The season is just under half over. Let's start by ranking quarterbacks. This is based almost exclusively on passing, with a little focus paid to rushing. This is not a list of who I'd like going forward, this season or in the future. I'd rather have Russell Wilson than literally any other player on here, but that doesn't mean he's going to be first. Similarly, I have no doubt that Tyrod Taylor will crash back down to earth, but he's still a top-ten QB so far this year. This list is exclusively based on play from the first half of this season.
1. Tom Brady. That's right, the sixth-round draft pick out of Michigan (as in the school that lost to their rival Michigan State when this happened) is ranked #1 this year. His Cinderella story gained a lot of attention from fans when he took over the starting job from Drew Bledsoe and won the Super Bowl... and then won three more Super Bowls. And two MVPs. Plus the MVP he's going to win this year (and the Super Bowl he's going to lose). #literallyKurtWarner. Brady is not having his best season ever, but he's having a season that looks so much like his best season ever that it's probably fair to call it one of the five or so best seasons ever (assuming he keeps it up, which, playing in the AFC, and the AFC East no less, he probably will). He's playing insanely efficiently and has thrown only one interception in 289 attempts, which isn't that meaningful a stat but is notable for being an all-time record. It also helps that his completion percentage is tied for a career high, his yards per attempt is the second best of his career, and his touchdown rate--while nowhere near his absurd 2007 mark, or even his markedly less absurd 2010 mark--is still the third-highest of his career, and sufficient for him to own the league lead in touchdowns thrown. Basically, Brady is having one of those seasons that makes me wonder if maybe, just maybe, his career will hold a candle to Peyton's when it's over... but it still doesn't. Even just looking at the latter half of Brady's career (since he got talented teammates in '07 to present), it barely keeps up with the latter half of Manning's, and that's before we factor in Manning's '04 season. But that debate is a topic for another post.
2. Carson Palmer. And now it's going to get weird. Palmer has been really good this year. As in, there isn't that big a gap between him and Brady. In fact, the gap is actually really small, and it might go the other way (i.e. Palmer might deserve the #1 spot on this list). I'm still giving it to Brady, partially because I already wrote up that whole entry for #1, and partially because I just think Brady's better. It's my list; I get to order them however I want. For the record, though, Palmer is having not only a career-best season (by a mile) but also, by ANY/A, the fourth-best passing season ever. (He's 16th all-time in PR; Brady's 5th in PR and 9th in ANY/A.) We're witnessing history. Kind of.
3. Andy Dalton. Blah, blah. Career year, insane efficiency (11th all-time PR, 8th all-time ANY/A). I don't fully expect all three of these guys to finish in the top 10 in these big efficiency categories, but it's still pretty amazing.
4. Aaron Rodgers. Rodgers isn't having an all-time great season, or even an extremely good one. What a loser. He (and the Packers) also joined the Less Than 50 Yards Passing In A Game Club, which is not a club you want to be in.
5. Derek Carr. Carr's on a warpath to prove that his performance against the Seahawks in the 2014 preseason wasn't a fluke. He's throwing to Amari Cooper, Michael Crabtree, and trash, and his performance has been close to Rodgers's. If I'm ranking rookies since '12 by how much I'd want them going forward (all other things equal), Carr might come second after Wilson. (He's easily ahead of Luck, looking better than Foles, Griffin, and Bridgewater, and I like him more than Tannehill.) Of course this might be a Foles-lite season (remember how Foles had the third-best season ever by both PR and ANY/A in '13 and then fell off a cliff, relatively speaking--he's still better than Luck), but it also might be an indication of things to come.
6. Philip Rivers. Rivers is the other guy (besides Brady) who's on pace to break Manning's passing yards record. He's also only the third guy on this list so far who's not having a career season (after Brady and Rodgers). Few people remember this, but in 2008 Rivers was far and away the best quarterback in the league (and it wasn't close). Yet not only was Rivers denied First Team All-Pro, but he didn't even make the Pro Bowl. Meanwhile, Kerry Collins, who put up a passer rating a full 25 points below Rivers's, and an ANY/A more than two full yards less than Rivers's. Even Peyton Manning, who won FTAP and MVP, wasn't particularly close. So yeah, he's not having a career season. But it's good.
7. Drew Brees. Boring. Ignore any and all stats about Brees's receivers. Brees's performance is and has always been independent of his receivers. That's what makes him Brees. He's going to be between 3rd and 10th on this list until he dies or retires.
8. Tyrod Taylor. Yes, Taylor has five career starts (or possibly four; PFR is inconsistent). But this is as far as I can let him slip because he's straight up been that good in those five starts. Taylor may have only gone 3-2 in his games this year, but in those games he completed 70.1% of his passes (best in the league), for 6.6% TD% (t-6th), 8.0 YPA (5th), 103.6 PR (6th), and an inexplicably mediocre 6.60 ANY/A (12th). If he can continue doing anything like that, he might be Buffalo's first answer at QB since freaking Jim Kelly. I mean, he might be. He's probably not.
9. Eli Manning. It's pretty expected to see the name Manning near the top of the list, so we're just gonna gloss over this. It's nice to see Beckham come back down to earth, because I don't like the Giants and it pains me to see them do well. We're going to ignore the fact that their 4-4 record puts them at outright first in the NFC East.
10. Russell Wilson. Wilson threw off the Seahawks' offensive plans when he stole the starting job from Matt Flynn in the 2012 preseason. They hadn't prepared a playbook for a mobile, accurate passer with legs. After Wilson proved himself to be the real deal (this happened in game 6 vs the Patriots, when Wilson hard-carried the game and singlehandedly forced the Hawks to win), most teams would have redesigned the offense around their new quarterback and modified the roster to make him successful. Not the Seahawks! Our front office saw his potential to hard-carry every game and decided, fuck it, rather than spending any money on receivers or O-line (the two position groups that have any statistical influence on a quarterback's performance), let's channel all our money into defense. To be fair, this wasn't the worst strategy in the world; the Seahawks' offenses ranked in the top ten for the three years prior to this season, and that's largely due to Wilson, again, hard-carrying the offense (along with Marshawn Lynch being one of the very few running backs in league history to be able to find success without offensive line support, although don't think that would be enough without Wilson). But then the Hawks traded their best offensive lineman, by FAR (Max Unger), to New Orleans for a receiving threat. Now the Seahawks have the 32nd-ranked OL in the league, and even Wilson is having difficulty. Of course, some of this is on Wilson--he's made a number of dumb mistakes, and even though his completion rate is through the roof, his ANY/A is the worst of his career by FAR. 10th is a reasonable place for Wilson. If and when he and/or the OL pulls it together, expect his meteoric rise to continue (to go completely unnoticed by the media, but hey).
11. Brian Hoyer. I have no idea why Hoyer is this high. My rankings are fundamentally based in statistics, but it was my impression that Hoyer is bad. I'm attributing this to DeAndre Hopkins, who has slowed his historic pace but is still on track to put up 1740 yards (and 12 TDs, on 132 catches) this season. That's insane. (Oh, by the way, as great as Todd Gurley is, his roll will also slow down pretty soon. That doesn't mean he's not great. It just means he won't have a rookie season on par with Eric Dickerson's (when he rushed for 1808 yards and 18 TDs). Right now, Gurley is on pace for 1150 yards and 6 TDs. But if you take into account the fact that he barely played in the Rams' first three games and assume that he'll continue at the rate he's been going for his last four games (he won't), he's on pace for 1707 yards and 9 TDs. Still not quite Dickerson, but a lot better than he's realistically going to do. And yet he's still the most promising young back in the NFL... If you don't count Le'Veon Bell as young at 23.)
12. Josh McCown. More like Josh McClown, am I right? This guy's career statsheet looks like a patchwork quilt of journeymanship and mediocrity. I mean, yes, he does have a higher passer rating than Russell Wilson this season on more attempts, but have you seen all those Cleveland receivers I've never heard of? You know, like Gary Barnidge and Duke Johnson? They're probably pretty good. I mean, Johnny Manziel with this team (with this line, which PFF has as second in the league this season) has produced an 84.5 passer rating, and Manziel is one of the worst quarterbacks I've ever seen. Which gives me great pleasure.
13. Ben Roethlisberger. Roethlisberger being this high does not give me great pleasure. I don't like Roethlisberger. But his stats speak for themselves, low volume aside. Which means I don't have to speak for them, which is good, because I'm done.
14. Matt Ryan. Matt Ryan is one of the most consistent quarterbacks in the NFL (possibly ever). Every single season he's played, he's finished between an 80.9 and 99.1 passer rating, and in seven out of eight seasons he's finished north of 87. His career rating is good for 11th all time, although part of that is due to rating inflation. (By the way, keep your eyes open for Wilson to enter that leaderboard next week.... at #2.) This is basically who Matt Ryan is. He's never going to put up a 110 PR season or win MVP, but he's also never going to be Andrew Luck and throw games away. It helps that Julio Jones is having a god season (on pace for 1784 yards and 12 TDs).
15. Alex Smith. It's weird to think that as the NFL's viewership gets younger and younger, more and more people will be watching what Smith is doing now without realizing what he went through to get here. Smith was picked 1st overall in '05 and started right off the bat in an era when QBs didn't do that nearly as much as they do now. He was terrible and, up until about 2011, he was considered one of the biggest busts of all time (behind only Ryan Leaf, Akili Smith, JaMarcus Russell, and Tim Couch at QB). Then Jim Harbaugh came to town. When he revitalized the 49ers franchise, he also revitalized Smith's career. Harbaugh, the QB Whisperer, turned Smith from a career 72.1 PR passer (in the 6 years before him) to a 92.7 PR passer (in the five years, and WAY more attempts, since). Smith, like Ryan, will never be Tom Brady. But at least he is like Ryan now, and not like Andrew Luck (whose career rating is currently in jeopardy of falling below Smith's 83.6).
16. Marcus Mariota. MariGOATa had one of the all-time great passing games in week 1 (his "perfect passer rating" was actually a 207.6 uncapped, which is significantly more impressive). In fact, that might be the greatest first-game debut by a rookie in NFL history, and certainly the best passing debut. (Among QBs who started game 1 of their rookie season, Mariota's game ranks first all-time, ahead of Fran Tarkenton's 166.9, RGIII's 139.9, Matt Ryan's unqualified 137.0, and Jim Kelly's 119.8. At other positions, Ottis Anderson started his career with a game of 193 yards rushing and a TD, while Billy Sims put up 153 yards and 3 scores. Anquan Boldin opened with 217 yards receiving and 2 TDs. A couple of defensive players and offensive non-skill guys had solid efforts in their debuts, but nothing spectacular, or at least nothing that shows up that way in the stat book. All that being said, I'm happy to call Mariota's debut the all-time best, since it outpaces Anderson and Boldin's efforts relative to their respective peers by a pretty wide margin--neither of them appear on the single-game leaderboard.) Anyway. Since his historic start, Mariota's performance has dropped from MariGOATa to MariNOta. If this keeps up, he's going to finish up a lot lower on this list than 16th.
17. Jay Cutler. Jay Cutler is well-known for using his tremendous physique to intimidate his opponents on the gridiron. (Just kidding.) For real, though, Cutler is basically the poster boy for mediocrity. Ever season of his career besides one (his first in Chicago, which was understandably transitional), he's finished with a passer rating in the 80s. That's honestly stunning. In fact, all but two of his seasons have finished between 85 and 90 PRs. This isn't exactly a desirable passer rating (Cutler ranks 24th on the career list, after the boost of modern passing rules), but it's still pretty amazing that he's that consistent, year in and year out.
18. Ryan Tannehill. A few weeks ago, Tannehill just missed out on setting the record for the highest Uncapped Passer Rating ever recorded in a game. He had the record, with the qualifying 15 attempts (with 16, in fact), and then he literally threw it away by staying in the game for no reason (it was a blowout). This is probably one of the most disappointing near-brushes with history any of us will ever witness. Bummer.
19. Jameis Winston. I thought, and still think, that Mariota was the best quarterback coming out of college this past spring. But credit where it's due: Winston has been really impressive in three of his games this season, and for a quarterback starting in his rookie season it's much more about being impressive intermittently than it is about being pretty good consistently. (This is why I'm still high on Mariota.) Basically the logic is this: If the QB is good enough to put up a 110+ passer rating in three separate games this year, he clearly has the talent to be successful in the NFL. His bad games are mostly due to rookie mistakes, which can be dealt with; not having the talent can't be. So basically, Tampa should be really happy with their rookie's performance so far.
20. Ryan Fitzpatrick. I actually met Ryan Fitzpatrick in a bar last weekend near where he went to college, and we started going at it. He was being a dick to my friend and started regurgitating Gordon Wood, talking about the pre-Revolutionary utopia and the capital-forming effects of military mobilization. Then, when I pointed out that Wood drastically underestimates the impact of social distinctions predicated upon wealth, especially inherited wealth, he was humiliated and slinked off in defeat, in the traditional manner of the Jets.
21. Teddy Bridgewater. People think Bridgewater is mobile. People are racist. He's not mobile, at all. Blake Bortles, Josh McCown, and Jay Cutler all have more rushing yards this season than Bridgewater. It baffles me how there is still such a massive prejudice in the NFL regarding race. Seems to me like the matter should have been resolved when Jim Brown entered the NFL and completely shit on the whitewashed league, thereby proving that not only were black players as good as whites, but they were in fact often (usually) better. The NFL is now overwhelmingly black, and yet there still exist these preconceptions (particularly at QB) that black players are "less cerebral" or "more mobile." This is racism. (Demographics: 68% of players, as of 2014, identified as black, followed by 28% white, and around 4% Asian/Pacific Islander, Hispanic, and Other. The Eagles were by far the whitest team in the league, with 25 players--47% of their active roster--reporting as white.) Bridgewater, or at least the hoax of his athleticism (which never existed--he rushed for 170 yards in college, total), is a result of this racism, because it's impossible for the sports media to accept that Bridgewater is a good, black quarterback, despite not being mobile. (Well, he's pretty good, at 21st.)
22. Matthew Stafford. The list gets real messy past around this point. The choices are still in approximate order, but feel free to move anyone (except the last two entries, who are far and away the worst QBs, statistically speaking, this season) up or down a slot or two as you see fit. Anyway, Stafford continues his trend of underwhelming efficiency despite throwing to absurdly talented receivers (specifically Calvin Johnson and Golden Tate). Does this make him a bad quarterback? I don't think so. Is he playing injured? Maybe. He usually is. But honestly, quarterbacking in the league this year is really good and mediocrity is almost never going to place you higher than the bottom third, regardless of how justified it may be. Let me repeat that for posterity: Environment very rarely justifies mediocrity, and there are no active cases in the league of this happening. The closest thing is Wilson trying to make magic behind PFF's 32nd-ranked offensive line, but even that doesn't fully justify the mistakes he's been making. (See how I acknowledge my QB's underperformance, rather than trying to explain it away and insisting he's still elite? Pay attention, Colts fans.)
23. Kirk Cousins. I'm still on the RGIII hope train. Although by this point the train is empty and I'm sitting alone while the waiver cliff rapidly approaches. Did you know Griffin was born in Okinawa? That means he can never be president. Maybe that's why the Redskins are featuring Kirk Cousins. Or maybe they're living in the past and fail to realize that Cousins hasn't had a season over 87 passer rating in his career. Imagine that, living in the past, never realizing that the player you're supporting hasn't been good for years... Fuck.
24. Blake Bortles. I actually called Bortles as the best QB in his draft class back before the draft. I certainly didn't expect him to go as high as he did, but I saw him as being potentially better than Bridgewater. His first season, he put up a passer rating of 69.5. This year, he's notched an 82.5. That's a gain of 13 rating points. At this rate, he'll put up a 95.5 next season, a 108.5 in 2017, a 121.5 in '18, and a record 134.5 in 2019. So I'm feeling pretty comfortable with my prediction. Just you wait.
25. Nick Foles. Foles's good season is the best one-hit-wonder season by a quarterback in NFL history. This is not Foles's good season. His performance has been virtually identical to where it was last season (and when I say identical, I mean cmp% within 1%, YPA identical, and PR within 0.2). Unfortunately that consistent rating has come on really inconsistent play this year. I don't see a resurgence from Foles. But hey, maybe he's going to be the next Kurt Warner.
26. Joe Flacco. Flaccastrophe is basically a slightly worse Matt Ryan, and I don't just say that because they're both from the same draft class. Just kidding, that's exactly why I say that. People jumped on the hype train after Flacco had that great playoff run in 2012, and no one listened when I explained that it was just variance. Well, it turns out it was just variance. The next season Flacco played his career worst, while the media still asked if he was elite. He's not. He will never be.
27. Cam Newton. I have seen some people suggesting that Cam Newton is an MVP candidate this year. I don't even have a response to that. I have arguments against any reasonable candidate, but not one who's so far outside the realm of competition that I'd never in a million years consider his case. Not only is Newton playing badly this season, but he's not even the reason the Panthers are doing well. (Usually when an individual player is responsible for massively increasing his team's performance, it shows up in their stats. E.g. literally every player who's ever done this. You really need a list? Start with '07 Brady, '13 Manning, '07 Moss, '11 Rodgers, '12 Peterson, '99 and '01 Warner. As a rule, when an individual player is playing so well that his team does extremely well as a direct result, this shows up in the player's statistics. Which is why we have statistics.) Statistically: Newton has as many games of sub-70 PR as he does of 80+ PR--two of each. He has a career-low passer rating despite spending his entire career in the 80s. His rushing (286 yards) doesn't add nearly enough value for him to merit consideration even as an average quarterback, let alone an elite one, let alone an MVP candidate. "But he doesn't have help from his team!" Okay, first of all, yes he does. 7-0 doesn't happen on one person's back, I don't care if you're Peyton Manning. And second: So fucking what? His team (hypothetically) being bad doesn't magically make his performance better (cf. Andrew Luck's entire career). Newton's numbers are slightly--and only slightly--better than Tim Tebow's were. Tebow "carried" his team far more than Newton has. Was Timmy an MVP candidate? Where were you then, desperate Panthers fans? Oh wait, I know this one: You were Packers fans.
28. Peyton Manning. It's kind of sad that I have to put Peyton below Newton after writing that whole big thing shitting on Cam, when I still believe (and frequently state) Peyton to be the greatest quarterback of all time. I don't know what's wrong with him. He's been declining (no, screw that, he's been declined) physically ever since he came to Denver, but it's not like that stopped him from having one of the greatest passing seasons ever in '13. (If he were having that season right now, he'd be #1 on this list, even with all the crazy shit going on up there.) Is it mental? Maybe, although the limiting factor that ends QBs' careers is almost universally physical. Still, I can't explain the mistakes. Peyton hasn't had a season this bad since he was a rookie. Since the rule changes in '04 (when he also put up the greatest passing season ever to that point), he hadn't had a rating below 90, and he'd spent more seasons above a 100 PR than below it. (If you're keeping track at home, Brady is currently enjoying his fourth 100+ PR season. Peyton has six. Then again Brady has more 110+ PR seasons, but Peyton has more 120+... And Brady's never had a season this bad. But if he sticks around long enough he will.) My point is that there's no real reason we should have seen this coming. And I can't explain it. But I hope it goes away soon. I've spent too much of my childhood and adult life watching Peyton Manning be the greatest for it to end like this.
29. Colin Kaepernick. Honestly I feel for Kaepernick at this point. I never particularly liked the Niners, but I also didn't buy into the forced "rivalry" that erupted seemingly out of nowhere a few years ago. That's not how rivalries work. They're bitter and build up over decades. The Seahawks have only been in the NFC West for 14 years this season, and we've barely had time to establish one rivalry with the Rams. So as much as I enjoyed Sherman's Tip in the '13 NFC Championship, I never completely bought into the Niners hate. So seeing the team get stripped down for parts makes me laugh, yes, and I will say that seeing Jim Harbaugh's Michigan team completely shit the bed against Michigan State made me gleefully happy, but I also can't help but feel bad that somehow some fans still blame it all on Kaepernick. To make me feel better let's have some NFC Championship trivia: The Seahawks have played in three NFC Champs ('05, '13, '14), winning all three (!!). The Seahawks are also the only team in NFL history to play in both an NFC and an AFC championship, although they lost the latter (to the '84 Raiders). #GoHawks.
30. Sam Bradford. It's kind of sad, but Bradford's performance has been a lot worse since he left St. Louis. It was gradually improving, despite the injuries, but in Philly he just hasn't been holding it together. At this point I think it'll probably never happen. It's a shame.
31. Andrew Luck. Well, well, well. Look who's back in the bottom of the barrel. I've written so much about Luck already that there's barely anything left to say. For the record, he was never that much better than he is right now. He was marginally better, sure. He's thrown more picks this year and is putting up a career low in efficiency. But he was never the bastion of budding greatness that the media and most of the fans seemed to think (and which many continue to believe, beyond all rational explanation). Luck wasn't the best (or second-best) rookie quarterback in 2012, he wasn't the most promising up-and-comer in '13, he wasn't really breaking out last season, and he isn't a victim of his team this season. This is just who he is. He's inconsistent, inefficient, and overrated. Don't ever expect the media to acknowledge this. Most likely, they'll keep talking him up for the rest of his career. He'll make the Hall of Fame despite never really accomplishing anything, and he'll be remembered as a great quarterback for generations to come, despite never actually being one. In the less likely case that he really does bomb out of the league, the media still will never print the headline "Whoops, Looks Like We Fucked Up The Andrew Luck Thing." No, they'll call him a bust and pretend they called it all along. Don't let the media's depictions of players influence your opinion. Form your own opinion. Base it on objectivity and statistics. Value advanced metrics and efficient performance. These are the things that matter, not when you were picked in the draft, how tall you are, how white you are, or how often you throw the ball.
32. Ryan Mallett. Turns out there's a floor even below Luck's shoddy play this season. But not much of one.
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