Who Needs An Elite Quarterback?

Is it really that important to have a quarterback who is an elite NFL-prospect in your program?

I was thinking about this the other day when reading about the performance of Trojan commit Matt Barkley at USC’s Rising Stars Camp.

Barkley is just the latest in a line of highly-recruited quarterbacks to play for Pete Carroll. There was, of course, Matt Leinart, a top-10 recruit out of Orange County and John David Booty, widely considered the nation’s top quarterback when he arrived from Shreveport’s Evangel Christian. The latest mega-recruits are former Parade Players of the Year Mark Sanchez and Mitch Mustain (who transferred from Arkansas), not to mention Aaron Corp, another top 10 signal caller from Orange County. All these guys have an excellent shot at the NFL and more than a couple possess the tools to be first round selections one day.

However, I find it noteworthy that it is the extreme exception, not the rule, for the national championship team to be quarterbacked by a first-round NFL pick–or even a first-day selection, for that matter–at quarterback.

Let’s look back 20 years at the national title quarterbacks:

1988–Tony Rice, Notre Dame

1989–Craig Erickson, Miami

1990–Darian Hagan, Colorado; Shawn Jones, Georgia Tech

1991–Billy Jo Hobert, Washington; Gino Toretta, Miami

1992–Jay Barker, Alabama

1993–Charlie Ward, FSU

1994–Tommy Frazier, Nebraska

1995–Tommy Frazier, Nebraska

1996–Danny Wuerffel, Florida

1997–Brian Griese, Michigan; Scott Frost, Nebraska

1998–Tee Martin, Tennessee

1999–Chris Weinke, FSU

2000–Josh Heupel, Oklahoma

2001–Ken Dorsey, Miami

2002–Craig Krenzel, Ohio State

2003–Matt Mauck, LSU; Matt Leinart, USC

2004–Matt Leinart, USC

2005–Vince Young, Texas

2006–Chris Leak, Florida

2007–Matt Flynn, LSU

From this whole group, you have Young (3rd overall pick) and Leinart (10th overall pick) as first rounders, with Brian Griese a third rounder and Chris Weinke a fourth rounder. The rest either weren’t drafted or were of little consequence to the NFL.  Furthermore, about half of the players above were NOT elite recruits coming out of high school.

I’d say that, based on the data, having an NFL-style elite prospect at quarterback is completely unrelated to a team’s title hopes.  So why is this the case?

A couple thoughts: The pro game and the college game are very different. However, there are some college coaches who are smitten with the NFL and its systems. For instance, some still try to teach the West Coast Offense–which takes five years to learn–to college quarterbacks. It could be that having a first-round talent on your roster makes it more likely that your offense will tend to a more complicated pro-style, West Coast system instead of toward a more stripped-down, gimmicky college system. The result is that your quarterback will be well-prepared for the NFL, but your offense will stink. Since college style schemes invariably work best in college–see the list of title-winning quarterbacks above for proof–it only makes sense that a pro-style scheme run by a first-round quarterback would rarely be successful in college.

Another thought is that teams without elite quarterbacks learn not to rely heavily on that position. They are better at being a team, utilizing all their resources. More often than not, the quarterback of such a team is proficient, scrappy, a team leader and, uh, considerably shorter than the NFL likes.

They may not make the big bucks in the NFL, but they always have that college ring to show off.

So, while many have USC as a leading national title contender this year, maybe it’s best to look for the team that has the next Craig Krenzel, Tee Martin or Jay Barker.