How good will JaMarcus Russell be at the Pro Level?

[GTripp0012]

Originally Posted by skinsfan69

Of couse he would benefit from playing his senior year. But Russell has nothing left to prove. His stock can only go down. If you were him would you stay? Hell no. He is mostly likely going to be the number one pick in the draft. That means a 50 million $ signing bonus. Why would you go back and risk getting hurt? Remember what happened to Leinart? If he had left his 3rd year he would be a 49er right now, and he would have went first in the 05 draft. Would that last year made difference? Sure. But he got outplayed by Vince Young on the big stage and cost himself millions of dollars. So keep that in mind. It's not just about getting more game time with most guys. Leinart being the exception.

Yes Russell made some bonehead plays. But so did Brady Quinn. So did Peyton Manning in the SB. All QB's make bad decisions in every game that they play in. But Russell made less mistakes every year he started. He grew and matured like every good QB does. You act like QB's are suppose to be like robots and not make mistakes. It happens to the best QB's in football every game.

I remember watching Brady Quinn throw into double coverage against LSU so many times it wasn't even funny. He played terrible. Does than mean he is a bad decision maker? No. He just had a bad game. Remember Tripp, QBs are not robots and stats don't always tell the whole story.

At think point, I think we are just going to have to agree to disagree.

I clearly don't believe that all first round projected QBs are created equal. I think we both agree on a lot of crucial points but are allowing some minor points we don't agree on to blow this argument out of proportion. We are both Skins fans, and Quinn having a better career than Russell won't affect us in any way since neither will land in our division.

[jsarno]

Originally Posted by GTripp0012

Which brings the original question back into focus: What is the significance of College playing experience?

Now seeing that a QB will enter the NFL on a very similar career path to the way he leaves it (barring of course a career ending injury), doesn't this change the value of NCAA QB experience? It now appears that starting more games would ALWAYS be beneficial to the QB. That would mean that leaving school early, while potentially a smart business decision, would ALWAYS hurt the quality of a guy's career.

Is this even plausible? Let's go to the numbers:

For first round QB's (of the last 10 years) only, it seems like we could--in fact--predict their successes at the next level based ONLY on the number of games they started in college. So if the scouts unianimously like a guy (because hes a first rounder), and he has a lot of college experience, recent history shows that this guy is a virtual lock for success. (This is really good news for J. Campbell, although there were exceptions--with very awful college stats).

Chad Pennington: 51 starts
Philip Rivers: 51 starts
Peyton Manning: 45 starts
Carson Palmer: 45 starts
Jay Cutler: 45 starts
Donovan McNabb: 45 starts
Daunte Culpepper: 44 starts
Matt Leinart: 39 starts
Jason Campbell: 39 starts
Drew Brees: 37 starts (he was the first pick in the 2nd round)
Eli Manning: 37 starts

Look at that company. More importantly, compare that company to guys who didn't start a lot of games in college.

Patrick Ramsey: 32 starts
Rex Grossman: 31 starts
Joey Harrington: 28 starts
JP Losman: 27 starts
David Carr: 26 starts
Tim Couch: 25 starts
Ryan Leaf: 24 starts
Aaron Rodgers: 22 starts
Alex Smith: 22 starts
Michael Vick: 19 starts
Akili Smith: 19 starts

So where does Russell fit in? Over his career at LSU, JaMarcus Russell started 29 games. Not only that, but his career 62% completion is not really any better than another SEC QB who left school early (and started 2 more games). I'm talking about the incomprable Rex Grossman.

For sake of comparision, Brady Quinn started 46 games at Notre Dame and ranks up there with McNabb and Palmer with his college stats.

This study argues that with another year of experience, JaMarcus Russell would be a great NFL QB prospect. But by coming out a year early, history as least suggests the guy will have a rather mediocre NFL career.

Those are VERY interesting stats. Good job digging that up. I am a stat head and that makes me scratch my head.
I have always felt that Quinn would make a better qb than Russell, but I thought Russell would be a good QB...maybe I am incorrect.

[GTripp0012]

Originally Posted by jsarno

Those are VERY interesting stats. Good job digging that up. I am a stat head and that makes me scratch my head.
I have always felt that Quinn would make a better qb than Russell, but I thought Russell would be a good QB...maybe I am incorrect.

The most confusing part of the study is the realization that these horrible busts of players could have been very good QBs had they stayed in school another year. This study suggests that a majority of busts (with a decent amount of exceptions) only busted because they were underprepared for the next level, and not for any other reason.

[jsarno]

Originally Posted by GTripp0012

The most confusing part of the study is the realization that these horrible busts of players could have been very good QBs had they stayed in school another year. This study suggests that a majority of busts (with a decent amount of exceptions) only busted because they were underprepared for the next level, and not for any other reason.

It might show something about their mental state..."give me money now", and less to do with actual talent.
I would have never thought of those starts as being a factor, but it's hard to ignore the correlation.