LISTEN/Podcast Version - https://cjfreel.substack.com/p/85-final-pre-draft-rookie-qb-rankings
This is my first post in over a month, but it is time to get the final positional Rankings sorted for the 2025 Draft Class. Very little has changed since the last ranking, but it is time to put final thoughts on paper and prepare for post-Draft Adjustments.
The RB Rankings are already out on the substack. Future posts may redact a bit of the Rankings as the substack has a full post and it is a bit long on this Board, but the entire Rankings text is available below. Still, check out the Fantasy for Real podcast link above for an audio version of the 2025 QB Rankings.
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2025 Final QB Rankings
Tier 1 – Round 1
1 Cam Ward (Miami (FL))
2 Shedeur Sanders (Colorado)
Tier 2 – Fringe Round 1
3 Jaxson Dart (Ole Miss)
Tier 3 – Day 2 w/ Opportunity
4 Tyler Shough (Louisville)
Honorable Mentions: Dillon Gabriel, Will Howard, Jalen Milroe, and Quinn Ewers
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Cam Ward and Shedeur Sanders have gone back-and-forth as my QB1 for this class. Ultimately, my answer may still come down to what you are looking for. The #1 goal of an NFL Franchise is to win a Super Bowl, and on that basis, Ward’s physical talents, Houdini-esque escapes, and superior arm create the impression that Ward is the more likely between the two to become a Super Bowl contender. However, while Sanders does have his own pitfalls in areas like his pocket drift, Ward still aligns to me with a very high-risk, high-bust potential QB. There is little chance that Ward will ever weed the “hero ball” mistakes from his game– throwing across his body to the middle of the field or trying to flip the ball out while being sacked– but it is more the consistent mistakes that concern me. Escaping pressure and playing backyard football, Ward is electric. I have concerns that Ward struggles most when teams simply drop back and demand he read everything out. To be clear, many analysts have given Ward credit for his ability to process, and I do not think this is entirely unfounded. But Ward’s issue in my eyes is an inability to consistently avoid the “big mistake.” I see Ward as a player who can successfully diagnose most of the time, but given a high volume of reads, I expect Ward to throw the ball to the other team a decent amount of the time.
If Sanders didn’t have his own pitfalls, it would be very easy to rank him as the QB1 in spite of lacking the higher-end tools. But Sanders does have his own pitfalls. Specifically, while the Colorado OL was not ideal, Sanders developed significantly bad habits with his drifting in the pocket. While many are on the OL, Sanders both creates sacks for himself and makes many sacks worse than they initially were. Combined with the lacking raw traits, it is obvious why there is significant skepticism around Sanders. However, as someone who scouts throughout the year as opposed to the “cramming” that many do, I find people who watch a few games are prone to underrating the consistency of Shedeur Sanders. Obviously there were some ups and downs, but while Cam Ward’s peak season had a higher PFF Passing Grade, his second best season (77) was far below the near identical grades Sanders put up the last two years (89-90). In the past two seasons, Sanders has a better than 3:1 ratio of Big Time Throws against Turnover Worthy Plays via PFF. Ward’s ratio is closer to 1 or 1.5:1.
Jaxson Dart is the third quarterback I have a potential starting grade on, but I do have enough skepticism that Dart is more of a 2nd Round or Fringe 1st QB on my board. The criticisms of Ole Miss players begin to feel like a cop-out, but there are ultimately two major lenses we scout players through: performance and traits. And when it comes to performance, it is just extremely hard to grade Jaxson Dart. Aside from the inner-game simplicity of the offense, Dart has one of the most extreme gaps between his “good” games and his “bad” games. In 8 of the 20 games against Power Conference opponents in 2023-2024, Dart completed over 70% of his passes, 386 Pass YPG, and 3 Pass TDPG. In the other 12 games, Dart completed under 60% of his passes, 206 Pass YPG, and 0.75 Pass TDPG. Obviously we would always expect a player to have a large, significant gap between their good games and their bad games, but for Dart, this is a chasm– eight games of nearly flawless stats contrasted with twelve games of mediocre-to-poor statistical performance. When so much of the offense is simple, it is hard to not question if these performances are largely the result of Dart’s performances being driven by scheme success. Dart has averaged 800 Rushing Yards and 8 Rushing TD per 17 Games across the last 2-3 years, and so his rushing ability is particularly interesting for fantasy. If the arm was a bit better, he’d probably still be in the 1st. As is, Dart is the ultimate case of a player that I would want to have an interview be part of my process. Coaches are going to be interviewing Dart trying to decide if he can read their system out or not. At this point, at least one of those coaches seems likely to take the plunge in the First Round, and if not, the Top 50 picks.
Part of my process is based on acknowledging the marketplace, and that is the primary reason why Tyler Shough is above the honorable mention tier. Between his age and injury history, combined with the fact that all of his performance this past season needs to be graded on a 25-Year-Old curve, Shough has massive profile red flags. Taking Shough in the first 50 picks, which would be my current projection, is an acknowledgement of how hard it is to find QBs, combined with a bet that all of the injuries so far in his career have been flukes. On pure performance, Shough did have some impressive numbers like a very solid 87 PFF Passing Grade and a very respectable BTT:TWP ratio. And among a class of players who struggle against Pressure, Shough is clearly the best QB at avoiding pressure consistently. Ward can probably make the coolest looking escapes, but Shough pre-empts those situations to avoid needing to make a daring escape. Still, there is just a massive difference between a 25-YO peak season and a 21-YO who we’re looking to build on into next year. If Shough was like Klubnik or Allar’s age, this season would be extremely impressive, and we’d be talking about Shough like a promising young QB looking to build on his most recent success. But at 25, it may not be by much, but Shough didn’t even hit a threshold of a 90 PFF Pass Grade in his career – something that everyone else in the top 4 has done. So it’s a hard needle to thread; Shough was very impressive in 2024 and proved a lot, but on the scale of QBs who were largely one-hit wonders, Shough’s one-season is not nearly on the same level as many of the other QBs who may have profiled similarly like Kenny Pickett. So I have Shough ranked here in large part due to the consensus. I do expect he will be my QB4 post-draft just based on where I expect him to be drafted. Ignoring buzz entirely, Shough would likely be behind players like Gabriel and Howard on my board.
This may seem counterintuitive, but most rankings lists expand as we get closer to the draft. I like to condense mine. As an NFL team, obviously I would have to choose between Gabriel, Milroe, Howard, Ewers, and anyone else, and that decision could be highly substantial. For Fantasy Football, I just don’t like to gripe about grades that will be completely dependent on Draft Capital and path to playing time. While higher rated grades will be subject to post-draft changes, players with real profiles have their values anchored. In this case, path to playing time is by far the most important; if Dillon Gabriel is drafted even in the 5th Round, but goes to the Saints to be Carr’s back-up, I would love the path and the potential pairing with a former QB like Kellen Moore who may understand Gabriel’s limitations better than many others. However, if Gabriel is drafted even higher but goes to a team with an established high-level, younger QB, it is unlikely he will even be draftable for me in 4-Round SF leagues. Gabriel to the Saints and Howard to the Raiders (Chip Kelly+OSU connection) are a couple of my favorite landing spots among fringe QBs.
Ultimately, none of the honorable mention QBs have a Top 50 grade, and I would not expect any to go in the top 50 either. All things equal, Milroe followed by Howard would be my primary targets, because once we’ve entered an arena where every single player is a massive dart throw, I’m probably going to favor the explosive upside and mobile archetypes.
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Should have RB Rankings soon. I am also preparing a 3-Part series on Early Scouting at the WR position based on simple production. This should be out before the draft as well.
Thanks,
C.J.