Between the Headset

While watching an NFL preseason game last week, my dad made the following observation (paraphrasing):

"It really seems that NFL quarterbacks come from small college programs, not from the big-time schools. Just look at (Baltimore Ravens QB Joe) Flacco."

That statement was met with some agreement and skepticism in the room, as people started rattling off NFL starting QBs and where they went to school. No consensus was reached on whether my dad was correct or not.

The next week, I heard a promotion for the Colin Cowherd show on ESPN radio. The clip used in the promotion was of Cowherd discussing the reason that NFL players from big programs are often busts in the pros. His rationale: "Players from big-time programs are surrounded by tons of talent, which means they don't have to work as hard to be successful." The other side to his argument is that players from smaller programs have to work harder to stand out and become great, which makes for a better work ethic and a more successful NFL career.

Both of the above statements sound good in the hypothetical, but I don't like to take statements like that at face value. Thus, I decided to take a look at actual NFL rosters and look at the numbers of starting QBs in the NFL and where they played their college ball. Below are my findings:

I have broken the starting QB's into two categories based on where they played in college: BCS schools and non-BCS schools (non Division I schools counted in the latter list as well)

BCS schools: Matt Ryan (Boston College), Trent Edwards (Stanford), Jay Cutler (Vanderbilt), Carson Palmer (USC), Brady Quinn (Notre Dame), Kyle Orton (Purdue), Matthew Stafford (Georgia), Aaron Rodgers (Cal), Matt Schaub (Virginia), Peyton Manning (Tennessee), Matt Cassel (USC), Tom Brady (Michigan), Drew Brees (Purdue), Eli Manning (Ole Miss), Mark Sanchez (USC), JaMarcus Russell (LSU), Donovan McNabb (Syracuse), Philip Rivers (NC State), Matt Hasselbeck (Boston College), Shaun Hill (Maryland), Marc Bulger (West Virginia), Kerry Collins (Penn State), Jason Campbell (Auburn)

# of starting QBs from BCS schools: 23

% of starting QBs from BCS schools: 72%

Non BCS schools: Kurt Warner (Northern Iowa), Joe Flacco (Delaware), Jake Delhomme (LA Lafayette), Tony Romo (Eastern Illinois), David Garrard (East Carolina), Chad Pennington (Marshall), Brett Favre (Southern Mississippi), Ben Roethlisberger (Miami OH), Byron Leftwich (Marshall)

# of starting QBs from non-BCS schools: 9

% of starting QBs from non-BCS schools: 28%

So at first blush, both my dad and Colin Cowherd aren't looking so good in their evaluations of the NFL QB pool. But let's dig a little deeper into these lists and see if we can draw any other conclusions about whether NFL QB's are more successful coming from big-time or smaller college programs.

First, let's break the above list down even further. If I separate the BCS school list into big-time BCS programs and smaller BCS programs (at the time the player was in school), we get the following:

QBs from big-time BCS schools: Palmer, Quinn, Stafford, P. Manning, Cassel, Brady, Sanchez, Russell, McNabb, Collins, Campbell

QBs from smaller BCS schools: Ryan, Edwards, Cutler, Orton, Rodgers, Schaub, Brees, E. Manning, Rivers, Hasselbeck, Hill, Bulger

The above breakdown is obviously subjective, but without doing too much research into the records of the teams when these players were in school, that is my first-glance breakdown of the big programs and the smaller ones.



So now that we have three lists, roughly the same size, we can compare the success that the QBs from each category have had at the pro level. For the sake of comparison, let's look at the number of MVPs and Super Bowl appearances each group has under its belt, as well as a career TD/INT ratio:

MVPs:

Big-time BCS: 3 (P. Manning 2, Brady 1)

Small BCS: 0

non-BCS: 5 (Favre 3, Warner 2)

Super Bowl Appearances:

Big-time BCS: 7 (Brady 4, P. Manning 1, Collins 1, McNabb 1)

Small BCS: 2 (Hasselbeck 1, E. Manning 1)

non-BCS: 8 (Warner 3, Favre 2, Roethlisberger 2, Delhomme 1)

Career TD/INT ratio:

Big-time BCS: 1092 TD/637 INT=1.7/1

Small BCS: 803 TD/531 INT= 1.5/1

non-BCS: 1163 TD/756 INT= 1.54/1

So what do we make of these numbers? The non-BCS schools and the Big-time BCS schools come out way ahead of the smaller but still major conference programs. The small BCS schools have no MVPs, 2 Super Bowl appearances (with only one win) and the worst QB/INT ratio. They also have the least number of TD passes, meaning they have fewer QBs with the longevity of the other two categories.

But should teams start drafting QBs from no-name schools in the first round because of the success of the current batch of small-school guys? Yes and no. Some of the most established NFL QB's (Warner and Favre) and some of the best young QB's (Flacco and Roethlisberger) are from non-BCS schools. So it might make sense for teams to dig a little deeper in their college scouting process to find more of these gems. But, obviously, teams shouldn't start drafting guys from D-III schools just for the fun of it.

And not all big-time BCS schools produce Pro Bowl QBs. Vince Young, Rick Mirer, Eric Crouch and Jason White are QBs who had great careers at big-time schools who didn't pan out in the NFL. But the numbers above are undeniable. Many QBs from big-time programs end up having great NFL careers, which could bode well for the likes of Mark Sanchez, Matthew Stafford and Brady Quinn.

As for the mid-level BCS schools and their general lack of success in the pro's? I think it's hard to figure out a reason solely from the numbers. A couple of them are good/great QB's who could become top-tier signal callers in the next few years (E. Manning, Rivers, Ryan) and some, like Brees, are already there.

But some of the biggest QB busts of all-time have come from these schools. Ryan Leaf (Washington St.), Akili Smith (Oregon) and Tim Couch (Kentucky) are all from these lesser BCS programs.

And what do we make of Colin Cowherd's statement that the amount of surrounding talent in college causes players not to work as hard? I actually don't buy this. Because there is so much talent and depth in the top-level programs, players have to work hard or they won't be starting for very long, since there is a guy right behind them ready to take their job. I think this forces these players work even harder. Meanwhile, players from the non-BCS programs have to work harder to make a name for themselves, and to make up for a lack of surrounding talent.

So perhaps we do have our answer. Many of the mid-level BCS programs don't quite have the competition like the big programs do to force players to keep working at the highest level to get better. But their status as major-conference teams guarantees a certain amount of exposure not promised to the non-BCS schools. Thus, they are not pushed to work harder to catch the eyes of NFL scouts.

At the end of the day, however, you can have all the statistics and trends in the world and still not be able to predict a player's success in the NFL, particulary at the QB position. There's a certain amount of luck in the NFL draft. But I think a great predictor of success in the pros can be gleaned from work ethic at the college level, and the school that a player attends can greatly affect that work ethic.

And I won't be surprised if the next five Super Bowls come from the list of lesser BCS programs, making this entire article moot.