Blogging The Boys
In an earlier post, we looked at 45 active NFL quarterbacks to understand which QBs have more good games than others. Our 45-QB sample showed that in games in which those 45 QBs started, had at least 10 pass attempts, and posted a QBR of 75 or higher, they were a combined 717-164-2 for a win percentage of .812
But if you want to be a top QB in this league, it’s not enough to have a bunch of 75+ QBR games that give your team a good chance to win. It’s at least equally important to minimize the number of bad games in which QBs actively lose games for their teams.
If we look at the games in our sample with a Total QBR below 40, those 45 QBs combined for a 218-625-4 record, a measly .257 win percentage, or about 25 percent.
It follows that if a Total QBR above 75 is a good game, a Total QBR below 40 is a bad game.
So here’s the same exercise as in the previous post, except with games with a QBR below 40. We’ll start off with the 36 QBs with more than 20 starts again, though this time a low “bad-game percentage” is what you are looking for.
body .sbnu-legacy-content-table td, body .sbnu-legacy-content-table th, body .sbnu-legacy-content-table { border: 1px solid #000 !important; border-collapse: collapse !important; } TierQBs with 20+ starts2026
Team Games Started
(min 10 PA) “Bad Games”
(QBR < 40)**Bad game
percentage Tier 1: Planet Mahomes Patrick MahomesKC12697.1%Tier 2: Borderline Top 5Drake MayeNE27311.1%Jordan LoveGB48714.6%Brock PurdySF45715.6%Matthew StaffordLAR1612616.1%Drew Brees (ret.)—841416.7%Josh AllenBUF1242217.7%Dak PrescottDAL1382618.8%Tom Brady (ret.)—1262419.0%Lamar JacksonBAL1052019.0%Tier 3: Above averageJustin HerbertLAC952021.1%Joe BurrowCIN771823.4%Kyler MurrayMIN862124.4%Jalen HurtsPHI812024.7%*Jameis WinstonNYG892224.7%*Kirk CousinsLV1584025.3%*Tua TagovailoaATL661725.8%Geno SmithNYJ681826.5%Tier 4: The bus driversDeshaun WatsonCLE711926.8%*Aaron RodgersPIT1514227.8%CJ StroudHOU451328.9%*Marcus MariotaWAS832428.9%*Bo NixDEN341029.4%Daniel JonesIND802430.0%Jayden DanielsWAS23730.4%Jared GoffDET1514731.1%*Andy DaltonPHI1043331.7%*Baker MayfieldTB1204134.2%Trevor LawrenceJAX602236.7%Jacoby BrissettARI642437.5%*Mac JonesSF552138.2%Joe FlaccoCIN893438.2%*Tier 5: The Eli Manning
pit of endless miseryEli Manning (ret.)—672638.8%Sam DarnoldSEA903640.0%Bryce YoungCAR441840.9%Caleb WilliamsCHI341441.2%### Tier 1 (Blue)
This list is utterly dominated by Patrick Mahomes. Incredibly, he’s only averaging about one “bad game” per season. Compare that to some random QB like Eli Manning, whose 38.8 bad game percentage would be the equivalent of seven bad games per 17-game season. Relative to his peers, Mahomes is truly on a different planet.
The second tier here are QBs that simply don’t have a lot of stinkers on their ledger, which means their performance very rarely is the reason their team loses. That does not automatically make them elite QBs, but the numbers here suggest they minimize their errors and bad plays and consistently keep their teams in the game, losing efforts notwithstanding. The interesting thing here is there seems to be a new guard (Drake Maye, Jordan Love, Brock Purdy) here complementing the old guard (Matthew Stafford, Josh Allen, Dak Prescott, Lamar Jackson) of high-performing QB.
The third tier consists of a bevy of well-known names like Justin Herbert, Joe Burrow, Kyler Murray, Jalen Hurts, and Kirk Cousins, who are averaging around 3.5 to 4.5 “bad games” per 17-game...
