Tuesday, September 1, 2015

The 2015 Quarterback Class Through the Eyes of the Filter


In anticipation of the 2015 NFL season, I've decided to look at the quarterbacks that passed and failed the filter that I use to evaluate prospects. If you are unfamiliar with the filter I use, you can read about it right here. Basically, it is a set of benchmarks that significantly increase the chances of picking a franchise quarterback in the draft. I wasn't able to do individual prospect breakdowns this year (school comes first), but I will briefly look through the class in this post.

These are the QBs that passed through the filter:

 Name
 Age
 Comp% Index
 Y/A Index
Att/TD Index 
 Att/INT Index
 WR DR
 Marcus Mariota
 21
1.704 
 2.743
 1.067
 3.261
0.350 
 Brett Hundley
 21
1.864 
 0.741
0.393 
1.697 
0.576 

That's it. To be fair, only 6 QBs were actually drafted. Both guys look to be solid bets to be startable guys, sooner or later. Marcus and Brett have played very well in the preseason, keeping up the momentum they had in college. To a certain degree, they are even similar 'types' of quarterbacks, both being safe, accurate throwers with a lower Att/TD index than Att/INT index combined with a solid Comp% index. The big difference between them is that Marcus has a massive advantage with yards per attempt. This could be a function of the talent around them, but it's more likely that Marcus is just a better passer. Justifiably, Marcus went number 2 overall, while Hundley slipped into the 5 round.

These are the QBs that failed, for one reason or another:

 Name
Age 
Comp% Index 
Y/A Index 
Att/TD Index 
Att/INT Index 
WR DR 
 Jameis Winston
 20
1.104 
0.427 
0.313 
-0.801 
0.590 
 Garrett Grayson
 23
0.904 
2.242 
0.830 
0.820 
0.919 
 Sean Mannion
 22
0.504 
-0.260 
-0.762 
0.660 
 0.374
Bryce Petty
 23
0.664 
1.742 
0.678
0.875 
0.524 
Trevor Siemian
 22
-0.316 
-1.662 
-3.169 
-0.340 
0.406 

The big name on the list is Jameis Winston. Jameis passes everything except massively missing Att/INT index. If I had to project the kind of QB that Jameis will be, I'd say something like Eli Manning. Enough to lift a team to the playoffs, but throws a bunch of picks and can lose a game all by himself. I'd expect a rocky freshman year in the NFC south.