BMitch & Finlay: Zach Krueger explains how college pressure to sack ratio could be a red flag for Draft QBs

Zach Krueger is all over analytics when it comes to fantasy football for Rotoworld, and last week, he sent JP Finlay an article that JP actually read during his seventh vacation of the year on pressure to sack rates, notably what it is and why it’s important.

So back in early-October, when Sam Howell was on pace to be sacked approximately a billion times, Krueger looked at Sam Howell’s rate and not just why it was such a problem, but how, and how it was something you could see all the way back to his days at North Carolina.

“We weren't even a month through the season and it was already a big problem, just something we couldn't even fathom for any quarterback for that matter, so I went back and I started looking at some of his pressure to sack numbers during his days at Carolina on a year-to-year basis,” Krueger said. “They were all high, but he ended up leaving North Carolina with a pressure to sack rate of 26.7 percent. I tracked 115 quarterbacks for their careers, and that was the fourth highest of 115.”

So yes, it was a lot of Howell last season, and since that analysis, Krueger has pored over the data for a lot of this year’s Draft QBs to see if this is something that could be a red flag, and in doing so, he found that in general, those ratios in college will, based on the past, be a couple of percent higher in the NFL – although some, like Justin Herbert and Josh Allen, have improved.

“I classify them as ‘landmines’ in my article, but my intention on pressure to sack rate is that not every quarterback who is good at avoiding sacks in college becomes a good NFL quarterback, but most good NFL quarterbacks are good at avoiding sacks in college,” Krueger said. “Pressure to stack as a stat that you can more accurately find players who may be. From 2015 to 2022, nine QBs were drafted in the first two rounds with a college pressure to sack rate above 20 percent, and 22 below – and of those nine, only two have signed what I would deem to be a franchise-caliber contract with their team that drafted them: Lamar Jackson and Joe Burrow. Of the 22 below, 12 in total have signed a second contract with their team that drafted them for what we consider to be a franchise deal.”

Interesting metric, so it seems 20 percent in college is kind of the danger zone – and Howell’s 26.7, as mentioned earlier, was behind only Brett Hundley in terms of any QBs drafted 2015-22 – and here’s the rub: Jayden Daniels’ 24.5 college rate is the highest of the Top 14 QB prospects in this year’s draft, with Drake Maye (18.9) and Caleb Williams (19.4) both below the magic number.

The best ratio? Michael Penix Jr. at 6.5 percent, with Bo Nix (11.6) and JJ McCarthy (14.3) third and fourth, respectively.

“If we're looking for longevity at the top of the NFL draft and we wanna find players who are gonna stick around for the long-term, the fact that only two out of nine compared to 12 out of 22 signed those long term deals is kind of an easy way to explain some of what we're seeing here,” Krueger said. “So, Williams, Maye, McCarthy, Daniels is my Top 4 now, and then I'd probably go Penix next.”

Take a listen to Krueger’s entire segment above!