The penultimate week of the season was an odd one from a statistical standpoint. QBR and PFF mostly agreed (for once), but some of the boxscores straight up lied to us about how well quarterbacks played. We saw 45 touchdown passes and 32 QB turnovers, and that’s standard fare for a late season week in today’s NFL. However, according to PFF graders, quarterbacks registered 36 big time throws and a whopping 55 turnover worthy plays!

Let’s look at the week 17 rankings then take a closer look at some of these misleading statlines:

#	QB Week 17	Plays	PFF	QBR	zPlays	zPFF	zQBR	zAvg	Diff
1	Tom Brady	51	84.7	78.6	1.48	1.32	1.17	1.31	0.15
2	Mac Jones	32	89.9	94.5	-0.89	1.64	1.78	1.17	0.14
3	Aaron Rodgers	41	90.2	68.1	0.23	1.65	0.77	1.11	0.88
4	Patrick Mahomes	40	83.8	86.0	0.11	1.27	1.46	1.09	0.19
5	Russell Wilson	36	85.8	89.2	-0.39	1.39	1.58	1.09	0.19
6	Joe Burrow	53	80.3	65.6	1.73	1.05	0.68	1.08	0.37
7	Kyler Murray	51	69.9	80.2	1.48	0.42	1.23	0.88	0.81
8	Justin Herbert	34	79.4	90.2	-0.64	1.00	1.62	0.86	0.62
9	Jalen Hurts	35	73.5	79.9	-0.52	0.64	1.22	0.58	0.58
10	Dak Prescott	49	64.4	63.6	1.23	0.09	0.60	0.47	0.52
11	Tyler Huntley	45	73.3	48.6	0.73	0.63	0.03	0.47	0.60
12	Josh Allen	40	70.6	61.3	0.11	0.46	0.52	0.41	0.05
13	Matthew Stafford	38	68.4	58.1	-0.14	0.33	0.39	0.25	0.06
14	Tim Boyle	42	62.4	56.9	0.35	-0.03	0.35	0.16	0.38
15	Taysom Hill	38	70.8	38.0	-0.14	0.48	-0.37	0.10	0.85
16	Sean Mannion	41	68.9	34.2	0.23	0.36	-0.52	0.07	0.88
17	Zach Wilson	38	68.1	37.7	-0.14	0.31	-0.38	0.01	0.69
18	Derek Carr	35	60.5	58.2	-0.52	-0.15	0.40	-0.06	0.55
19	Taylor Heinicke	43	56.5	38.8	0.48	-0.39	-0.34	-0.20	0.05
20	Trey Lance	34	59.7	34.1	-0.64	-0.20	-0.52	-0.38	0.32
21	Baker Mayfield	54	47.4	14.8	1.85	-0.94	-1.25	-0.48	0.31
22	Ryan Tannehill	26	56.5	51.7	-1.64	-0.39	0.15	-0.48	0.54
23	Drew Lock	29	64.5	18.7	-1.27	0.09	-1.10	-0.54	1.20
24	Carson Wentz	34	55.7	28.9	-0.64	-0.44	-0.72	-0.56	0.28
25	Davis Mills	40	49.8	29.7	0.11	-0.80	-0.69	-0.58	0.11
26	Andy Dalton	40	45.2	30.9	0.11	-1.08	-0.64	-0.71	0.44
27	Ben Roethlisberger	51	42.8	11.9	1.48	-1.22	-1.36	-0.73	0.14
28	Tua Tagovailoa	44	47.6	7.9	0.60	-0.93	-1.52	-0.80	0.58
29	Sam Darnold	37	40.4	23.4	-0.27	-1.37	-0.93	-1.02	0.44
30	Trevor Lawrence	32	41.9	23.6	-0.89	-1.28	-0.92	-1.09	0.36
31	Matt Ryan	33	40.0	24.4	-0.77	-1.39	-0.89	-1.12	0.51
32	Mike Glennon	17	21.4	0.0	-2.76	-2.52	-1.82	-2.36	0.71

Joe Burrow posted a league leading 11.5 ANY/A in Cincinnati’s big win over the Chiefs on Sunday, but he placed outside the top five in both PFF and QBR. That’s because this game was a masterpiece from rookie WR Ja’Marr Chase and Burrow was kind of along for the ride. In the first quarter, Chase turned a 10 yard pass into a 72 yard touchdown with a couple of ankle breaking moves in the open field. Later, he ran an intermediate completion 69 yards to the house after Daniel Sorensen took one of the worst angles you’ll ever see from a player in coverage. All told, 58% of Burrow’s yardage came after the catch, he took four sacks for 34 yards, and just 27% of his dropbacks resulted in a first down.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, Josh Allen ranked 11th in both QBR and PFF grade despite a ghastly -0.58 ANY/A and 17.0 passer rating. In fact, that passer rating was the lowest for a winning QB since the 2010 Todd Collins vs. Jimmy Clausen trainwreck! But Allen did a ton of damage with his legs as he earned the highest rushing grade of the week in both metrics. This is where I normally make a wisecrack about QBR putting too much weight on rushing, but PFF concurred so I think it’s legitimate. Moreover, two of his three picks came on tipped passes and his receivers generated a pathetic 2.7 YAC per catch. Buffalo scoring 29 points on only seven real drives justifies Allen’s good marks in the advanced metrics.

In Dallas’ loss to Arizona, Dak Prescott tossed three TD passes with no picks and a 105.8 passer rating. However, PFF credits him zero big time throws and a pair of turnover worthy plays.

Drew Lock posted a shiny 9.8 ANY/A and 116.1 passer rating in Denver’s blowout loss to the Chargers. But that clean statline yielded the 16th best PFF grade and 28th highest QBR of the week. Lock completed a couple of deep passes but was otherwise pretty ineffective. He was also terrible on late downs, as Denver converted just 4 of 15 third and fourth down opportunities.

With Jimmy Garoppolo sidelined with yet another injury, the 49ers turned to rookie Trey Lance this week. His stats were very good – 9.83 ANY/A and 116.0 passer rating – but PFF and QBR both thought his performance was well below average. Lance’s rushing was poor with none of his eight attempts yielding more than six yards. PFF assigned him two turnover worthy plays despite only one interception, and his two 40+ yard completions were both heavily aided by nifty moves from the receiver (that’s typical for the Niners offense regardless of who plays quarterback).

Andy Dalton, Tua Tagovailoa, Taylor Heinicke, Ben Roethlisberger, Davis Mills, and Sam Darnold each got away with the same number of terrible plays; these guys all threw one actual pick but were nailed for three turnover worthy plays by PFF. Matt Ryan did them one better with no INT’s but three turnover worthy plays.

Sometime after week 18 I’m going to compare full season TD/INT ratios to BTT/TWP ratios; I think the vast differences between the two methods will surprise a lot of people!

Here are the season rankings with one week to go:

#	QB 2021 Season	Plays	PFF	QBR	zPlays	zPFF	zQBR	zAvg	Diff
1	Tom Brady	760	91.4	66.7	1.60	1.56	1.55	1.56	0.01
2	Justin Herbert	737	89.4	66.5	1.38	1.38	1.53	1.42	0.16
3	Josh Allen	776	85.5	61.1	1.76	1.02	1.07	1.18	0.04
4	Aaron Rodgers	588	89.1	67.8	-0.04	1.35	1.65	1.16	0.30
5	Joe Burrow	642	91.7	54.1	0.48	1.58	0.46	1.02	1.12
6	Patrick Mahomes	747	79.2	61.5	1.48	0.46	1.10	0.85	0.64
7	Matthew Stafford	647	79.2	63.5	0.53	0.46	1.27	0.72	0.82
8	Kyler Murray	580	84.6	58.5	-0.11	0.94	0.84	0.70	0.10
9	Kirk Cousins	624	86.4	50.6	0.31	1.11	0.16	0.66	0.95
10	Ryan Tannehill	645	83.5	52.9	0.51	0.84	0.36	0.63	0.49
11	Derek Carr	701	79.0	54.3	1.04	0.44	0.48	0.57	0.04
12	Dak Prescott	691	81.6	50.1	0.94	0.67	0.11	0.56	0.56
13	Mac Jones	591	81.6	54.2	-0.01	0.67	0.47	0.47	0.21
14	Jalen Hurts	622	80.8	48.7	0.29	0.60	-0.01	0.36	0.61
15	Carson Wentz	608	71.2	58.3	0.15	-0.26	0.82	0.15	1.09
16	Matt Ryan	645	75.2	47.1	0.51	0.10	-0.15	0.11	0.24
17	Jimmy Garoppolo	492	75.1	53.6	-0.95	0.09	0.42	-0.02	0.33
18	Lamar Jackson	574	70.3	50.3	-0.17	-0.35	0.13	-0.17	0.48
19	Russell Wilson	470	73.4	51.5	-1.16	-0.07	0.23	-0.20	0.30
20	Teddy Bridgewater	519	73.5	47.0	-0.70	-0.06	-0.16	-0.21	0.10
21	Daniel Jones	472	71.6	42.1	-1.14	-0.23	-0.58	-0.52	0.35
22	Tua Tagovailoa	439	68.4	48.8	-1.46	-0.52	0.00	-0.55	0.52
23	Taylor Heinicke	599	59.7	43.2	0.07	-1.30	-0.48	-0.78	0.82
24	Baker Mayfield	529	63.6	35.3	-0.60	-0.95	-1.17	-0.95	0.22
25	Ben Roethlisberger	657	57.1	35.4	0.62	-1.54	-1.16	-0.99	0.38
26	Trevor Lawrence	715	56.5	32.1	1.17	-1.59	-1.45	-0.99	0.14
27	Jared Goff	556	59.8	36.4	-0.34	-1.29	-1.07	-1.04	0.22
28	Zach Wilson	441	62.0	29.5	-1.44	-1.09	-1.67	-1.34	0.58
29	Sam Darnold	456	58.5	34.0	-1.30	-1.41	-1.28	-1.35	0.13
30	Justin Fields	397	64.2	25.7	-1.86	-0.90	-2.00	-1.42	1.10
31	Davis Mills	431	55.1	32.0	-1.54	-1.72	-1.45	-1.60	0.26

What are your thoughts?