Ranking all 136 FBS QB situations into tiers ahead of the 2025 season
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David Hale
There’s plenty of star power in the 2025 quarterback class. Carson Beck, Cade Klubnik and Drew Allar return. Kevin Jennings, Maddux Madsen and Sam Leavitt led playoff teams and are back for more. Oh, and there’s some guy named Manning who’ll finally get his shot to start at Texas.
But after the past few years in which blue bloods routinely chased veterans in the transfer portal, we’re about to enter a season in which Michigan, Georgia, Texas, Ohio State, Notre Dame, Alabama and Ole Miss expect to start guys with little or no experience as QB1.
After COVID-19 rules allowed players to stick around for five, six or even seven years in college, 2025 represents the unofficial end point of the bonus year — unless you’re Diego Pavia, who might play until he’s eligible to collect social security.
Meanwhile, some of last season’s most disappointing QB stories — Miller Moss, Conner Weigman, Jackson Arnold — will get a chance to rewrite their script with new teams this season.
It all shapes up to be one of the more intriguing seasons at the game’s most important position.
But luckily, we’ve done the heavy lifting of sifting through the depth charts of all 136 FBS teams, digging deep into the stats, and consulted our Magic Eight Ball to rank every QB situation in the country by tiers.
Jump to a section:
Best of the best | Waiting time is over
One more try
Wiley veterans | Used to be starters
Tier 1: Top of the class (11 players)
Clemson (Cade Klubnik, Christopher Vizzina)
LSU (Garrett Nussmeier, Michael Van Buren Jr.)
Oklahoma (John Mateer, Michael Hawkins Jr., Whitt Newbauer)
Penn State (Drew Allar, Ethan Grunkemeyer)
South Carolina (LaNorris Sellers, Air Noland)
Last season’s best quarterback, Cam Ward, was electric — a magician on the field who routinely made awe-inspiring plays. This year’s best don’t exactly fit that mold. Instead, some of the biggest names — Allar, Klubnik, Nussmeier — didn’t so much catch lightning in a bottle as slowly build their repertoire until earning their place at the top of the sport. They’re consistent producers; veterans who, if you follow the career trend lines, should reach peak performance in 2025.
Sellers and Mateer, on the other hand, had a few more of those “Heisman moments” last year. Sellers started slow but blossomed late, playing at as high a level as anyone in the country by year’s end. Mateer flourished in the relative obscurity of Washington State and now will be tasked with reviving Oklahoma’s program under the glare of the SEC spotlight. Both players scratched the surface of greatness last year and enter 2025 with massive expectations.
QB comparison
QB A: 78.1 QBR, 68% completions, 7.4 yards per pass, 25 touchdowns
QB B: 78.8 QBR, 64% completions, 7.7 yards per pass, 26 touchdowns
QB B is LSU’s Nussmeier last season against FBS opponents. He was good, but the numbers aren’t eye-popping. So why is there so much buzz around him? Well, QB A is Jayden Daniels‘ line at LSU from 2022 — a year before he won the Heisman Trophy with some truly eye-popping stats. Could Nussmeier be on the same trajectory?
Fun facts:
Eight QBs in the playoff era have racked up at least 4,100 yards and 43 touchdowns while having seven or fewer turnovers, as Klubnik did last season. The others include five Heisman winners and two finalists. Each was selected within the first 10 picks of the NFL draft.
No QB had more touchdown passes on throws of 20 yards or more last season than Klubnik (16). His line on deep balls: 47% completions, 16 TDs, 3 INTs, 16.6 yards/attempt.
In the playoff era, 14 players posted a line of 4,000 yards, 40 touchdowns, 9 yards per pass and no more than 10 turnovers. That group includes 13 players selected in the first 15 picks of the draft, six Heisman winners and eight more finalists. Mateer missed that club by only 36 yards last year.
Mateer’s 53 broken or evaded tackles last season topped all FBS quarterbacks.
No QB who averaged at least 9 air yards per throw had a lower rate of off-target throws than Mateer (9.1%).
Penn State ran a successful play on 52.8% of its dropbacks last season, tops by a team returning its 2024 starter. Next best was TCU (50.3%).
If Allar starts nine games, he’ll be the fourth Penn State QB since 2013 with 38 career starts while playing for only one team. There are only 33 other Power 5 QBs who’ve done that in the same span. No other team has more than two.
Sellers’ 2024 production:
In Weeks 1-9: 51.7 QBR, 5 passing TDs, 4 INTs, 6.91 yards per pass
In Weeks 10 through the bowl game: 81.4 QBR, 13 passing TDs, 4 INTs, 9.85 yards per pass
Tier 1b: So hot right now (six players)
Florida (DJ Lagway, Harrison Bailey)
Miami (Carson Beck, Emory Williams)
Texas (Arch Manning, Matthew Caldwell)
A year ago, Beck was the clear-cut top QB entering the season, and though he put up relatively strong numbers again in 2024, he was largely considered a disappointment. Then he was injured in the SEC title game and transferred to Miami, and now Beck he enters 2025 as something of a mystery. He could recover his NFL draft stock with an elite season following in Ward’s footsteps … or he could be a multimillion-dollar bust.
The conversation around Manning and Lagway is two former five-star recruits who appear on the verge of breakout performances. Their ceilings are ridiculously high, but their actual on-field production so far leaves plenty of room for questions.
QB comparison
What if I told you one of these QBs is getting love as a potential No. 1 draft pick for 2026 and the other is coming off a “down year”?
QB A: 82.3 QBR, 28 TD passes, 12 INTs, 64.7% completions, 7.78 yards per attempt
QB B: 79.1 QBR, 29 TD passes, 12 INTs, 64.2% completions, 7.72 yards per attempt
So, who’s the hot shot and who’s spiraling downward? QB B is LSU’s Nussmeier, who’s a favorite in the way-too-early mock drafts. QB A is Miami’s Beck, who was supposed to be a possible No. 1 pick until his 2024 performance drew heavy criticism.
OK, one more.
QB A: 72% completions, 9.45 yards per pass, 24 touchdown passes, 3,941 passing yards
QB B: 73% completions, 8.74 yards per pass, 29 touchdown passes, 3,917 passing yards
QB B looks a tick better, right? Well, QB A is Beck’s 2023 season at Georgia, when he was lauded as one of the nation’s best. QB B is Beck’s 2024 season at Georgia, if you adjust his stat line to the same rate of drops and contested catches by his receiving corps in 2024 that he had in 2023.
Fun facts:
Returning QBs who averaged at least 9 yards per attempt last season:
Lagway, 9.97
Blake Horvath, 9.73
Darian Mensah, 9.49
Mateer, 9.05
Deshawn Purdie, 9.01
The first month of the season showcased Manning’s potential: 983 yards on 91 touches, 12 touchdowns and two turnovers — all against lesser competition in Texas blowouts. From Oct. 1 on, he threw only 12 more passes for 38 yards.
Tier 2: Pretty darned good (eight players)
Arizona State (Sam Leavitt, Jeff Sims)
Baylor (Sawyer Robertson, Walker White)
Georgia Tech (Haynes King, Aaron Philo)
Iowa State (Rocco Becht, Connor Moberly)
If none of the four starting QBs here is a household name, it’s only because those names haven’t been paid enough attention. Leavitt led Arizona State to the College Football Playoff last year. Becht had Iowa State knocking on the door. Robertson finished as strong as any QB in the country, and King kept winning games despite cruising to the finish line of the season like Monty Python’s Black Knight — down a few limbs but still fighting like crazy.
QB comparison
One of these QBs was lauded for his ridiculous final stretch of the season. The other flew mostly below the radar nationally.
QB A: 6-1 (loss in bowl), 80.1 QBR, 64% completions, 20 TDs, 5 turnovers, 314 yards per game
QB B: 6-1 (loss in bowl), 80.1 QBR, 67% completions, 18 TDs, 5 turnovers, 302 yards per game
Do that over a full season and either would be in the Heisman conversation. But it was only QB A — South Carolina’s Sellers — who received much love last December. But it’s worth appreciating that QB B — Baylor’s Robertson — was every bit as good.
Fun facts:
From Nov. 1 on, no returning QB posted a better QBR than Leavitt (86.8).
No returning QB scrambled for more yards last season than Leavitt (423).
Becht has accounted for at least one touchdown in 27 straight games, the longest active streak in FBS — six games more than any other QB.
Becht numbers when Iowa State was trailing in the second half last season: 82.3 QBR, 8.55 yards/attempt, 11 total touchdowns, 3 interceptions.
No QB had a higher percentage of his passing yards come from throws behind the line of scrimmage last year than King (28.2%). Leavitt was third (26.6%).
ACC QBs to post a 7-to-1 touchdown-to-interception ratio over the past 20 years: Jordan Travis, Devin Leary, Trevor Lawrence, Deshaun Watson, Russell Wilson and King.
Robertson’s 82.9 QBR is the best by any returning Power 4 QB from last season.
Tier 3: Buckle up (19 players)
Arkansas (Taylen Green, KJ Jackson)
Duke (Darian Mensah, Henry Belin IV)
Kansas (Jalon Daniels, Cole Ballard)
Louisville (Miller Moss, Brady Allen)
Navy (Blake Horvath, Braxton Woodson)
SMU (Kevin Jennings, Ty Hawkins, Tyler Van Dyke)
TCU (Josh Hoover, Ken Seals)
Texas Tech (Behren Morton, Mitch Griffis)
Vanderbilt (Diego Pavia, Drew Dickey)
Every projected starter in Tier 3 has delivered serious highlights — massive wins, explosive plays, and even a chance for Vandy fans to dump a goal post into the river. But for all the success, there are still some minor questions — Morton’s health or Jennings’ playoff performance or whether Pavia will have to leave film study early to take his grandkids to soccer practice — that add a bit of danger to the proceedings. That probably means this is the tier that’ll provide the most fun in 2025.
QB comparison
Two QB lines since Week 7 of 2023. Who’s better?
QB A: 76.3 QBR, 64.9% completions, 8.01 yards per pass, 40 pass touchdowns, 18 interceptions
QB B: 75.6 QBR, 62.9% completions, 7.79 yards per pass, 40 pass touchdowns, 10 interceptions
Aside from the INTs, edge QB A? Well, that’s TCU’s Hoover. QB B is Penn State’s Allar, widely considered one of the best in the nation.
Here’s another.
QB A: 5-8 record, 45.6 QBR, 58% completions, 18 TD passes, 14 picks
QB B: 9-1 record, 68.7 QBR, 65% completions, 23 TD passes, 6 picks
QB A is Texas Tech’s Morton vs. FPI top-50 teams in his career. QB B is Morton vs. everyone else.
Fun facts:
Horvath’s 83.6 QBR was the best last season — and the seventh best of the playoff era — by any quarterback outside the Power 4. The playoff era non-power conference QBs ahead of him are also some big names: McKenzie Milton (2017), D’Eriq King (2018), Zach Wilson (2020) and new Colorado QB Kaidon Salter (2023) among them.
Last season, 36.6% of Mensah’s attempts were to a wide-open target, second highest nationally. Last year, only 21% of throws to Duke receivers were wide open (104th in FBS), and the Blue Devils said goodbye to their top two receivers, their starting tight end and their top pass-catching back.
Mensah’s past six games: 80.3 QBR, 9.74 yards per pass, 69% completions, 11 touchdowns, 4 picks.
In the first 18 games of his career, Jennings had 333 touches and committed seven turnovers. In his past eight games, he has had 317 touches and 14 turnovers.
No returning P4 QB was blitzed more often last season than Pavia.
No returning QB had a higher successful play rate on red zone dropbacks last year than Pavia (50%).
Pavia vs. top-40 defenses last season: 78.8 QBR, 12 TD passes, 3 interceptions and 7.0 yards per dropback.
Last season, 23.8% of Jalon Daniels’ passes were thrown 20 yards or more downfield, most by any Power 4 QB.
No P4 QB had a higher rate of off-target throws last season than Daniels (19.5%).
Daniels vs. FBS competition last year:
First four games: 6 TDs, 9 turnovers, 41.3 QBR
Next five games: 12 TDs, 2 turnovers, 85.9 QBR
Last three games: 1 TD, 3 turnovers, 77.2 QBR
Moss had five touchdown passes in the second half or OT to put USC ahead last year, tied for the most by any QB in the country. The Trojans still went 2-3 in those games.
No returning QB had more explosive plays last season than Green (98).
Tier 4: The young pups (eight players)
Michigan (Bryce Underwood, Mikey Keene)
Notre Dame (CJ Carr, Kenny Minchey)
Ohio State (Julian Sayin, Lincoln Kienholz)
Washington (Demond Williams Jr., Kai Horton)
Four schools with playoff hopes turn to young QBs with elite recruiting backgrounds. Not long ago, this wouldn’t seem like a wild premise, but in the era of the transfer portal, the notion that programs with as much talent as Notre Dame or Ohio State are putting their fates into the hands of QBs with no on-field experience feels akin to handing your teenager, who has his learner’s permit, the keys to your new Ferrari.
QB comparison
QB A: 82.9 QBR, 68% completions, 8.6 yards per pass, 4.4 touchdown-to-interception ratio
QB B: 66.2 QBR, 59.8% completions, 7.3 yards per pass, 1.9 touchdown-to-interception ratio
QB A is Michigan’s passing rates in 2022 and 2023, largely buoyed by J.J. McCarthy. QB B is Michigan’s passing every other year of the playoff era. Last season was defined by woeful QB play, but the Wolverines are betting they’ve found another star in Underwood, and even if he doesn’t blossom immediately, Keene seems to be an upgrade from anyone they relied on in 2024.
Fun facts:
Since 2010, the only Ohio State QB to start at least six games and finish with a QBR less than 70 is Cardale Jones in 2015. He won a national championship the year before.
No returning QB had a higher adjusted completion percentage last season than Keene (76.6%).
Williams played at least 10 snaps in five games last season (including two starts). Four were vs. top-40 defenses. His stat line in those games: 79% completions, 8.99 yards per attempt, eight touchdowns, one turnover, 86.0 QBR, 265 non-sack rushing yards.
Tier 5: The waiting is the hardest part (nine players)
Alabama (Ty Simpson, Austin Mack, Keelon Russell)
Georgia (Gunner Stockton, Ryan Puglisi)
Ole Miss (Austin Simmons, Maealiuaki Smith)
Oregon (Dante Moore, Austin Novosad)
After three years as a backup, Stockton drove his 1984 F-150 onto center stage in last season’s Sugar Bowl, and while he ended up on the losing end, he played well enough for Georgia to feel comfortable handing him the offense in 2025. Simpson, a top-five QB recruit in 2022, also has patiently waited his turn at Alabama. Moore earned starting experience at UCLA as a freshman, then left for Oregon and waited behind Dillon Gabriel. Simmons watched Jaxson Dart for two years at Ole Miss. These guys know the system, know the locker room, and they are ready for their moment in the spotlight.
QB comparison
QB A: 80.3 QBR, 67% completions, 8.84 yards per attempt
QB B: 66.3 QBR, 62% completions, 7.84 yards per attempt
QB B isn’t awful, but QB A is bordering on elite. That’s no surprise. QB A is Georgia’s average with Beck or Stetson Bennett on the field. QB B is Georgia’s passing game with anyone else at QB since Kirby Smart took over in 2016.
Fun facts:
In his five years as head coach at Ole Miss, Lane Kiffin’s starting QBs have averaged 24 touchdown passes, eight picks, 67% completions and 9.5 yards per pass with a QBR of 82.0. Overall, Ole Miss’s QBR in that span is 80.4, trailing only Ohio State, Alabama, Georgia and Oregon nationally.
In 11 career games (three starts) vs. Power 5 competition, Moore has completed 52% of his throws with four touchdowns and eight picks.
Oregon’s 87.4 QBR since Dan Lanning took over as head coach in 2022 is tops in the nation.
Of the past 10 quarterbacks to start Week 1 for Alabama, eight took over the job having fewer than 100 career attempts under their belts. The three QBs competing for the job this season have a combined 53 college pass attempts.
Alabama quarterbacks accounted for 17 turnovers last season, the most for the Tide since at least 2004 and more than double their 2023 total.
Tier 6: Second time’s the charm (eight players)
Kansas State (Avery Johnson, Jacob Knuth)
Nebraska (Dylan Raiola, Marcos Davila)
NC State (CJ Bailey, Lex Thomas)
Texas A&M (Marcel Reed, Jacob Zeno)
UCLA (Nico Iamaleava, Luke Duncan)
Tier 6 quarterbacks all got a healthy dose of life as QB1 last season with some mixed results. But if those growing pains as a first-time starter in 2024 translate into more refined play in 2025, each QB could easily blossom into one of the country’s best.
QB comparison
Consider these two true freshmen from last season.
QB A: Nine starts, 60.1 QBR, 65% completions, 22 TDs, 13 turnovers, 74.0 Pro Football Focus grade
QB B: Seven starts, 57.9 QBR, 60% completions, 12 TDs, 9 turnovers, 67.0 Pro Football Focus grade
Who’s better? Aside from a few extra turnovers, you’d probably lean with QB A, right? Well QB B is a guy everyone is high on this year — Florida’s DJ Lagway. QB A is NC State’s Bailey.
Fun facts:
Bailey in the red zone last year: 17 total TDs, zero turnovers.
Returning Power 4 QBs who accounted for 32 TDs and 3,200 yards last year: Nussmeier, Klubnik, Robertson, Becht and Kansas State’s Johnson.
Raiola’s numbers last season from Oct. 1 onward: 53.8 QBR, 5.95 yards per attempt, 4 touchdowns, 11 turnovers, 9.1 yards per completion.
Last season, Reed had six plays with a 20% win probability added. Over the past two seasons, all other Texas A&M quarterbacks had one.
Iamaleava last season vs. Chattanooga, UTEP, Kent State and Mississippi State (combined 4-31 vs. FBS teams last year): 71% completions, 10 touchdown passes, zero picks, 10.9 yards per attempt. Iamaleava vs. all others: 61% completions, 9 touchdown passes, 5 interceptions, 6.9 yards per pass.
Tier 7: Consistently consistent (16 players)
Boise State (Maddux Madsen, Max Cutforth)
BYU (Jake Retzlaff, Bear Bachmeier)
Cincinnati (Brendan Sorsby, Brady Lichtenberg)
Illinois (Luke Altmyer, Ethan Hampton)
Indiana (Fernando Mendoza, Alberto Mendoza, Grant Wilson)
Michigan State (Aidan Chiles, Alessio Milivojevic)
USC (Jayden Maiava, Husan Longstreet, Sam Huard)
Virginia Cavaliers (Chandler Morris, Daniel Kaelin)
The term “game manager” gets thrown around a lot in QB analysis, and it’s often used in place of the term “average.” That’s an unfair descriptor for these players, who are game managers more in a sense of doing all the little things it takes to give their teams a chance to win without often hogging much of the spotlight in the process. They’re very good — they’re just probably not going to emerge as superstars.
QB comparison
QB A: 74.9 QBR, 62% completions, 7.1 yards per dropback, 20 TD passes and 6 interceptions
QB B: 74.7 QBR, 62% completions, 7.4 yards per dropback, 19 TD passes and 6 interceptions
Pretty close, right? QB A is Boise State’s Madsen. QB B is former Louisville QB Tyler Shough, who was the third quarterback selected in last month’s NFL draft.
Fun facts:
Two QBs return for 2025 after having thrown for 3,500 yards and 35 touchdowns last year: Klubnik and Virginia’s Morris.
Last season, 67.6% of Retzlaff’s completions went for a first down or TD, tops among all Power 4 QBs.
Retzlaff’s production:
vs. top-40 defenses: 50.0 QBR, 55% completions, 4 touchdowns, 6 picks, 7.0 yards per dropback.
vs. all others: 74.2 QBR, 60.1% completions, 16 touchdowns, 6 picks, 8.0 yards per dropback.
Altmyer finished last season with 22 passing touchdowns (most by an Illinois QB since 2008) and 2,717 passing yards (most since 2015).
In four wins vs. FBS opponents last season, Sorsby threw four touchdowns and three interceptions. In seven losses, he threw 12 touchdowns and four picks.
Michigan State has not thrown more touchdowns than its opponents in any full season since 2017.
USC had a 48.2% successful play rate on offense with Maiava at QB last year and a 48.1% rate with Moss, but the Trojans averaged more yards per play (6.41 to 6.16) and a better EPA per play (0.16 to 0.05) with Moss than Maiava.
Tier 8a: Fresh starts: veteran edition (nine players)
Auburn (Jackson Arnold, Ashton Daniels, Deuce Knight)
Florida State (Tommy Castellanos, Brock Glenn)
Houston (Conner Weigman, Zeon Chriss)
Northwestern (Preston Stone, Jack Lausch)
Remember that season of “Dallas” that turned out to be just a bad dream, and the next year the show pretended as if none of it ever happened? That’s sort of how this tier wants to view 2024. Arnold and Weigman were among the most touted recruits and seemed poised to break out last season. Instead, they fell flat. Stone and Castellanos had both turned in impressive 2023 campaigns only to get benched a year later. Now, all four are getting a fresh start in a new home with a chance to prove 2024 was the aberration and all the hype they’d enjoyed before last year was entirely deserved.
Tier 8b: Fresh starts: untested edition (six players)
Cal (Devin Brown, Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele)
Missouri (Beau Pribula, Sam Horn)
Syracuse (Steve Angeli, Rickie Collins)
These jobs are still up in the air, and the contenders include a host of once-heralded prospects who’ve never quite clicked. Aside from Horn, all have transferred to new schools looking for a change of scenery and a chance to play, and odds are, one or two will finally prove the long-forgotten recruiting buzz was deserved.
QB comparison
QB A: 69.0 QBR, 9.16 yards per pass, 33 touchdowns, 7 interceptions
QB B: 43.7 QBR, 6.23 yards per pass, 27 touchdowns, 19 interceptions
QB A looks pretty good. QB B looks entirely bleak. Well, QB A is Stone, Northwestern’s new quarterback, over the past two seasons at SMU, the latter of which resulted in him being benched. QB B is the combined production of all Northwestern quarterbacks over the same span.
Fun facts:
Arnold was pressured on 45.1% of his dropbacks last season when the defense did not blitz — the highest rate of any QBR-qualified Power 4 player.
Arnold’s career numbers vs. man coverage: nine touchdowns, one INT. Arnold vs. zone coverage: six touchdowns, five INTs.
Arnold played at least 20 snaps vs. seven Power 4 opponents last season. Six of them won at least nine games and ranked in the top 20 in ESPN’s FPI at season’s end. He also faced Tulane from the Group of 5. The Green Wave won nine games and ranked 32nd in FPI.
Angeli was ESPN’s No. 179 recruit in the class of 2022. Collins was No. 199 in 2023. They haven’t played much in college, but when given playing time, they’ve been good: 88.0 QBR, 75% completions, 10 passing touchdowns, one interception and averaged 9.31 yards per attempt.
In the playoff era, only one QB (not coached by Mike Leach) had more passing attempts in a season than Kyle McCord did for Syracuse last year. The Orange averaged 46 passes per game, which is the third most by an ACC team in the past 20 years.
Over the past two seasons, other Texas A&M quarterbacks combined for 23 plays of at least a 10% win probability added. Weigman had zero.
The only Power 4 QB who finished with a worse QBR last year than Castellanos (37.9) was Utah’s Isaac Wilson, who will not be the Utes’ starter in 2025. Among QBs with eight or more starts for a Power 5 school, Castellanos posted the 21st-worst QBR of the playoff era.
No Power 4 team averaged fewer yards per dropback last year than Florida State (4.8).
Pribula, Horn, Angeli and Brown were all considered blue-chip recruits and ranked among the top 30 QBs of the class of 2022. Entering Year 4 of their careers, they’ve combined to make two starts and have thrown 192 total passes.
Tier 9: Welcome to the big leagues (14 players)
Colorado (Kaidon Salter, Julian Lewis)
Iowa (Mark Gronowski, Hank Brown)
North Carolina (Gio Lopez, Bryce Baker, Max Johnson)
Tennessee (Joey Aguilar, Jake Merklinger, George MacIntyre)
Utah (Devon Dampier, Brendan Zurbrugg, Isaac Wilson, Nate Johnson)
Bill Belichick is betting big on a QB from South Alabama. Iowa’s offense could finally have some life with a QB from South Dakota State. Utah might’ve planned to keep turning to Cam Rising right up until Cam Rising Jr. was ready to take over, but instead, the Utes will turn to a QB from New Mexico. All of the Tier 9 quarterbacks are moving up from a lower level and will be expected to produce immediately at places with high hopes for a playoff run in 2025.
QB comparison
QB A: 70.1 QBR, 61 TD passes, 31 turnovers, 8.0 yards per attempt, 60.1 completions, 289 yards per game
QB B: 69.7 QBR, 54 TD passes, 16 turnovers, 7.7 yards per attempt, 63.5 completions, 249 yards per game
QB A definitely needs to cut down on the turnovers, but aside from that, they’re pretty close, right? Well, QB A is Aguilar’s numbers over the past two years. QB B is Tennessee’s quarterback production over that same span.
OK, one more.
QB A: 395 plays, 25 TDs, 7 turnovers, 2,559 pass yards in 11 starts
QB B: 391 plays, 18 TDs, 10 turnovers, 2,459 pass yards in 10 starts
You’d lean QB A, but not by a wide margin. QB A is UNC’s Lopez last year playing in the Sun Belt. QB B is former UNC quarterback Jacolby Criswell‘s line for the Heels in 2024.
Fun facts:
Most touchdowns accounted for over the past two seasons, returning QBs:
Salter, 66
Klubnik, 66
King, 62
Pavia, 61
Aguilar, 61
No QB was more elusive under pressure last year than Dampier. No one even came close. Dampier was sacked once for every 25.2 dropbacks under pressure — nearly eight more dropbacks per sack than the next-best player.
Iowa has only 47 touchdown passes in the past five seasons combined. In that same span, Ohio State has 173.
Iowa hasn’t averaged 1.0 passing touchdowns per game since … 2019.
QBs who accounted for 1,000 non-sack rush yards last year and return for 2025: Mateer (1,032), Parker Navarro (1,143), Dampier (1,187) and Horvath (1,298).
Lopez saw man coverage on just 19.3% of his dropbacks last year, the lowest rate of any returning QBR-qualified FBS player and roughly half as often as UNC QBs last season.
Tier 10: One more try (seven players)
Arizona (Noah Fifita, Braedyn Locke)
Mississippi State (Blake Shapen, Luke Kromenhoek)
Virginia Tech (Kyron Drones, William Watson III, Garret Rangel)
Like the QBs in Tier 8, these players are hoping to erase some bad memories from 2024. But unlike Tier 8, these QBs stayed put. Fifita, Drones and Shapen have all experienced success, but all fell flat last season. But they all have enough potential that the schools who’ve been on the roller coaster with them were willing to go for one last ride in 2025.
QB comparison
QB A: 88.0 QBR, 9.84 yards per pass, 8 touchdowns, 4 picks, 19 completions of 20 yards or more
QB B: 59.4 QBR, 6.06 yards per pass, 6 touchdowns, 6 picks, 6 completions of 20 yards or more
QB A has some swagger, right? Well, that’s Arizona’s Fifita last season when targeting future No. 8 draft pick Tetairoa McMillan. QB B is Fifita when throwing to any other wide receiver.
Fun facts:
Drones in wins over the past two seasons: 11 games, 75.6 QBR, 63.8% completions, 8.63 yards per pass, 29 touchdowns, 6 turnovers, 15 sacks
Drones in losses over the past two seasons: nine games, 47.3 QBR, 55.8% completions, 5.85 yards per pass, 10 touchdowns, 11 turnovers, 20 sacks.
Since the start of the 2023 season, Shapen has averaged 7.8 yards per pass, accounted for 27 touchdowns and thrown only four picks. But he has also sat out 12 games.
Tier 11: Room for improvement (eight players)
Oregon State (Maalik Murphy, Gabarri Johnson)
Pitt (Eli Holstein, David Lynch, Cole Gonzales)
West Virginia (Nicco Marchiol, Jaylen Henderson, Max Brown)
Holstein, Marchiol and Murphy, who were all solid recruits, have shown flashes of brilliance but have left fans wanting more. But if they can build off the foundation from 2024 and blossom this season, there’s a chance they could become genuine stars.
QB comparison
QB A: 45.5 QBR, 7.1 yards per pass, 15 touchdowns, 7 turnovers
QB B: 91.4 QBR, 10.8 yards per pass, 5 touchdowns, 1 turnover
Two completely different players, right? Well, QB A is Holstein in the first three quarters last season. QB B is Holstein’s fourth-quarter production.
Fun facts:
Holstein vs. top-40 defenses (by efficiency) last season: 31.6 QBR, 5.3 yards per attempt, 0 touchdowns, 4 interceptions
Holstein vs. everyone else: 55.6 QBR, 8.54 yards per attempt, 17 touchdowns, 3 interceptions.
Marchiol has 10 career games since 2022 in which he has taken at least 10 snaps. His line in those games: 58% completions, 9 total TDs, 5 turnovers, 6.16 yards per pass.
The only Power 4 QBs with more games with three passing touchdowns than Murphy’s six last season? Ward, Klubnik and Shedeur Sanders.
Murphy is 11-3 as a starting QB. That’s a better career winning percentage than Jordan Travis, Dillon Gabriel and Riley Leonard.
Tier 12: What’s in the box? (10 players)
Boston College (Dylan Lonergan, Grayson James)
Minnesota (Drake Lindsey, Dylan Wittke, Emmett Morehead)
Oklahoma State (Hauss Hejny, Zane Flores)
Stanford (Elijah Brown, Ben Gulbranson, Dylan Rizk)
The four schools in Tier 12 are turning to largely unproven quarterbacks in 2025. Hejny, Brown, Lonergan and Lindsey — should they end up the starters — have a combined 11 career passing attempts. So, what will happen? That’s the beauty of the unknown. Until the games are played, we can assume this will all work out wonderfully.
QB comparison
QB A: 78.9 QBR, 8.11 yards per attempt, 2.8 TD-INT ratio
QB B: 56.0 QBR, 6.84 yards per attempt, 1.5 TD-INT ratio
It might be hard to remember, but there was a time when Stanford churned out some exceptional quarterbacks. QB A is the Cardinal’s passing rates from 2010 to 2018, when Andrew Luck, Kevin Hogan and KJ Costello put up big numbers, played in Rose Bowls and won 78% of their games. QB B, on the other hand, is Stanford’s QBs over the past six seasons — none amounting to more than four wins.
Fun facts:
Best QBR vs. bowl-eligible Power 4 teams among returning players (minimum four starts):
Robertson, 83.2
Pavia, 82.6
Beck, 82.1
Grayson James, 82.1
During Mike Gundy’s first 15 seasons at Oklahoma State, the Cowboys averaged a touchdown pass every 15.5 attempts. Since 2020, that rate has jumped to one for every 24.7 attempts.
Stanford has not thrown 20 touchdown passes in a season since 2018.
Tier 13: Wily veterans (11 players)
Colorado State (Brayden Fowler-Nicolosi, Jackson Brousseau)
Kentucky (Zach Calzada, Beau Allen)
Miami (OH) (Dequan Finn, Henry Hesson)
Memphis (Brendon Lewis, Antwann Hill)
Rutgers (Athan Kaliakmanis, AJ Surace, Rocco Rainone)
The COVID-19 season afforded everyone an extra year of eligibility, and that changed QB play for the past few years. In 2018, the average QBR-qualified quarterback had started 18.4 games by season’s end. In 2023, that number had jumped to 23.6 — basically an extra half-season, on average, of starting experience. Last year, 29 different quarterbacks (21% of FBS starters) finished the season with at least 36 career starts — essentially three full seasons’ worth — with Bo Nix topping the list with 61. Gabriel ended his career with 63 starts. The 2025 season will be the last to include a sizable number of COVID-eligibility players, while the trend toward less experienced QBs is already beginning. Still, there are a few who have paid their dues — and then some. That’s what Tier 13 is all about. The anticipated starters here already have 157 career starts across 13 schools under their belts.
QB comparison
QB A: 57.7 QBR, 2 touchdowns, 4 interceptions
QB B: 78.2 QBR, 10 touchdowns, 2 interceptions
The first guy is Rutgers’ Kaliakmanis through the first five games of last season. The second guy is Kaliakmanis after that.
Fun facts:
Two teams had a single QB throw every pass last season: Rutgers and New Mexico.
No returning QB had a higher Pro Football Focus grade last season than Lewis.
Four quarterbacks — Paxton Lynch, Brady White, Riley Ferguson and Seth Henigan — account for 153 of the past 154 games started for the Tigers, dating to 2013. Each started at least 26 games at Memphis and accounted for at least 70 touchdowns.
Tier 14: Best of the Group of 5 (10 players)
Florida Atlantic (Caden Veltkamp, Kasen Weisman)
UConn (Joe Fagnano, Nick Evers)
Ohio (Parker Navarro, Nick Poulos)
Old Dominion (Colton Joseph, Quinn Henicle)
Southern Miss (Braylon Braxton, Jeremy Hecklinski)
Toledo (Tucker Gleason, John Alan Richter)
South Florida (Byrum Brown, Bryce Archie)
UTSA (Owen McCown, Dematrius Davis Jr.)
These days in college football, there’s a pretty steady talent drain from the Group of 5 to the big boys. In the past two seasons, 47 quarterbacks from outside the Power 5 finished with a QBR of 60 or better. Only 17 returned to their team the next year (36%). Sixteen transferred to Power 4 schools. The point is, keeping talented quarterbacks in the Group of 5 is tough to do. The players in Tier 14 still fit the bill.
QB comparison
QB A: 9.9 yards per pass, 13 touchdowns, 1 pick
QB B: 7.2 yards per pass, five touchdowns, 7 picks
QB A was basically unstoppable. That was FAU’s Veltkamp last season (at Western Kentucky) against man coverage. QB B struggled much more. That was Veltkamp vs. zone defenses.
Fun facts:
Braxton vs. the blitz last season: 94.3 QBR (best among returning QBs), 8 TDs, 0 INTs, 10.51 yards per attempt.
Braxton’s 59.7 QBR when pressured is the second best among all returning QBs (trailing only Horvath).
Last year at Marshall, Braxton went 8-0 as the starter. In those games, he had 15 touchdowns and two picks.
Braxton had three games in which he threw three touchdowns and no interceptions while tallying fewer than 220 yards passing. In the playoff era, only three other QBs have done that.
In the fourth quarter last season, Navarro completed 77% of his throws, averaged 9.8 yards per attempt, and posted a QBR of 96.0, the best mark of any QB in the country.
Navarro is one of just 13 FBS QBs to rush for 18 touchdowns or more in a season in the playoff era.
UConn’s offense averaged 6.7 yards per play and 7.97 yards per pass with Fagnano at QB last year. With Evers: 4.96 yards per play and 5.04 yards per pass.
The only Group of 5 QB with 3,000 yards, 30 touchdowns and 13 or fewer turnovers returning to his team this season: Gleason.
QBs returning to the same team who posted a QBR of 60, threw 25 touchdowns and 10 or fewer interceptions: Klubnik, Becht, Robertson, Johnson and UTSA’s McCown.
Tier 15a: We used to be somebody: top recruit edition (10 players)
Maryland (Justyn Martin, Malik Washington)
Louisiana (Walker Howard, Daniel Beale)
UCF (Tayven Jackson, Jacurri Brown, Davi Belfort, Cam Fancher)
Wake Forest (Robby Ashford, Deshawn Purdie)
The transfer portal has turned the task of evaluating QB depth charts into something akin to joining Facebook in the 2010s, where you find out what happened to folks you used to know but had all but forgotten about — only instead of realizing your prom date is now a divorced dental hygienist in Topeka, you shake your head and think, “Robby Ashford’s at Wake Forest now? I never would’ve guessed!” And in true mid-2010s Facebook fashion, Purdue’s Browne ended up rekindling a relationship with his ex.
Tier 15b: We used to be somebody: established starter edition (17 players)
James Madison (Matthew Sluka, Camden Coleman)
Liberty (Ethan Vasko, Ryan Burger)
Purdue (Ryan Browne, Bennett Meredith, Evans Chuba, Malachi Singleton)
Tulane (Kadin Semonza, Brendan Sullivan)
UNLV (Anthony Colandrea, Alex Orji)
Washington State (Zevi Eckhaus, Ajani Sheppard, Jaxon Potter)
Wisconsin (Billy Edwards Jr., Danny O’Neil)
It’s fun that Purdue’s starting QB situation can be reasonably explained with the GIF of Grandpa Simpson opening a door, doing a lap and walking back out the door. Browne started a pair of games for the Boilermakers last season, entered the portal, spent four months with Belichick, then went right back to Purdue, no harm done.
QB comparison
QB A: 72.3% completions, 13 touchdowns, two turnovers, 70.0 QBR
QB B: 59.7% completions, seven touchdowns, nine turnovers, 48.8 QBR
That’s one QB playing elite football and another who deserves a seat on the bench, right? Well QB A was Edwards in August and September of last year at Maryland. QB B is Edwards the rest of the way. On the other hand, Maryland’s record in August and September dating back to 2013 is 36-10. After Oct. 1, however, the Terps are 28-69. So maybe the problem wasn’t Edwards.
Fun facts:
Only returning QBs with an adjusted completion percentage less than 60%: Purdie (59.6) and Parker Awad (53.4)
The only QBR-qualified Power 4 QB not to throw a single touchdown pass on third or fourth down last season: Edwards (0 TDs, 4 INTs).
Among 207 QBs with at least 60 dropbacks last season, Anthony Colandrea finished 162nd in yards per dropback (5.48) and Alex Orji finished 207th (2.93).
UCF has three quarterbacks on its roster who were four-star recruits and another with four years of experience as part-time starters. The combined stat line of those QBs: 37 starts, 17-20 record, 45.3 QBR, 38 touchdown passes, 37 interceptions.
Sullivan spent the past three years at Iowa and Northwestern. Those two teams combined in that span have a QBR of 37.1, with 63 TD passes and 62 INTs. Tulane in that same span: 64.0 QBR, 80 touchdown passes and 20 INTs.
Tier 16a: We used to be ACC starters (17 players)
Akron (Ben Finley, Brayden Roggow)
Charlotte (Conner Harrell, Grayson Loftis, Zach Wilcke)
Coastal Carolina (MJ Morris, Emmett Brown)
Georgia State (Christian Veilleux, Cameran Brown)
Nevada (Chubba Purdy, AJ Bianco)
South Alabama (Zach Pyron, Bishop Davenport)
Texas State (Nate Yarnell, Keldric Luster, Holden Geriner, Brad Jackson)
Tier 16b: We used to be starters in the Big Ten, Big 12 or SEC (11 players)
App State (AJ Swann, JJ Kohl)
Bowling Green (Drew Pyne, Lucian Anderson III)
Eastern Michigan (Noah Kim, Jeremiah Salem)
UMass (Brandon Rose, AJ Hairston, Grant Jordan)
Utah State (Bryson Barnes, Jacob Conover)
The Peter Principle suggests that people rise to the level of their incompetence. The inverse of this might be true in college football now, where QBs fall to the level of their competence. This tier has 79 career starts at the Power 4 level, winning 35 of them. These QBs moved on — in some cases, twice already — and now find themselves helming Group of 5 offenses. For a few, such as Finley and Veilleux, it has already proved to be a smart move. For the rest, 2025 could be the year they find new life at a slightly lower level.
QB comparison
QB A: 9-4 as a starter, 64% completions, 29 touchdown passes, 12 picks, 7.7 yards per attempt
QB B: 9-3 as a starter, 61% completions, 29 touchdown passes, 12 picks, 7.1 yards per attempt
Both guys are pretty solid, right? QB A is getting plenty of love for it, too. That’s LSU’s Nussmeier last season. QB B though? That’d be Bowling Green’s Pyne dating to 2021 across three different Power 5 schools.
Fun facts:
In the playoff era, Bryson Barnes is one of just five QBs to account for at least 17 touchdowns on fewer than 200 touches.
Finley’s last five games of the season at Akron: 3-2 record, 9 TD passes, 2 interceptions, 21 completions of 20 yards or more. Finley averaged 11.4 air yards per throw in that span, completing just 47% but averaging 14.7 yards per completion.
Tier 17: We can make this work (16 players)
Arkansas State (Jaylen Raynor, Ethan Crawford)
ECU (Katin Houser, Raheim Jeter)
FIU (Keyone Jenkins, Chayden Peery)
Georgia Southern (JC French, Turner Helton)
Louisiana Tech (Evan Bullock, Blake Baker)
Middle Tennessee (Nicholas Vattiato, Roman Gagliano)
Sam Houston (Hunter Watson, Mabrey Mettauer)
SJSU (Walker Eget, Xavier Ward)
There’s no shame in being in Tier 17. These QBs have all had a little success, proved they belong and figure to be perfectly good in 2025, too. They’re a little like flying out of Atlanta-Hartsfield. It’s far from a pleasant experience, but when you consider the context, it really should be so much worse.
QB comparison
QB A: 48.6 QBR, 56% completions, 22 touchdowns, 11 turnovers, 21 completions of 20 yards or more
QB B: 48.1 QBR, 62% completions, 21 touchdowns, 10 turnovers, 21 completions of 20 yards or more
QB A is one of the biggest names in the Group of 5 — Liberty’s Salter, now QB1 at Colorado. QB B is Sam Houston’s Watson.
Fun facts:
ECU’s Katin Houser had the lowest average time to delivery among returning QBs (2.35 seconds).
Jenkins’ last four games of the season: 70.3 QBR, 64% completions, 10.2 yards per pass, 12 touchdowns, one interception.
In six games vs. teams with a .500 record or better, Raynor had four touchdown passes and seven interceptions. In seven games vs. teams with a losing record, he threw 12 TD passes and three interceptions.
Vattiato has thrown for more yards (7,524) in his career than all but three other returning quarterbacks.
Tier 18a: New faces, good places (17 players)
Air Force (Josh Johnson, Liam Szarka, Maguire Martin)
Army (Dewayne Coleman, Cale Hellums, Ethan Washington)
Fresno State (E.J. Warner, Jayden Mandal)
Jacksonville State (Cade Cunningham, Gavin Wimsatt)
North Texas (Reese Poffenbarger, Drew Mestemaker)
San Diego State (Jayden Denegal, Bert Emanuel Jr)
Wyoming (Kaden Anderson, Mason Drube, Landon Sims)
Everyone in this tier has a fresh face at QB, but these schools have some history of talent at the position. Whether anyone can repeat the success of past stars such as Bryson Daily or Josh Allen, however, remains a big question.
Tier 18b: Welcome to the club (six players)
Delaware (Zach Marker, Nick Minicucci, Braden Streeter)
Missouri State (Jacob Clark, Drew Viotto, Deuce Bailey)
The two newest FBS programs both return established QBs with some talent, and given the quick success of JMU, Jacksonville State and Sam Houston after moving up from the FCS, it’s certainly possible these guys could make some noise in Conference USA.
Tier 18c: Lost that loving feeling (four players)
Troy (Goose Crowder, Tucker Kilcrease)
Western Kentucky (Maverick McIvor, Tucker Parks)
It’s just a shame that a QB named Maverick and a QB named Goose aren’t on the depth chart at Navy.
Fun facts:
The only active QBs with more multi-touchdown passing games than Warner (18): Finn, Aguilar and Pavia.
Warner’s 37 career interceptions are the most by any returning QB.
Air Force’s QBR from 2019 through 2022: 67.9. Air Force’s QBR the past two seasons: 34.6.
Tier 19: It could be worse (21 players)
Ball State (Kiael Kelly, Walter Taylor III)
Buffalo (Ta’Quan Roberson, Gunnar Gray)
Central Michigan (Joe Labas, Angel Flores)
Marshall (Zion Turner, Carlos Del Rio-Wilson)
New Mexico State (Logan Fife, Parker Awad)
Northern Illinois (Josh Holst, Jalen Macon)
Rice (AJ Padgett, Drew Devillier)
Temple (Evan Simon, Gevani McCoy, Anthony Chiccitt)
UAB (Jalen Kitna, Ryder Burton)
UTEP (Skyler Locklear, Malachi Nelson)
Each year, there are quarterbacks who fly completely beneath the radar, have perfectly fine seasons, and for one random Tuesday night in November, capture the imagination of a few thousand of the most die-hard college football fans by throwing for 400 yards and six touchdowns against Akron. Somewhere in this tier is that QB for 2025.
Fun facts:
Turner and Del-Rio Wilson have combined to play for six schools, make 14 starts and throw 13 touchdown passes.
Kitna vs. Tulsa last season: 78% completions, 6 touchdown passes, 12.6 yards per pass.
Kitna vs. everyone else: 60% completions, 11 touchdown passes, 11 picks, 6.4 yards per pass.
Last season, Labas threw five interceptions against Florida International. Every other quarterback in the country accounted for six interceptions against Florida International. Labas accounted for 17% of all of FIU’s interceptions since 2020
Locklear and UConn’s Nick Evers are the only FBS QBs to throw for 90 yards or fewer while attempting at least 10 passes in four different games last season.
Tier 20: Nowhere but up (16 players)
Hawai’i (Micah Alejado, Luke Weaver, Jarret Nielsen)
Kennesaw State (Dexter Williams, Amari Odom)
Kent State (Devin Kargman, Ruel Tomlinson)
New Mexico (Cole Welliver, Toa Faavae, Jack Layne)
Tulsa (Kirk Francis, Carson Horton)
UL Monroe (Aiden Armenta, Hunter Herring)
Western Michigan (Broc Lowry, Brady Jones)
Each season, only a few hundred players get to say they’re an FBS quarterback. These guys are among them. That’s something.
Fun facts:
QBs with seven or more starts who threw more interceptions than touchdowns last season:
Zeon Chriss: four TDs, eight picks
Gevani McCoy: three TDs, six picks
Ashton Daniels: 10 TDs, 12 picks
Isaac Wilson: 10 TDs, 11 picks
Bryce Archie: nine TDs, 10 picks
Jack Lausch: seven TDs, eight picks
Armenta: nine TDs, 10 picks; he’s the only member of this group pegged to start again in 2025
No QBR-qualified player returning for 2025 finished last season with a lower QBR than Francis (27.7).
The last QB to start a win vs. an FBS team at Kent State is Collin Schlee. He played for two other teams since then and is out of eligibility.
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David Hale
CLEMSON, S.C. — Dabo Swinney has a knack for finding a silver lining. It has been his defining trait over the past five seasons, as Clemson has hovered near the top of the ACC, but frustratingly far from the run of dominance it enjoyed in the 2010s. In a loss, Swinney found lessons. Even after a blowout, he saw hope. Even in the midst of fan revolt, he found all the evidence he needed of an inevitable turnaround within his own locker room.
Perhaps that’s what’s most jarring about Clemson’s most recent bout with mediocrity. It’s not just that the Tigers, the prohibitive favorite in the ACC to open the season, are 1-3 heading into Saturday’s showdown with equally disappointing and 2-2 North Carolina (noon ET, ESPN), but that Swinney’s usual optimism has been tinged with his own frustration.
“It’s just an absolute coaching failure,” Swinney said. “I don’t know another way to say it. And I’m not pointing the finger, I’m pointing the thumb. It starts with me, because I hired everybody, and I empower everybody and equip everybody.”
Record aside, Clemson has been here before — after slow starts in 2021, 2022, 2023 and last year’s blowout at the hands of Georgia to open the season. And yet, at each of those turns, Swinney remained his program’s biggest salesman.
Now, after the Tigers’ worst start since 2004, not even Swinney is immune to the reality. The questions are bigger, the stakes are higher and the solutions are more ephemeral.
In the aftermath of an emphatic loss to Syracuse in Death Valley two weeks ago, ESPN social posted the historic upset in bold type. The response from former Clemson defensive end Xavier Thomas echoed the frustration so many inside the Tigers’ once impenetrable inner sanctum are feeling.
“At this point,” Thomas replied, “it’s not even an upset anymore.”
Two months remain of a seemingly lost season. There is a path for Clemson to rebound, as it has before, and finish with a respectable, albeit disappointing, record. But there is another road, too — one hardly imagined by anyone inside the program just weeks ago. A road that leads to the end of a dynasty.
“He’s definitely bought himself some time to be able to have some hiccups along the way,” former Clemson receiver Hunter Renfrow said. “He’s an unbelievable coach and leader, and he’ll get it figured out.”
FORMER CLEMSON RUNNING back and now podcaster Darien Rencher banked a cache of interviews with star players during fall camp that he planned to release as the season progressed. Most have been evergreen. At the time he talked with Clemson quarterback Cade Klubnik, that one did, too. Looking back, it feels more like a time capsule, one that can’t be unearthed without a full autopsy of what has unfolded since.
“A month and a half ago, we’re talking about him being a front-runner for the Heisman, a top-five draft pick,” Rencher said. “I mean — my gosh.”
Any unspooling of what has gone wrong at Clemson must start with the quarterback.
Klubnik’s career followed a pretty straight trend — a rocky rookie season primarily as the backup to a sophomore campaign filled with growing pains to a coming-out party last season that ended with 336 passing yards and three touchdowns in a playoff loss to Texas. The obvious next step was into the echelon of elite QBs — not just nationally, but within the pantheon of Clemson’s best, alongside Deshaun Watson and Trevor Lawrence.
Instead, Klubnik has looked lost.
“It can’t be physical unless he’s got the yips, which maybe he does,” former Clemson offensive lineman and current ACC Network analyst Eric Mac Lain said. “It’s bad sometimes. You’ve got guys screaming wide-open, and he’s looking at them, and the ball’s just not coming out. That’s the unexplainable thing.”
Through four games, Klubnik has nearly as many passing touchdowns (six) as he does interceptions (four).
There are, however, more than a few folks around the program who believe they can explain the struggles — for Klubnik and other stars who underwhelmed in September.
“We don’t got no dogs at Clemson,” former All-America defensive end Shaq Lawson posted in early September. “NIL has changed everything.”
It’s telling that even Swinney also has been vocal in his critique of Klubnik.
“It’s routine stuff. Basic, not complicated, like just simple reads, simple progression,” Swinney said of Klubnik’s play in Week 1, a performance that has been mirrored in subsequent games. “Holding the ball and running out of the pocket. Just didn’t play well, and so I didn’t have to talk to him. He already knew. He knows the game.”
This is a different era of college football, and while Swinney often sought a measure of patience with his players before, Klubnik is, by most reports, the second-highest-paid person inside the football building after Swinney, so the expectations have changed.
“If [Klubnik] ain’t a dude, we ain’t winning,” Swinney said after the loss to LSU in Week 1. “Dudes got to be dudes. This is big boy football.”
That massive NIL paydays and equally immense hype might underpin Klubnik’s struggles is not without anecdotal evidence. Look around the country and there are plenty of others — Florida‘s DJ Lagway, Texas‘ Arch Manning, UCLA‘s Nico Iamaleava, South Carolina‘s LaNorris Sellers and LSU’s Garrett Nussmeier — who’ve endured rough starts to seasons that were supposed to be star turns.
And yet, for Klubnik, this feels like a hollow excuse. He is, according to numerous coaches and teammates, unflinchingly competitive and talented. If anything, the knock on Klubnik the past few years has been his eagerness to play the role of hero, to do too much.
Perhaps the bigger impact of NIL on Klubnik’s performance comes in how far he has been from earning the paycheck. The millions could be an excuse to relax or a burden to live up to, and Klubnik’s tape through four games shows a QB scrambling to look the part rather than simply playing the game as he always has.
“It’s a tough sport and a team sport. There’s no perfect quarterback,” Klubnik said. “For me, I’m not paying attention to how other quarterbacks are playing, but I’m competitive whether we’re good or not, and I’m going to fight to the very end. I feel like the tape shows that, but you ask anybody in this facility about who I am and who this team is, we’re going to fight and we’re not going anywhere.”
SWINNEY HAS OFTEN bristled at outright criticism of his own performance, like his tirade in response to one apoplectic Clemson fan — Tyler from Spartanburg — who called into Swinney’s radio show after a 4-4 start to the 2023 season demanding change. Swinney’s rant was largely credited as inspiring a five-game winning streak to end the year, an emphatic rebuke to those ready to write his epitaph.
“He’s done it his way,” Renfrow said of Swinney. “And he’s built a really good roster. Three months ago, everyone was crowning us as the best team to play this year.”
The narrative has quickly changed, and Swinney isn’t arguing.
“Everybody can start throwing mud now,” Swinney said even before this latest round of mudslinging began in earnest. “Bring it on, say we suck again. Tell everybody we suck. Coaches suck, Cade stinks. Start writing that again.”
During Clemson’s past four seasons — years of 10, 10, nine and 10 wins — the underlying narrative was that the Tigers remained good, but they were slowly falling behind the competition due to Swinney’s stubborn insistence on remaining old-school. He was tagged as reluctant to embrace the NIL era due to comments he made in 2014, seven years before NIL began (though Clemson was heavily invested in its players via its collective at the time), and for multiple seasons, he refused to deal in the portal, retaining the vast majority of his recruited talent but adding nothing in the portal until this offseason.
And yet, Swinney has evolved — even if a bit more gradually than most coaches.
“One of the lazy takes on Swinney is he hasn’t changed,” Rencher said. “He did what he needed to do to give them a chance. He went and got the best offensive coordinator [Garrett Riley] in the country to come to Clemson. He got one of the most renowned defensive coordinators [Tom Allen] in the country who was just in the playoffs to come to Clemson. He went in the portal and got a stud D-end [in Will Heldt]. He paid his guys, retained his roster. These guys got paid.”
Even amid the hefty criticism coming from former players, little has been directed at Swinney. They played for him, they know him, and they’re convinced he’s not the source of Clemson’s struggles.
The new coordinators — Riley was hired in 2023, and Allen was hired this offseason — and current players, however, are a different story.
“They want to win more than we do,” former edge rusher KJ Henry posted amid Clemson’s stunning loss against Syracuse.
The outpouring of frustration from former players — many, such as Henry, who endured a share of setbacks during Clemson’s more rocky stretch in the 2020s — has been notable.
Heldt said he has not paid much attention to outside criticism, but he understands it.
“They’ve earned the right,” Heldt said. “They put in the time and have earned the right to say how they feel, but I don’t put too much thought into that.”
If the commentary hasn’t seeped into the locker room, the message still seems clear.
Swinney’s scathing review of the coaching staff — himself included — this week was evidence that the whole culture is off. Swinney was lambasted for years for an insular approach to building a staff, hiring mostly former Clemson players and promoting from within, but those hires at least maintained a culture that had driven championships. But now, the disjointed play and lack of any obvious identity on both sides of the ball has made Riley and Allen feel more like mercenaries than saviors, and the result is a sum that is less than its individual parts.
Riley’s playcalling has been questioned relentlessly. In the second half against LSU, with Clemson either ahead or within a score, the Tigers virtually abandoned the run game entirely.
Allen was brought in to toughen up a defense that was scorched last season by Louisville, SMU, Texas and, in the most embarrassing performance of the season, by Sellers and rival South Carolina. And yet, with NFL talent such as Heldt, Peter Woods and T.J. Parker on the defensive line, Syracuse owned the line of scrimmage in its Week 4 win in Death Valley.
Meanwhile promising recruits such as T.J. Moore and Gideon Davidson have yet to look ready for the big time, and the transfer additions beyond Heldt — Tristan Smith and Jeremiah Alexander — have offered virtually nothing.
Start making a list of all the things that have gone wrong, and the frustration is apparent.
“Dropped balls, Cade misses a guy, the offensive line gets beat, Cade has PTSD and rolls out when he shouldn’t — it’s just all these things,” Rencher said. “You can blame a lot of things but it’s just too much wrong to where it can’t be right. It’s too many things everywhere so it can’t come together. You can overcome some things, but they’re just all not on the same page.”
BEFORE HIS GAME against Clemson, which Georgia Tech ultimately won on a last-second field goal, Yellow Jackets coach Brent Key set the stage for what he knew would be a battle, despite the Tigers’ rocky start.
“No one’s better at playing the underdog than Dabo,” Key said.
Swinney has resurrected his teams again and again, swatted away the critics, stayed true to his core philosophies and emerged victorious — if not a national champion.
So, is this year really different? Has Clemson lost its edge? Has Swinney lost his magic?
“I see an extremely talented team,” Syracuse defensive coordinator Elijah Robinson said. “Those guys are dangerous. I don’t care what their record is. That’s not just a team, that’s a program. Dabo Swinney does a great job, and they went out and lost the first game last year and went on to win the conference. A lot of these kids, when I was at Texas A&M, we tried to recruit them. People can think what they want when they look at the record. I’m not looking at the record at all.”
Added another assistant coach who faced Clemson this season: “It wouldn’t surprise me if they run the table the rest of the way.”
Winning out would still get Clemson to 10 wins, a mark that has been the standard under Swinney. Winning out would likely shift all the criticism of September into another offseason of promise, such as the one Clemson just enjoyed. Winning out is still possible, according to the players there who’ve said a deep breath during an off week has been a chance to reset and start anew.
“The college football landscape has changed so much over the last 10 years,” Renfrow said. “But developing, teaching, coaching, bringing people together — that hasn’t, and Swinney’s as good as I’ve been around at those things.”
That’s largely the lesson Florida State head coach Mike Norvell took from his team’s miserable 2-10 performance a year ago. In the face of a landslide of change and criticism, the key is doubling down on the beliefs that made a coach successful to begin with, not a host of changes intended to appease the masses.
“The dynamic of college football and being a part of a team and the pressures that are within an organization now are greater than they’ve ever been,” Norvell said. “You put money into the equation, and you have all the agents and people surrounding these kids, when things don’t go as expected, you’ve got to really stay true to who you are and make sure you’re connected with these guys at their needs. The example we had last year, we didn’t do a great job at that because as the tidal wave of challenges showed up, it’s critical to refocus and revamp the guys for what they can do. It’s not fun to go through, but I think you’ll continue to see more and more.”
The game has changed, and Clemson, for all of Swinney’s steadfast resolve, has been swept along with the currents.
There’s a legacy at Clemson, one it helped build, and for all its faith in Swinney’s process, it’s not hard to see the cracks in the façade.
Never mind the record, Rencher said. Maintaining the Clemson standard is what’s at stake now.
“That, more than any loss, would be the most disappointing thing, if they didn’t respond,” Rencher said. “Swinney’s optimistic. They’re built to last. He said they’re going to use all these things people are throwing at us to build more championships, and I believe him. Clemson is built on belief and responding the right way. It would be unlike Clemson to not respond. That would be so much more disappointing than going 1-3 if we just laid down. If this is the class that just lays down, I can’t imagine that.”
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Alden Gonzalez
WHEN THE LOW point arrived last year, on Sept. 15 in Atlanta, Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts broke character and challenged some of his players in a meeting many of them later identified as a fulcrum in their championship run.
This year, he attempted to strike a more positive tone.
It was Sept. 6. The Dodgers had just been walked off in Baltimore, immediately after being swept in Pittsburgh, and though they were still 15 games above .500, a sense of uneasiness lingered. Their division lead was slim, consistency remained elusive and spirits were noticeably down. Roberts saw an opportunity to take stock.
“He was talking to us about the importance of what was in front of us,” Dodgers infielder Miguel Rojas said in Spanish. “At that time, there were like seven, eight weeks left because we only had three weeks left in the regular season, and he wanted all of us, collectively, to think about what we were still capable of doing, and the opportunity we still had to win another championship.”
Later that night, Yoshinobu Yamamoto got within an out of no-hitting the Baltimore Orioles, then he surrendered a home run to Jackson Holliday and watched the bullpen implode after his exit, allowing three additional runs in what became the Dodgers’ most demoralizing loss of the season. The next morning, though, music blared inside Camden Yards’ visiting clubhouse. Players were upbeat, vibes were positive.
The Dodgers won behind an effective Clayton Kershaw later that afternoon, then reeled off 16 wins over their next 21 games — including back-to-back emphatic victories over the Cincinnati Reds in the first round of the playoffs.
It took a day, but Roberts’ message had seemingly landed.
“We needed some positivity,” Dodgers outfielder Teoscar Hernandez said, “to remove all of the negativity that we were feeling in that moment.”
As they approach a highly anticipated National League Division Series against the Philadelphia Phillies, the Dodgers once again look like one of the deepest, most fearsome teams in the sport.
But the journey there was arduous.
A Dodgers team many outsiders pegged as a candidate to break the regular-season-wins record of 116 ultimately won only 93, its fewest total in seven years. Defending a championship, a task no team has successfully pulled off in a quarter-century, has proven to be a lot more difficult than many Dodger players anticipated. But they’ve maintained a belief that their best selves would arrive when it mattered most. And whether it’s a product of health, focus, or because the right message hit them at the right time, they believe it’s here now.
“We’re coming together at the right time,” Dodgers third baseman Max Muncy said amid a champagne-soaked celebration Wednesday night, “and that’s all that really matters.”
BUSTER POSEY’S San Francisco Giants became the most dominant team in the first half of the 2010s, during which they captured three championships. They won every other year — on even years, famously — but could not pull off the repeat the Dodgers are chasing. To this day, Posey, now the Giants’ president of baseball operations, can’t pinpoint why.
“I wish I could,” Posey said, “because if I knew what that one thing was, I would’ve tried to correct it the second, third time through.”
Major League Baseball has not had a repeat champion since the New York Yankees won their third consecutive title in 2000, a 24-year drought that stands as the longest ever among the four major North American professional sports, according to ESPN Research. In that span, the NBA had a team win back-to-back championships on four different occasions. The NHL? Three. The NFL, whose playoff rounds all consist of one game? Two.
MLB’s drought has occurred in its wild-card era, which began in 1995 and has expanded since.
“The baseball playoffs are really difficult,” Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman said. “You obviously have to be really good. You also have to have some really good fortune. The number of rounds and the fact that the very best team in the league wins around 60% of their games, the very worst team wins around 40% — now you take the upper-echelon in the playoffs, and the way baseball games can play out, good fortune is a real part of determining the outcomes.”
The Dodgers, now 11 wins shy of a second consecutive title, will hope for some of that good fortune this month. They’ve already encountered some of the pitfalls that come with winning a championship, including the one Posey experienced most vividly: the toll of playing deep into October.
“That month of postseason baseball — it’s more like two or three months of regular-season baseball, just because of the intensity of it,” Posey said.
The Dodgers played through Oct. 30 last year — and then they began this season March 18, nine days before almost everybody else, 5,500 miles away in Tokyo.
“At the time, you don’t see it,” Hernández said, “but when the next season starts, that’s when you start feeling your body not responding the way it should be. And it’s because you don’t get as much time to get ready, to prepare for next season. This one has been so hard, I got to be honest, because — we win last year, and we don’t even have the little extra time that everybody gets because we have to go to Japan. So, you have to push yourself to get ready a month early so you can be ready for those games. Those are games that count for the season. So, working hard when your body is not even close to 100%, I think that’s the reason. I think that’s why you see, after a team wins, next year you see a lot of players getting hurt.”
The Dodgers had the second-most amount of money from player salaries on the injured list this season, behind only the Yankees, the team they defeated in the World Series, according to Spotrac. The Dodgers sent an NL-leading 29 players to the IL, a list that included Freddie Freeman, who underwent offseason surgery on the injured ankle he played through last October, and several other members of their starting lineup — Will Smith, Max Muncy, Tommy Edman and Hernández.
The bullpen that carried the Dodgers through last fall might have paid the heaviest price. Several of those who played a prominent role last October — Blake Treinen, Michael Kopech, Evan Phillips — either struggled, were hurt or did not pitch. It might not have been the sole reason for the bullpen’s struggles — a combined 4.94 ERA from free agent signees Tanner Scott and Kirby Yates played just as big a role — but it certainly didn’t help.
“I don’t know if there’s any carryover thing,” Treinen said Sept. 16 after suffering his third consecutive loss. “I don’t believe in that. We just have a job, and it’s been weird.”
IN FEBRUARY, ROJAS made headlines by saying that the 2025 Dodgers could challenge the wins record and added they might win 120 games at full health. An 8-0 start — after an offseason in which the front office added Blake Snell, Roki Sasaki, Michael Conforto, Hyeseong Kim, Scott and Yates to what was arguably the sport’s best roster already — only ratcheted up the expectations.
The Dodgers managed a 53-32 record through the end of June — but then, they went 10-14 in July, dropped seven of their first 12 games in August and saw a seven-game lead in the National League West turn into a one-game deficit.
From July 1 to Aug. 14, the Dodgers’ offense ranked 20th in OPS and 24th in runs per game. The rotation began to round into form, but the bullpen sported the majors’ highest walk rate and put up a 1.43 WHIP in that stretch, fifth highest.
The Dodgers swept the San Diego Padres at home in mid-August, regaining some control of the division, but then Los Angeles split a series against the last-place Colorado Rockies and lost one in San Diego. The Dodgers swept the Reds, then lost two of three to the Arizona Diamondbacks, dropped three in a row to the Pirates and suffered those back-to-back walk-off losses to the Orioles.
Consistency eluded the Dodgers at a time when it felt as if every opponent was aiming for them.
Before rejoining the Dodgers ahead of the 2023 season, Rojas spent eight years with the Miami Marlins, who were continually out of the playoff race in September and found extra motivation when facing the best teams down the stretch. Those matchups functioned as their World Series.
“I think that’s the problem for those teams after winning a World Series — you’re going to have a target on your back,” Rojas said. “And it’s going to take a lot of effort for your main guys to step up every single day. And then, at the end of the regular season, you’re going to be kind of exhausted from the battle of every single day. And I think that’s why when teams get to the playoffs, they probably fall short.”
Travis d’Arnaud, now a catcher for the Los Angeles Angels, felt the same way while playing for the defending-champion Atlanta Braves in 2022. There was “a little bit more emotion” in games that otherwise didn’t mean much, he said. Teams seemed to bunt more frequently, play their infield in early and consistently line up their best relievers. Often, they’d face a starting pitcher who typically threw in the low-90s but suddenly started firing mid- to upper-90s fastballs.
“It’s just a different intensity,” said A.J. Pierzynski, the catcher for the Chicago White Sox teams that won it all in 2005 and failed to repeat in 2006. “It’s hard to quantify unless you’re playing in the games, but there’s a different intensity if you’re playing.”
BEFORE A SEASON-ENDING sweep of the Seattle Mariners, the 2025 Dodgers were dangerously close to finishing with the fewest full-season wins total of any team Friedman has overseen in these past 11 years. Friedman acknowledged that recently but added a caveat: “I’d also say that going into October, I think it’ll be the most talented team.”
It’s a belief that has fueled the Dodgers.
With Snell and Glasnow healthy, Yamamoto dialing up what was already an NL Cy Young-caliber season and Shohei Ohtani fully stretched out, the Dodgers went into the playoffs believing their rotation could carry them the way their bullpen did a year earlier. Their confidence was validated immediately. Snell allowed two baserunners through the first six innings of Game 1 of the wild-card round Tuesday night, and Yamamoto went 6⅔ innings without allowing an earned run 24 hours later.
“For us, it’s going to be our starting pitching,” Muncy said. “They’re going to set the tone.”
But an offense that has been without Smith, currently nursing a hairline fracture in his right hand, has also been clicking for a while. The Dodgers trailed only the Phillies in slugging percentage over the last three weeks of the regular season. In the Dodgers’ first two playoff games, 10 players combined to produce 28 hits. Six of them came from Mookie Betts, who began the season with an illness that caused him to lose close to 20 pounds and held a .670 OPS — 24 points below the league average — as recently as Aug. 6. Since then, he’s slashing .326/.384/.529.
His trajectory has resembled that of his team.
“We had a lot of struggles, really all year,” Betts said. “But I think we all view that as just a test to see how we would respond. And so now we’re starting to use those tests that we went through earlier to respond now and be ready now. And anything that comes our way, it can’t be worse than what we’ve already gone through.”
The Dodgers still don’t know if their bullpen will be good enough to take them through October — though Sasaki’s ninth inning Wednesday night, when he flummoxed the Reds with triple-digit fastballs and devastating splitters, certainly provided some hope — but they believe in their collective ability to navigate it.
They believe this roster is better and deeper than the championship-winning one from last fall. And, as Rojas said, they believe they “know how to flip the switch when it matters most.”
“It’s been a long year,” Muncy said. “At this point, seven months ago, we were on the other side of the world. We’ve been through a lot this year, and to end up in the spot we’re in right now — we’re in a great spot. We’re in the postseason. That’s all that matters. That’s what we’ve been saying all year. Anything can happen once you’re in October.”
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