I imagine most of us have heard by now, but Jalen Hurts will sit on Saturday and Gardner Minshew gets the start. If you read my Eagles-Cowboys mega preview you know that I'm not sour on the Eagles' chances should Minshew need to play. Now that we know for sure that we're set for another episode of Minshew's Moustache Mania, let's chat a bit about our new and temporary starting QB.
I have to confess that I've long been of the mind that Gardner Minshew is significantly underrated in the NFL at large. I was pretty excited when Philly traded for him last summer to be their reserve QB. We pointed out already that Minshew's performance in Jacksonville was pretty much representative of a mid-level starter, and that becomes even more impressive considering how bad the Jaguars were on offense in 2019 and 2020. In the preview I stated that I believed Minshew would perform as an above-average level starter and compared him to a Derek Carr-type player. Let's see how that stacks up....
Consider the following four players:
| ESPN's QBR | Rank | Rank | Passer Rating | Rank | Bad Throw % | Rank | |
PLAYER 1 | 52.7 | 2 | 6.45 | 1 | 92.1 | 2 | 14.1% | T1 |
PLAYER 2 | 45.4 | 3 | 6.39 | 2 | 93.9 | 1 | 18.2% | 4 |
PLAYER 3 | 53.3 | 1 | 6.06 | 3 | 91.9 | 3 | 14.1% | T1 |
PLAYER 4 | 43.0 | 4 | 5.85 | 4 | 88.6 | 4 | 15.7% | 3 |
Those numbers are the career stat lines of (in alphabetical order) Derek Carr, Mac Jones, Ryan Tannehill... and Gardner Minshew (the table is not sorted in this order, you can guess who is who). Back in September I rated each of those three players as solid starters, and given that, why should we feel differently about Gardner Minshew? If we're rolling into this game with Carr or someone of his caliber, does Vegas give us more credit? Would the talking heads actually be picking the better team (it's the Eagles)? In case there is any lingering doubt, check this guy out:
QBR | ANY/A | Rating | Bad throw % | |
Dak Prescott (2022 stats) | 54.8 | 6.43 | 93.8 | 18.1% |
Had I placed Dak's stat line in with those other guys, you wouldn't know the difference. It's entirely possible that Philly's backup will actually be the best QB on the field on Christmas Eve.
Merry Christmas and go Birds!
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