Jacksonville Jaguars rookie Gardner Minshew II won seven Pepsi Rookie of the Week awards and was September’s Rookie of the month. On the other side of the ball, his comrade, Josh Allen, led all rookies in sacks with 10.5.
Those feats seemingly didn’t mean much for Pepsi’s Rookie of the Year award, however, as both were left off the ballot this week. Instead of Minshew and Allen being amongst the five candidates for the award, fans will have to choose between San Fransisco 49ers edge rusher Nick Bosa, Tennessee Titans receiver A.J. Brown, Oakland Raiders running backs Josh Jacobs, Arizona Cardinals quarterback Kyler Murray and Philadelphia Eagles running back Miles Sanders.
Of course, for the sake of this debate, the two players who matter are Bosa and Murray as they play the same positions as Allen and Minshew, respectively. When comparing the stats between them at each position, it’s hard to find a reason why both Jags rookies were excluded from the final ballot. Let’s start by comparing the statistics of Murray and Minshew:
- Minshew: 12 games started, 3,271 passing yards, 60.6% completion percentage (285-of-470), 21 touchdowns, six interceptions, 91.2 rating
- Murray: 16 games started, 3,722 passing yards, 64.4% completion percentage (349-of-542), 20 touchdowns, 12 interceptions, 87.4 rating
With Murray playing in four more games than Minshew, Murray had 451 more passing yards than Minshew, which was expected. However, Minshew surpassed Murray in the touchdown and quarterback rating categories, which says a lot about Minshew when considering he didn’t start in the same amount of games. For those reasons, and the fact that Murray had a slightly better offensive line, it’s honestly baffling that Minshew isn’t on the ballot.
Now lets compare the statistics of Bosa and Allen:
- Allen: Four games started, 31 tackles, 10.5 sacks, two forced fumbles
- Bosa: 14 games started, 32 tackles, nine sacks, one forced fumble and one interception
With both players having nearly identical stats, the figures above are a clear indication that Allen needs to be in every conversation for any Defensive Rookie of the Year award, not just Pepsi’s. Add in the fact that Bosa (634) had 146 more snaps than Allen (780), and the former Kentucky Wildcat has an even stronger case.