With no football on the docket until who knows, plenty of analysts have been pondering who is the best signal caller in the country. 247Sports Brad Crawford tried to tackle this debate and his list is very debatable after he projected the Top 25 QB’s nationally.
Crawford knows this is extremely subjective, especially in the Top 10, where most should have the same names, but in different orders. Starting from the bottom of the top, Crawford ranks SMU’s Shane Buchele 10th, Iowa State’s Brock Purdy 9th and then Notre Dame’s Ian Book eighth. Purdy and Book went head to head in the Camping World Bowl and it was clear who was the better QB, #12 in Blue and Gold.
After Book, this is where the list becomes very much about potential, and less about experience. Minnesota’s Tanner Morgan is 7th, USC Kedon Slovis 6th, Arizona State’s Jayden Daniels 5th, and North Carolina’s Sam Howell 4th, were all first-year starters last year and put up big numbers. Nobody can disregard their play from last year, but the book is out on them, they won’t surprise anyone this coming season. Putting Book behind these players doesn’t make much sense to me, I believe he’s clearly better than each of those quarterbacks named above, not just based on potential but production as well.
Ian Book is a know commodity, one that has 2 years of experience, putting together back to back impressive seasons. I can’t really complain much about the top 3, Ohio State’s Justin Fields, Clemson’s Trevor Lawrence and Texas’ Sam Ehlinger are all proven commodities. You can argue that Fields doesn’t quite have as much experience as the other two, but he is coming off a Heisman type season where he led his team to an undefeated regular season and College Football Playoff berth.
A 5th year senior should be held in higher esteem than Crawford has rated Book, you can’t teach experience, you have to gain it and Book has plenty of it. Yes, this is just a projection, but if you ask me, Crawford has put a little too much emphasis on potential instead of past performance. Where would you rank Book among his QB peers?