The pressure starts to build immediately. The moment a first-round quarterback is chosen, the expectations placed on his shoulders — from those inside and outside the building — are immense.
We know it’s unfair, yet every year we go through the same exercise, wondering if these quarterbacks can lead their teams to salvation. This year’s crop of QBs is no different, except they are all now following in the footsteps of CJ Stroud, who is coming off what many consider to be the best rookie quarterback season in NFL history .
Stroud ranked sixth in EPA/Dropback and first in TD/INT ratio among qualified quarterbacks according to TruMedia while leading the Houston Texans to an AFC South title and a wild-card round victory. For comparison, Patrick Mahomes started one game during his rookie season and Lamar Jackson started seven. Josh Allen started 11 games during his rookie campaign, but only managed a record 5-6. That makes three of the best QBs in the league, and Stroud has far surpassed them all.
GO FURTHER
Post-NFL Draft outlook for each team: Which teams improved the most? Who still has work to do?
With six quarterbacks in the top 12 in the 2024 NFL Draft, I wanted to dive into what you can expect from a quarterback in his rookie season because, as we all should know, Stroud is the exception, not Rule.
For this exercise, I looked at all QBs drafted in the first three rounds of the NFL draft – or who started at least five games in their first season – since 2017. That gives us a sample size of 42 quarterbacks, or six quarterbacks per season. Is 2017 an arbitrary deadline? Of course. However, I believe the sample size is large enough to provide fair representation.
Conclusions
Winning…it’s hard
The average QB selected from this list averaged eight starts in their rookie campaigns and won three games. That comes out to 6.4 wins prorated over a full regular season. Only 25 percent of quarterbacks who started more than halfway through the season had a winning percentage above 50 percent. Granted, there is some bias, as teams that select QBs typically pick high in the draft and don’t have great rosters.
Average efficiency or worse
Just looking at efficiency, the average EPA/Dropback within this group is -0.05 – or the equivalent of what Russell Wilson and Justin Fields produced in 2023 (good luck, Steelers!). If we look at just first-round quarterbacks, starts jump to 10.5 and win average to 4.0. Over a full season, first-round rookie QBs won at a rate of 6.5 games. Efficiency also improves to around 0 EPA/Dropback. That’s exactly league average, comparable to what Gardner Minshew gave the Indianapolis Colts last season.
One and not done
All is not lost for QBs who struggle to get out of goal. Sure, Bryce Young’s -0.21 EPA/Dropback is one of the worst in this group, but there’s a good case to be made that he was thrust into a terrible environment in Carolina. Trevor Lawrence and Jared Goff endured poor rookie seasons while suffering from similar issues, and both turned out well. When evaluating rookie QBs, landing spots are critical. The second and third seasons are where you want to see a quarterback start to elevate the talent around him.
GO FURTHER
Which quarterbacks landed in the best place to succeed? Landing Spot Rankings of a Historic Draft Class
Of course, there is a flip side to the argument. We’ve seen QBs deliver promising rookie seasons only to fizzle out. The most recent example is that of Mac Jones. No, I don’t think Stroud’s rookie season compares to Jones’, but I think it’s best to end up somewhere in between when it comes to rookie quarterback performance for a prospect to long term.
What to expect from the Class of 2024
Team success
A few weeks ago, I used my NFL Projection Model to rank NFL rosters, and using that same process, I can look at what each team that drafted a quarterback has in terms of talent, position and quality of the offensive line.
Caleb Williams of the Chicago Bears and JJ McCarthy of the Minnesota Vikings will each be surrounded by top-10 supporting casts, while Jayden Daniels of the Washington Commanders, Drake Maye of the New England Patriots and Bo Nix of the Denver Broncos will be surrounded by subpar supporting players. talent and will still have work to do.
You may have noticed that I didn’t mention Michael Penix Jr.
The Atlanta Falcons have a top-five supporting cast, but if things go as planned, Penix won’t see the field this year. So even if he landed in a sweet spot, he’s more likely to follow Jordan Love’s path by sitting out a few seasons (or more?), before seeing game action. Whether this was a wise decision from an organizational standpoint is a conversation for another day.
Note: Odds are updated live and are subject to change.
As you can see from BetMGM’s current odds, the Bears lead the way with 8.5 projected wins. They are followed by the Vikings (6.5), Commanders (6.5), Broncos (5.5) and Patriots (4.5).
So, the secondary players in my ranking tend to follow the situation of the betting market on these teams. However, the betting market doesn’t see any of these teams winning nine games, and my model agrees.
While not yet finalized, a far-too-early look at my model reveals that the two with the best odds — the Bears and Vikings — are the third and fourth best teams in the NFC North. It bears repeating, it’s an uphill battle to succeed with a rookie quarterback.
GO FURTHER
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Individual success
Among the 2024 rookies, I would expect Williams – the most talented of the group – to have the greatest chance of succeeding as he joins what could be the best roster a first overall pick has landed on in quite some time .
After that, it’s anyone’s guess. McCarthy is going to an offensive-minded coach, and a good supporting cast will make his life easier. Yet he was the fifth quarterback drafted for a reason. If Penix were to start, I might pick him (again based solely on the supporting cast), but we might not even see him after preseason this year. After that, it will probably be Maye, Daniels and Nix.
However, as we’ve seen with some of the great quarterbacks in this league, the rookie quarterback’s performance isn’t always the best predictor of future success. Mahomes, Allen and Jackson haven’t found the field or early success, so whatever happens in 2024, it’s probably best to temper expectations (there probably won’t be a CJ Stroud this year!) and to see how they will all behave in 2024. 2025 before drawing definitive conclusions.
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(Photos by Bo Nix, Caleb Williams and Michael Penix Jr.:
David Zalubowski/Associated Press; Michael Reaves/Getty Images and John Bazemore/Associated Press)