With the draft one month away from day, there’s ongoing chatter about which quarterbacks should be selected first. And should teams like Houston, Jacksonville, Oakland and Minnesota take quarterbacks at all (in the first round)?
Are these quarterbacks – Bortles, Manziel, Bridgewater – worthy of being selected really high in the draft?
I find that troubling. With quarterbacks, it’s hit or miss as it is. If people have reservations about a prospect, then the success rate really goes down. Set aside the can’t-miss superstars like Andrew Luck and Cam Newton, and there’s a lot more misses than hits with quarterbacks, even in the first round.
In this century, there have been 21 quarterbacks selected in the first round who weren’t selected in the top 5. These are guys who are good (or perceived to be good) but not in such an obvious way that teams were beating down the door to get to them.
Of the 21, three were knock-it-out-the-park success stories. Ben Roethlisberger, Aaron Rodgers and Joe Flacco. All have won Super Bowls. Roethlisberger and Rodgers might wind up in the Hall of Fame. Flacco dipped some last year and isn’t in the same class as those guys, but he’s definitely been a success – he definitely would guy higher than 18th is they did a re-do of the 2008 draft.
One other guy can be called a success, I think. Jay Cutler. Stats-wise, he’s been a little better than Flacco. Hasn’t had the postseason success, and he’s rubbed some people the wrong way, but for the most part he’s had a good career. If they did the 2006 draft again, he’d go higher than 11th.
Chad Pennington went 44-37 as a starter during his career, but I’m going to call him a failure. Great head for the game – smart and accurate – but simply didn’t have an NFL-caliber arm, which limited his ability to succeed. He was the 18th pick of the 2000 draft, and I think he’d go lower rather than higher if they did that draft again.
So by my count, there’s about an 80 percent failure rate when taking a semi-flawed quarterback in the first round. So when you talk about Manziel-Bortles-Bridgewater, the odds indicate that at most one of these quarterbacks will have a good career.
| FIRST-ROUNDERS OUTSIDE THE TOP 5 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Pick | Player | W | L | T | Pct |
| 2004 | 11 | Ben Roethlisberger | 95 | 47 | 0 | .669 |
| 2005 | 24 | Aaron Rodgers | 58 | 29 | 0 | .667 |
| 2008 | 18 | Joe Flacco | 62 | 34 | 0 | .646 |
| 2010 | 25 | Tim Tebow | 8 | 6 | 0 | .571 |
| 2000 | 18 | Chad Pennington | 44 | 37 | 0 | .543 |
| 2006 | 11 | Jay Cutler | 56 | 48 | 0 | .538 |
| 2003 | 22 | Rex Grossman | 25 | 22 | 0 | .532 |
| 2003 | 7 | Byron Leftwich | 24 | 26 | 0 | .480 |
| 2012 | 8 | Ryan Tannehill | 15 | 17 | 0 | .469 |
| 2011 | 8 | Jake Locker | 8 | 10 | 0 | .444 |
| 2006 | 10 | Matt Leinart | 8 | 10 | 0 | .444 |
| 2003 | 19 | Kyle Boller | 20 | 26 | 0 | .435 |
| 2002 | 32 | Patrick Ramsey | 10 | 14 | 0 | .417 |
| 2011 | 12 | Christian Ponder | 14 | 20 | 1 | .414 |
| 2005 | 25 | Jason Campbell | 32 | 47 | 0 | .405 |
| 2013 | 16 | EJ Manuel | 4 | 6 | 0 | .400 |
| 2009 | 17 | Josh Freeman | 24 | 36 | 0 | .400 |
| 2004 | 22 | J.P. Losman | 10 | 23 | 0 | .303 |
| 2012 | 22 | Brandon Weeden | 5 | 15 | 0 | .250 |
| 2007 | 22 | Brady Quinn | 4 | 16 | 0 | .200 |
| 2011 | 10 | Blaine Gabbert | 5 | 22 | 0 | .185 |
—Ian Allan