Stel's admittedly amateur analysis of sub 60% college QBs in the NFL

[Stel]

No secret I'm not a fan of drafting a QB who has a college career completion percentage of less than 60%. While I agree that no one metric should be any players total evaluation, I think this one is very important. At the very least, it should make one closely examine ever other facet of such a QB.

My admittedly amateur analysis focuses on the past 6 drafts, mainly because that's as far as I've gone back so far but also because the NFL game is constantly evolving. What worked 10 years ago may not be what works next year. Also, I readily admit that there are specific QBs who will refute my premise but I assert that those are statistical outliers (sort of like finding your future Super Bowl MVP QB stocking shelves at the local grocery store - it can happen but you shouldn't plan on it. It is a lot like playing the lottery).

Since 2010, there have been 69 QBs drafted: 16 in Round 1, 7 in Round 2, 7 in Round 3, and 39 in Rounds 4-7. During that same time, only 17 QBs have been drafted who had a career college completion percentage of less than 60%: 1 in Round 1, 1 in Round 2, 1 in Round 3, and 14 in Rounds 4-7. While any QB taken in any round is a bit of a crap shoot, I'm only focussing on the sub 60% crowd. These are the 17:

Year QB (Round) Career % (last season %) TD/int NFL career: G GS Comp%


2010 John Skelton (5) 58.8 (64.4) 69/36 20 17 53.2
2010 Jonathon Crompton (5) 55.3 (58.3) 36/22 0 0 0.0
2010 Rusty Smith (6) 56.4 (57.3) 76/36 3 1 51.1
2010 Joe Webb (6) 59.1 (59.8) 37/25 51 4 57.9 *not now a QB in the NFL
2011 Jake Locker (1) 54.0 (55.4) 53/35 30 23 57.5
2011 Colin Kaepernick (2) 58.2 (64.9) 82/24 57 47 59.9
2011 Ryan Mallett (3) 57.8 (64.7) 69/24 13 6 53.1
2011 Ricky Stanzi (5) 59.8 (64.1) 56/31 0 0 0.0
2011 Nathan Enderle (5) 54.6 (56.7) 74/60 0 0 0.0
2011 Tyrod Taylor (6) 57.2 (59.7) 44/20 22 8 66.0
2012 Ryan Lindley (6) 55.5 (53.0) 90/47 9 6 50.8
2012 BJ Coleman (7) 57.4 (60.9) 52/32 0 0 0.0
2013 BJ Daniels (7) 57.3 (56.9) 52/39 0 0 0.0
2014 Logan Thomas (4) 55.5 (56.5) 52/39 2 0 11.1
2014 Tom Savage (4) 56.8 (61.2) 37/19 2 0 52.6
2014 Garrett Gilbert (6) 58.7 (66.5) 49/45 0 0 0.0
2015 Trevor Siemian (7) 58.9 (58.2) 27/24 0 0 0.0

That's it. Six years, 17 QBs, only 3 with more than 10 starts (and both Skelton and Locker are done). Kaepernick has been the best of the lot. Tyrod Taylor, after 4+ years of development is finally contributing and is the only one who has completed 60% of his passes. Locker was the only sub 60% first round selection and Kaepernick the only second round selection.

This is why I'm extremely suspect of both Cook [57.6 (56.1)] and Hackenberg [56.1 (52.9)] as future NFL QBs. I would take neither in the first round and I'd take a lot of convincing to take either on Day 2.

Just my two cents. Sorry for the long post and sorry I can't do tables very well.

 

[RAGRam]

I went for a slightly more educated approach, I looked at every QB drafted in the 1st round since 2001, looked at their college completion percentage in their senior year (unless they attempted under 250 passes, in which case I used both Junior and Senior years) I then tested to see if their was any trend.

As the plot above shows there appears to be a positive trend, as completion percentage increases pro passer rating increases, the equation predicts that using only college completion percentage Cook should have a career passer rating of 75.73, Goff a career passer rating of 80.59 and 82.91, in essence the difference between the 3 QBs based solely on completion percentage in their final college season is the difference between Nick Foles this season and Sam Bradford this season.

Also worth noting is the R-squared value of 0.1, suggesting that college completion percentage alone is not strongly correlated with pro passer rating.

 

[Stel]

As I said, not single metric is conclusive. However, in the last 6 drafts, no QB with a college completion rate under 60% has made a meaningful contribution in his first year. That's 0 for 17.

Assuming your analysis is correct, I'm not spending a first round pick to get a 75.73 career QB rating.

 

[RAGRam]

As I said, not single metric is conclusive. However, in the last 6 drafts, no QB with a college completion rate under 60% has made a meaningful contribution in his first year. That's 0 for 17.

Assuming your analysis is correct, I'm not spending a first round pick to get a 75.73 career QB rating.

Are you spending one on a career 82.91? Because I'm not.

 

[Stel]

Are you spending one on a career 82.91? Because I'm not.

More likely to take the chance. That is at least getting me into Hasselbeck, Smith, and Eli Manning area. Beats where we've been and is good enough to at least sniff post season.

 

[Athos]

Yes. But most of those QBs were in later rounds.

I think you also have to take into account the type of routes these QBs are running.

Are they in systems that promote a lot of down fied passing this the completion rates, or are they sucking at the NFL bread and butter. Short and intermediate routes.

 

[OldSchool]

Yes. But most of those QBs were in later rounds.

I think you also have to take into account the type of routes these QBs are running.

Are they in systems that promote a lot of down fied passing this the completion rates, or are they sucking at the NFL bread and butter. Short and intermediate routes.

Exactly this, only one first round and one second round ab are on that list. How many QBs taken in the first two rounds meet this comp % criteria have failed or succeeded. How do the top four prospects this year rate for career comp%?

 

[Stel]

Yes. But most of those QBs were in later rounds.

True. Because sub 60% passers are not taken early because they tend to not be successful NFL QBs. I repeat, not one sub 60% passer taken in the last 6 drafts has made a significant contribution to his team in his first year. Not one. As a rule, sub 60% passers are long shots to succeed in the NFL.

 

[jrry32]

During that same time, only 17 QBs have been drafted who had a career college completion percentage of less than 60%: 1 in Round 1, 1 in Round 2, 1 in Round 3, and 14 in Rounds 4-7.

So...essentially, we have a sample size of 3. There have been a total of 3 QBs drafted on either Day 1 or 2. Day 3 QB picks are throwaways. Hell, Day 2 QB picks are long shots themselves.

You're talking about a minute sample size.

In fact, let's look at the QBs drafted in the first round since 2000:
http://pfref.com/tiny/ekg84

Of these 42 QBs, these QBs career completion percentages were below 60% in college:
1. Michael Vick
2. Joey Harrington
3. Patrick Ramsey
4. Carson Palmer
5. Kyle Boller (below 50%)
6. J.P. Losman
7. Jay Cutler
8. Brady Quinn
9. Matt Ryan
10. Matthew Stafford
11. Josh Freeman
12. Jake Locker

Counting Vick, Palmer, Cutler, Ryan, and Stafford as the non-busts...that gives us a 5/12 success rate (41.7%). Removing these 12 QBs, that leaves you win 30 QBs. After omitting the 5 QBs drafted in the past two years (since it's too early to make a call on them), that leaves us with 25 QBs. Out of those 25 QBs, these are the guys that I'd label as busts:
1. David Carr
2. Byron Leftwich
3. Rex Grossman
4. Jason Campbell
5. Vince Young
6. Matt Leinart
7. JaMarcus Russell
8. Mark Sanchez
9. Tim Tebow
10. Christian Ponder
11. Blaine Gabbert
12. Brandon Weeden
13. E.J. Manuel

I didn't count Sam Bradford as a bust. That leaves us with 12 out of 25 QBs as non-busts. That's a success rate of 48%.

Basically, there's very little difference in your success rate. Refusing to draft Cook in the first round because of this one stat seems very suspect to me. It reminds me of the people claiming they wouldn't draft Jameis Winston because he threw 28 INTs over his final 2 college seasons including 18 INTs as a senior.

Evaluate the player, not the stats. If you don't like Cook because of the things you see in his game, so be it. You're entitled to your evaluation of the kid.

But focusing on one stat which is both strongly affected by the system a QB played in and his supporting cast seems misguided to me.

And interestingly enough, of the three guys that Connor Cook most reminds me of, two of them were on the list of guys that completed less than 60% of their passes in college (Stafford and Cutler). The third guy, Eli Manning, just barely beat the mark at 60.8% for his college career.

Frankly, do you think if you put Cook in one of those systems where 20% of his attempts are high % screens and another 40% to 50% of his attempts are within 5 yards of the LOS that he couldn't complete 60% of his passes?

 

[jrry32]

And FWIW, I want nothing to do with Hackenberg. But it has nothing to do with his completion %. I think he processes things too slowly, falls apart under pressure, and has a bad internal clock. Essentially, I think he's Blaine Gabbert. All of the physical talent and brains but none of the natural ability on the field.

Also, I readily admit that there are specific QBs who will refute my premise but I assert that those are statistical outliers (sort of like finding your future Super Bowl MVP QB stocking shelves at the local grocery store - it can happen but you shouldn't plan on it. It is a lot like playing the lottery).

Kind of hard for me to believe they're "outliers" when there are four successful former first round QBs currently starting in the NFL that completed less than 60% of their passes in college.

A guy like Kurt Warner is an outlier. He's one in a million. But 4 out of 32? That's not really an outlier.

 

[dieterbrock]

Kind of hard for me to believe they're "outliers" when there are four successful former first round QBs currently starting in the NFL that completed less than 60% of their passes in college.

A guy like Kurt Warner is an outlier. He's one in a million. But 4 out of 32? That's not really an outlier.

Totally agree. And the streets are filled with former D1 qb who had comp % over 60% that didnt make the nfl.
How many QB did Mike Leach put in the nfl? Any of them ever have less than 60%?
Under 60% comp as a metric doesnt mean much to me if over 60% means absolutely nothing
That said, please no Connor Cook. Do we really want Kyle Orton 2.0?

 

[JoeBo21]

why do we always suck when there's no elite QB prospects???

haven't we suffered enough??

 

[jrry32]

why do we always suck when there's no elite QB prospects???

haven't we suffered enough??

I'm not sure why you're complaining. We're sucking in a year where we'll likely have 3 QBs....possibly 4...go in the first round. That's good luck. Unless we draft the wrong QB.

Even if we sucked in a year where there was an elite QB prospect like Andrew Luck. We're not getting the #1 pick either ways. So it would have done us no good. Having depth this year in the first round is better for us than a Luck caliber prospect.