Earlier this week, Matt Ryan signed a 6 year, $72 Million deal, with $34.7 Million guaranteed. This, in my opinion, is utterly absurd. I could go on and on about how ridiculous this is, but I'll point you in the direction of The Daily Norseman, SBNation's Vikings blog. Gonzo has a great article expressing my exact feelings about the entire situation much better than I ever could have. Here's the main idea:
There is NO reason for NFL teams to pay the amounts they're paying now to guys that haven't even attended an NFL Training Camp yet, never mind played in an NFL game. The NBA does it, and it's one of the few things that they actually do better than the NFL. The NBA doesn't have contract holdouts, they don't have to give potentially franchise-killing contracts to rookies. . .heck, even LeBron James had to earn his big payday. . .and teams know what they're getting into before they make their selections.
Make sure to check out the rest of his article. He makes some other great points.
Here's an exercise for you: I've put together the college stats for 6 quarterbacks drafted in the first round the past 3 seasons, minus Joe Flacco, as his stats are skewed by playing in Div 1-AA. The QBs are:
- Jay Cutler
- Matt Leinart
- Vince Young
- Brady Quinn
- JaMarcus Russell
- Matt Ryan
I've also included a 7th mystery quarterback, who was drafted some years ago. I've used the NFL's version of QB Rating, rather than the college Rating system.
| Starts | Comp | Att | Comp. Pct | Yds | YPA | TD | INT | Rating | |
| A | 46 | 929 | 1602 | 58.0% | 11762 | 7.34 | 95 | 39 | 90.62 |
| B | 45 | 710 | 1242 | 57.2% | 8697 | 7.00 | 59 | 36 | 82.66 |
| C | 42 | 851 | 1354 | 62.9% | 11201 | 8.27 | 90 | 33 | 100.93 |
| D | 39 | 807 | 1245 | 64.8% | 10693 | 8.59 | 99 | 23 | 110.69 |
| E | 32 | 806 | 1346 | 59.9% | 9310 | 6.92 | 56 | 37 | 83.22 |
| F | 32 | 444 | 718 | 61.8% | 6040 | 8.41 | 44 | 28 | 92.84 |
| G | 30 | 493 | 707 | 69.7% | 6625 | 9.37 | 52 | 21 | 111.38 |
Tomorrow or Saturday, I'll post who each quarterback is, along with Stampede Blue's consensus choice of franchise quarterback.
Also, Tony Dungy will be joining Mike and Mike live from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway at 7:45 tomorrow (Friday) morning. You can hear it on ESPN Radio, and watch it on ESPN2.