Any takers for Ryan Tannehill? He hasn’t lit the world on fire in his first two years, but he’s been OK.
If you were to poll current teams, it would be interesting to see how many prefer him over the new quarterback coming out of Texas A&M.
Tannehill passed for more yards and touchdowns last year than Andrew Luck. Completed a higher percentage of his passes as well. But everyone agrees that Luck is going to be one of the all-time greats, while Tannehill generates mostly shrugs. Is this the quarterback who can lead Miami to a Super Bowl or not?
In this century, 24 quarterbacks have thrown at least 100 passes in both their first and second year. Of that group, only three have thrown more touchdowns. Only eight have a higher composite passer rating.
Of those eight, it includes Josh Freeman, who looks like a big pile of poo right now. The lesser quarterbacks (based on early career production) have mostly flopped, though Alex Smith has rekindled his career recently, starting playoff games for both San Francisco and Kansas City.
| QUARTERBACKS, FIRST TWO YEARS | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Years | Player | Pct | TD | Int | Rating |
| 04-05 | Ben Roethlisberger | 64.7% | 34 | 20 | 98.3 |
| 12-13 | Robert Griffin III | 62.7% | 36 | 17 | 91.5 |
| 06-07 | Jay Cutler | 62.6% | 29 | 19 | 88.2 |
| 11-12 | Cam Newton | 58.9% | 40 | 29 | 85.3 |
| 08-09 | Joe Flacco | 61.7% | 35 | 24 | 84.9 |
| 08-09 | Matt Ryan | 59.7% | 38 | 25 | 84.3 |
| 09-10 | Josh Freeman | 58.8% | 35 | 24 | 82.2 |
| 12-13 | Andrew Luck | 57.0% | 46 | 27 | 81.5 |
| 12-13 | Ryan Tannehill | 59.4% | 36 | 30 | 79.1 |
| 03-04 | Byron Leftwich | 58.9% | 29 | 26 | 77.8 |
| 01-02 | Michael Vick | 52.6% | 18 | 11 | 77.6 |
| 11-12 | Christian Ponder | 59.2% | 31 | 25 | 77.1 |
| 02-03 | Patrick Ramsey | 52.5% | 23 | 17 | 74.2 |
| 10-11 | Sam Bradford | 57.6% | 24 | 21 | 74.2 |
| 12-13 | Brandon Weeden | 55.9% | 23 | 26 | 71.8 |
| 06-07 | Matt Leinart | 56.0% | 13 | 16 | 71.2 |
| 04-05 | Eli Manning | 51.6% | 30 | 26 | 70.5 |
| 11-12 | Blaine Gabbert | 53.8% | 21 | 17 | 70.2 |
| 09-10 | Mark Sanchez | 54.4% | 29 | 33 | 70.2 |
| 06-07 | Vince Young | 57.1% | 21 | 30 | 69.0 |
| 03-04 | Kyle Boller | 54.4% | 20 | 20 | 68.1 |
| 05-06 | Alex Smith | 56.2% | 17 | 27 | 65.5 |
| 02-03 | David Carr | 54.1% | 18 | 28 | 65.5 |
| 02-03 | Joey Harrington | 53.3% | 29 | 38 | 62.2 |
—Ian Allan