First Annual Big 10 Quarterback Rankings

by grahamfiller10 on Oct 1, 2008 8:54 AM CDT

Bob Griese. Chuck Long. Tom Brady. Troy Smith. Although the Big 10 isn't known as the quarterback conference of college football, these aforementioned signal callers certainly held their own at the college or professional level. So in honor of the possibility that you sit by Terrelle Pryor in English 111, here is The Rivalry's First Annual Big 10 Quarterback Rankings.

Frankly, this year's Big 10 doesn't contain a bumper crop of quarterbacks, but conference play will answer many questions: How will Brian Hoyer react when an opposing team finally stops Javon Ringer? Will Steven Threet continue sabotaging the Michigan offense? Will Terrelle Pryor lead the Bucks to a Big 10 title?

I only ranked the probable starters for this week, so my apologies to Ben Chappell, Todd Boeckman, and Jake Christensen (who I almost jokingly ranked #198).

	QB	Team	Comments
#1	Daryll Clark	PSU	Most efficient Big 10 QB has shown dual threat capability.
#2	Terrelle Pryor	OSU	Only played extensively in three games, but already looks comfortable and scary in the Buckeye offense.
#3	Juice Wiliams	ILL	Tied with Bacher for Big 10 lead in picks, to no one's surprise. Made a couple big-time throws to Benn against PSU.
#4	C.J. Bacher	NW	Big 10 POW may be inaccurate at times, but he led a beautiful comeback versus Iowa.
#5	Curtis Painter	PU	Big stats, little results. Painter underperformed against ND and Oregon. Doesn't look like 4 year vet.
#6	Adam Weber	MN	Gopher offense demands short, accurate throws and Weber has made them successfully, leading Big 10 in completion percentage.
#7	Ricky Stanzi	Iowa	Stan the Man has captured the starting spot (maybe) and was competent but not spectacular versus Northwestern.
#8	Brian Hoyer	MSU	This handoff machine hasn't had to do much since Javon Ringer started going wild, but didn't show much confidence in Cali game.
#9	Allen Evridge	UW	Another handoff machine; the coaches don't trust him to go throw down the field.
#10	Kellen Lewis	IND	As one Hoosier quipped, "Someone has to make plays...and Lewis is our only playmaker." Coaches support his decision making so much that he split time with Ben Chappell versus MSU.
#11	Steven Threet	UM	Apparently once was an Elite 11 quarterback, a mind boggling fact. Has airmailed throw after ugly throw, doesn't have any touch to short passes...Lowest rated starting QB in Big 10.

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My bad

Graham:
In regards to your issues with my response to this over at my blog, www.gopherfootball.blogspot.com…
You are right, I didn’t defend my position very well.
In my defense however, in this post, I didn’t feel like you did much to back up your rankings either, but when you replied and said it was “arbitrary,” well then it totally makes sense, and I get it. I don’t have a problem with doing an arbitrary ranking, I just thought that it should have been explained that that is, in fact, what it was, in the actual post.
As far as bloated stats, and the stats that I mentioned on Weber, you are right that through 5 games they don’t mean much. My thought, however, was to look for something tangible, and while we can argue about the validity of QB stats through 5 games (4 of them being non-conference), they are at least something that we can tangibly look at.
I will post my rankings of Big10 QB’s soon.
Jeremy

by jerdogg1 on Oct 3, 2008 4:03 PM CDT 0 recs

JUICE?

Seriously? The kid is a very good running back, but in no way is he a top 3 QB in the Big Ten. I came to this from http://gopherfootball.blogspot.com/2008/10/is-this-joke.html and of course I believe Weber should be a little higher but the ranking of Juice bothers me more.

If the knock on Weber is that he has good numbers against bad teams, why does Juice get credit for average numbers against bad teams and losses to good teams? 2 touchdowns and three picks against Eastern Illinois and Louisiana LaFayette (both of whom are worse than the three FBS teams MN faced). He is living on his 5-star recruit ranking. Incredibly talented and is dangerous, but not the 3rd best QB in the league. Very dangerous and improved from a year ago but leads the league in INT % (by a lot).

One could make an argument for Bacher, Weber and Painter that is compelling enough, but Juice is inexcusable imo.

what you say here can, and will, be used against you

by GopherNation on Oct 3, 2008 4:35 PM CDT 0 recs

The Juice is Pulpy

I still have fond memories of Juice leading the Illini team to a Rose Bowl, plus I like his running ability, hence the ranking: he became the face of a successful Big 10 team. But if he continues with his low completion percentage and interceptions, I will follow the wishes of Gopher Nation and drop him…

Check out the rankings next week…

by grahamfiller10 on Oct 3, 2008 5:01 PM CDT up 0 recs