't expect some Arian Foster undrafted free agent replay with Keenum. But he's not some charity case either. This is a quarterback who could have won a Heisman Trophy with a few better bounces. He fits into the Texans' talent haul.

"I feel like we’ve improved our football team," Smith said after the Texans' last draft pick, before Keenum was even signed. ". . . I look at our class and I think it accomplished several things that we were attempting to accomplish. We were able to add some players that can impact our team like we talked about, both offensively and defensively."

Smith couldn't right the wrong of the Keenum snub. That's not his job. In truth, as much as they weren't in any great need for a quarterback, the Texans could have drafted the record breaker too if they felt that strongly about Keenum.

It's nice that Keenum will be able to start laying the foundation to prove the NFL's too-rigid system of evaluating talent wrong in Houston though.

Passed over by everyone? Again and again and again and again? Keenum's much-maligned arm will have plenty to say about that.

Sooner or later.