Some may remember my earlier thread about DTs and DE/OLBs. This one should be more interesting, due to the QBness of it. I did the same for QBs, using data from PFF to analyse the typical development of a QB as well as the expected return from a draft pick spent on a QB. Here is development:
Pretty steady climb through 12 years. Basically all the ridiculous waves on the right are thanks to Favre.
Here are snaps per year:
I'm a little surprised that rookies take more snaps than any other group.
Here is skill (vertical) vs draft position (horizontal). Blue dots are draft picks, the dark green, light green, white, pink, and red lines are the 90th, 75th, 50th, 25th, and 10th percentile respectively.
Huh. Drafting a QB late looks about the same as picking up a UDFA. This led me to make another chart. I arbitrarily decided that a QB in the 95th percentile was elite, 85th percentile was good, and 50th percentile was average. I then decided to determine the percent likelihood of drafting a QB in each round that fell into each category.
In case that doesn't make sense, I'll explain:
A QB drafted in the first round has a:
17.5% chance of being Elite
37.5% chance of being Good
50% chance of being at least average.
Second round:
0% Elite
6.25% Good
37.5% Average
Third round:
0% Elite
13.3% Good
53.3% Average
Fourth round:
0% Elite
8.3% Good
41.7% Average
Fifth round:
0% Elite
0% Good
14.3% Average
Sixth Round:
0% Elite
0% Good
50% Average
Seventh Round:
3.2% Elite (Tom Brady)
3.2% Good
45.2% Average
UDFA
0% Elite
7.7% Good
73.1% Average
My conclusion: If you do not draft a QB in the first round, there is no point drafting one at all. Just pick up a UDFA.