The Four Most Underrated NFL Quarterbacks Going Into 2024

Seattle Seahawks v Dallas Cowboys

An analysis of the NFL’s most underrated quarterbacks could take on as many forms as there are quarterbacks.

You might approach such an exercise from a film standpoint, accounting for subtleties in offensive or defensive formation. You could emphasize pre-snap adjustments and a QB’s ability to manipulate defenders, as Tom Brady recently suggested to the football watching public’s amazement. You could base your analysis on dawg levels, or whether the QB plays for your home team, or whether his team has won a bunch of games in recent seasons.

It might not stun you to know I’m approaching this analysis from a purely analytical place, weighing heavily metrics that capture a quarterback’s accuracy and efficiency. You may hate this approach. That’s fine. There are, I think, statistical nuggets here that could suggest a surprisingly good 2024 campaign for some or all of the four signal callers below.

Geno Smith (SEA)

The thing about the underwhelming 2023 Seahawks offense is that they were downright elite on first and second down. Only the 49ers were markedly better on early downs than Geno’s Seahawks offense last season.

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It was on late downs, when defenses could pin back their proverbial ears and attack on predictable drop backs, that the Seahawks fell apart. Perhaps that had something to do with an offensive line graded by PFF as the league’s fourth worst pass-blocking unit. Geno, after all, faced the fourth highest pressure rate (25.5 percent) among 33 qualifying QBs.

I’m (unfortunately) on record as saying Geno would be a quick-lived disaster as Seattle’s starter following the team’s split with Russell Wilson. I had not considered that no QB can succeed in the Jets’ clown-show organization — a reminder for Sam Darnold’s prospects as a starter outside New York.

Geno has done much to change my hot take-riddled mind over the past two years. To boot: Seattle has the eighth…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/four-most-underrated-nfl-quarterbacks-124753847.html

Author : NBC Sports

Publish date : 2024-07-03 12:47:53

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