Photos: David Rosenblum (left, right), David Buono (middle)/Icon Sportswire

It will be years until we determine what prospects pan out to be the best of this upcoming class, but that isn’t going to stop us from making predictions. Cam Ward, Shedeur Sanders, and Jaxson Dart are projected to be the top 3 quarterbacks taken in this class, but we don’t know the order in which they’ll be selected.

What we do know is how they performed in their collegiate careers from a statistical and scouting perspective, and that is what will be used to project them forward. 

Without a true consensus No. 1 like we have seen in past seasons (e.g. Trevor Lawrence, Joe Burrow), teams will have to look at the fit in their schemes to see which one will have the best potential to succeed. 

A quick pass RPO scheme? Dart would be the look. 

A more mobile playmaker? Ward’s your guy. 

Someone who can avoid pressure and throw on the move? That would be Sanders. 

Using the reports from our scouting department and the metrics from our charting operation, let’s take a look deeper into how these three compare (and contrast) and why we think each fits as they do.

Overall

From a statistical perspective, Dart had the better season in yards per attempt, interceptions, and SIS’ Independent Quarterback Rating (IQR, an SIS quarterback metric that builds on the traditional Passer Rating formula by considering the value of a quarterback independent of results outside of the his control such as dropped passes, dropped interceptions, throwaways, etc.). His success is all the more impressive when considering he also had the higher average depth of target by 2 yards over Ward and almost 4 higher than Sanders.

Under Pressure and On the Move

Most of Dart’s success comes from a clean pocket, as his IQR dips significantly when under pressure and falls behind his two counterparts. As Max Nuscher and Brandon Tew highlighted in Dart’s scouting report, “When under pressure, he throws too often off his back feet and will put the ball in dangerous places.”

Sanders is the one who led the pack in IQR when pressured, but Ward led in accuracy with a 73% on-target percentage. Dart’s was a measly 61%, which was 44th in FBS among 116 QBs with 50 attempts under pressure (put another way, he was in the 63rd percentile of those QBs).

All three of these guys have talent on the move according to our scouts…

“He does a good job with his accuracy on the move and has shown the ability to make good throws across his body and down the field if can’t get set.”

– Max and Brandon on Dart

“He is accurate on the move as long as he can get enough into the throw.”

– Matt Manocherian on Sanders

“His ability to extend plays is phenomenal. He scrambles with a pass-first mindset, constantly keeping his eyes downfield on broken plays.”

– Zach Somma and Vincent Shipe on Ward

IQR and On-Target Percentage while on the move

However, Sanders has the advantage while on the move, leading in both IQR and on-target percentage on those passes. Ward is accurate but made too many poor decisions that resulted in 4 interceptions, the most out of the three. Dart’s accuracy was better when on the run than it was while pressured, meaning he can benefit from having better pocket awareness and escaping when able.

Accuracy on Throws to Different Areas of the Field

My colleague Chris Lee wrote a great piece projecting accuracy from college to the pros and highlighted the on-target percentages of the quarterbacks of this year’s class. He found that, out of the three, Dart had the best accuracy on intermediate throws at 74%, followed by Sanders at 69% and Ward at 67%. On deep throws, Sanders had the edge at 55% with Dart at 51% and Ward at 46%.

Ward’s deep ball accuracy being worse than 50% is at the low end of the spectrum. The vast majority of those misses are on overthrows, over 70 percent of them. The trend is less stark on intermediate throws, but he is still more prone to sailing a throw when he misses. According to our scouts, his footwork may be the main culprit.

“Mechanically, Ward has decent footwork, but relies upon an extra hitch often in order to fully set his feet rather than throwing at the top of his drop consistently. Additionally, he often fails to transfer his weight toward his target, throwing off his back foot or while falling to one side or the other.”

– Zach and Vincent on Ward’s mechanics

Inside vs. Outside Throw On-Target Percentage

When comparing accuracy on inside and outside throws, Dart’s is 7 percentage points higher on outside throws than the next closest in Sanders.

Dart shines on a specific sideline throw according to our scouts:

“He throws with good accuracy throwing to the back shoulder along the sideline where only his receiver can get to it.”

– Max and Brandon

Snap to Throw Times

All of these guys had clean-pocket snap-to-throw times in 2024 ranging between 2.43 and 2.49 seconds.  Ward had the fastest at 2.43 seconds followed by Dart at 2.47 seconds and Sanders at 2.49 seconds. However, the way that they got to those numbers differs considerably.

In 2023, Cam Ward recorded the fastest clean-pocket snap-to-throw time we have recorded at 2.13 seconds, following up the 8th-fastest in 2022 at 2.20 seconds. The jump this year is certainly notable given that he played in a new offense in Miami. 

Part of the reason might be a change in his drop type distribution. The number of deep drops he had last season increased to 49 in 2024 from 31 in 2023 while his short drops decreased to 351 in 2024 from 395 in 2023.

Shedeur had nearly 3 times the amount of deep drops than the other two in 2024. According to our scouts, deep drops can get him into trouble…

“However, he tends to hold the ball for much too long on deep drops. He doesn’t always trust his reads and will miss some on-schedule opportunities, extending plays unnecessarily and getting himself into trouble.”

– Matt on Shedeur’s deep drops

His 3.1 second snap-to-throw time on deep drops is roughly average. However his on-target percentage on deep drops falls to 63.4%, the lowest out of the group.

Conclusion

This quarterback class certainly is more up-in-the-air than ones in the past. Ward, Sanders, and Dart each have plenty of strengths and flaws. If one is provided a system that highlights their best traits (the ones we’ve noted here), we think they’ll have a better chance to thrive. There is a long time until we know the answer of who is the best, so set your predictions now and see where they take you.