QB Draft Analysis Based On the Numbers

When it comes to QB draft analysis, there is no better tool for evaluating a QB prospect than good old fashioned game film. Not watching a couple of games here and there, but actual all-22 analysis that goes over each play, good and bad, identifying QB tendencies that may or may not translate to success in the NFL. However, not everyone has the access or the time to do a proper film analysis, and must rely on stats or other's film analysis to rank their favorite QBs.



So, in an effort to help out those fans who just don't have the time or patience to watch hours of films to figure out which QB the Vikings should draft, I have gone through the analytics looking at what college QBs have done in the past and how those numbers have translated to success in the NFL. Below is a chart of final or best year's numbers of the highest drafted QBs from 2017 to 2020, with the busts highlighted in red, and the hits highlighted in green. Mayfield and Jones are highlighted in orange to indicate they are busts, but ended up being at least serviceable.







After sorting this chart on the different values gathered, some of these stats do not appear to mean a whole lot. Big time throw percentage for instance, a stat that translates very well in the NFL to elite QB play, seemed to have no correlation between success at the college level and success in the pros. Both good and bad NFL QBs ranked low and both good and bad ranked high as well. The same goes for passer rating under pressure and pressure percentage faced. This actually surprised me a bit, as I thought a QB who faced little pressure in college would struggle when facing it in the pros, and that success throwing it under pressure (passer rating) would also translate well to the pros. Surprising, but likely due to how wide of a gap there is in talent in college football. It appears talent around the QB is more important to beating pressure than the QB himself. Also, I did not use Allen's or Love's final years, but instead I used their best years since their final years were so poor due to the talent around them regressing significantly. I could have done the same for Caleb Williams, who's 2022 season was significantly better in most categories, but decided not to since his 2023 season was still pretty good.

Moving on, now that we have a baseline of some basic analytics that seem to correlate to success, we can add the current crop of QBs to this group and see how they stack up in the individual stats.

First up is PFF grade. The above chart is sorted by grade descending and you will notice that the better the grade, generally the better NFL QB. This bodes really, really well for the current QB class (highlighted in white):





With all of these top 10 grades for QBs drafted in the 1st and 2nd round, overall PFF grades do a surprisingly good job at identifying talented QBs in college and this was one of the most predictive stats for success that I found. Even with QBs like Allen and Love their lower grades make sense with how much development the two needed to do when they entered the league. As for this current class, according to overall grade, there are no busts in this QB draft class among the top six QBs, and this is a great year to be looking for a QB. Daniels and Bo Nix are the stars of this stat, and they are sitting pretty with only Joe Burrow having them beat here. Zero red flags for the other QBs of the class though, who all graded higher than every bust but Baker Mayfield (the best of the busts).

Next up is adjusted completion percentage, which counts drops as receptions and removes throwaways from their attempts:






With this stat again Bo Nix stands out, but we will see that some context is needed here when we get to the next stat. Again, no real red flags on any of the QBs entering the draft, although Penix is very close to the danger zone.

Now for that context I mentioned for Bo Nix as we look at Average Depth of Target:







This is our first red flag for any QB and it is a big one that probably has Bo Nix off my board. This makes all these positive stats around Nix somewhat meaningless since all he did was throw nice, easy, short passes to get those stats. The rest of the QBs look pretty good here, with Penix topping the list and making his low adjusted completion percentage not look so bad.

Turnover Worthy Play Percentage:






No surprise here that having fewer turnover worthy plays leads to more success in the NFL. No real red flags with this one and knowing Nix rarely threw downfield it isn't surprising he tops this list. Daniels being number two is a bit surprising though and this one is a huge positive for him. Again, this class continues to impress with their numbers.

Percentage of Passes Thrown Over 20 yards:






Good QBs threw downfield a lot in college, and most QBs in the 2024 draft class threw downfield a lot. Nix of course did very little of it, and JJ McCarthy has his first red flag show up here, barely beating out Dwayne Haskins.



Deep Passing Adjusted Completion Percentage:




Nix was the worst deep passer of this class, but wasn't so bad it should be a red flag. Penix Jr is pretty low on this list but he also threw it downfield a ton. Jayden Daniels was fantastic, better than Burrow and Mayfield who were two all time great deep ball passers in college.

Time to Throw



This is an interesting stat in that it appears to be worse to be in the middle than to get rid of it very fast or take a longer time to throw. This is actually mostly true in the NFL too, and I think it is because you want a QB who can either make very quick reads and get rid of the ball quickly, or a guy who buys times with his legs or sliding in the pocket. Not really sure if you can give any red or green flags for this one, but interesting to look at.



Now for a stat that makes PFF look really stupid: PFF Grade Under Pressure



Yep, outside of Murray (the worst of the QB "hits"), QBs who did worse under pressure (according to PFF), did much better in the NFL than ones who did great on average. PFF might want to re-evaluate their formula on this one as it is clearly not working. Bo Nix gets another red flag and the Bears should view this as a positive when they draft Williams.

Share of Pressures Attributed to the QB



Again PFF drops the ball with this one, implying a negative for a stat where it is actually a positive. QB share of pressures inadvertently is a stat that shows how often a QB scrambles to buy time, and the ability to buy time for a QB is as important as having a great arm. No red flags for the QBs in this draft class. Nix is almost saved here, and this number combined with his very low pressure to sack % indicate he not only scrambles a lot, but he does it very well.

TLDR Version

This QB class is fantastic, with 5 of the 6 QBs having no major red flags statistically. Daniels, Maye and Williams have zero red flags, while Penix Jr and McCarthy look great too. Only drafting Nix would upset me based on the numbers and even he has a lot of positive stats compared to other successful NFL QBs. If the Vikings weren't looking to trade up for Daniels who would be my number one based on the analytics, the numbers would have me drafting Penix Jr, and after reading what Uncle recently posted on what KOC wants in a QB, I think KOC would be happy with him too.

What do you all think? Stats are certainly not perfect and I understand team and scheme definitely play a factor in these analytics, but I do think we can learn some things from them. I am also open to adding more if anyone has ideas on what other analytics to look at.