A few days ago I posted the list of quarterback drafted in the second half of the first round over the last 20 years. Very few success stories: Aaron Rodgers and Joe Flacco are pretty much the entire list of hits, with Chad Pennington and Jason Campbell the other semi-successes out of 17 players. Thought I'd see if quarterbacks who slip the second round fare any better.
In fact, they do. There's definitely some subjectivity here, but I see 6-7 successful quarterbacks out of 22; nearly 1 in 3. The subjectivity comes if we are going to call Jimmy Garropolo a success already, and where we put Colin Kaepernick. Which is tricky; the guy did take a team to a Super Bowl, after all.
If we leave both of them out of the equation, we're still left with four good quarterbacks (out of 20), and just as many great ones as late first-rounders (one: Drew Brees, while Aaron Rodgers was the late-first representative). I'm not ready to call Derek Carr great yet, though it's certainly possible for him.
I look at it this way: if a quarterback isn't selected in the top half of the first round, it might not matter much if he's selected in the latter half of the round, or in the second. Similar chances of finding a franchise guy.
Note though that the best guys were selected early in the second round (Brees, Dalton, Carr). Once you slip down 50 picks into the draft, you're looking at Quincy Carter and Brian Brohm. Not a great sign for Christian Hackenberg (although everyone has pretty much given up on him already anyway).
Second-round quarterbacks from the last 20 years are shown below.
| SECOND-ROUND QUARTERBACKS, 1997-2016 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Pick | Player | Result |
| 1997 | 42 | Jake Plummer, Ariz. | Good |
| 1998 | 60 | Charlie Batch, Det. | Good |
| 1999 | 50 | Shaun King, T.B. | Bad |
| 2001 | 32 | Drew Brees, S.D. | Great |
| 2001 | 53 | Quincy Carter, Dall. | Bad |
| 2001 | 59 | Marques Tuiasosopo, Oak. | Bad |
| 2006 | 49 | Kellen Clemens, NYJ | Bad |
| 2006 | 64 | Tarvaris Jackson, Minn. | Bad |
| 2007 | 36 | Kevin Kolb, Phil. | Bad |
| 2007 | 40 | John Beck, Mia. | Bad |
| 2007 | 43 | Drew Stanton, Det. | Bad |
| 2008 | 56 | Brian Brohm, G.B. | Bad |
| 2008 | 57 | Chad Henne, Mia. | Bad |
| 2009 | 44 | Pat White, Mia. | Bad |
| 2010 | 48 | Jimmy Clausen, Car. | Bad |
| 2011 | 35 | Andy Dalton, Cin. | Good |
| 2011 | 36 | Colin Kaepernick, S.F. | Good |
| 2012 | 57 | Brock Osweiler, Den. | Bad |
| 2013 | 39 | Geno Smith, NYJ | Bad |
| 2014 | 36 | Derek Carr, Oak. | Good |
| 2014 | 62 | Jimmy Garoppolo, N.E. | Good |
| 2016 | 51 | Christian Hackenberg, NYJ | ? |
--Andy Richardson