How does the Raiders’ quarterback duo stack up against the rest of the division?
The AFC West certainly has an interesting collection of quarterbacks heading into the 2024 NFL season. The Kansas City Chiefs and Los Angeles Chargers have two of the best in the league with Patrick Mahomes and Justin Herbert behind center.
Meanwhile, the Las Vegas Raiders are about to enter training camp with a competition at the position between Aidan O’Connell and Gardner Minshew, and the Denver Broncos also have questions at quarterback as rookie Bo Nix is the presumptive starter.
So, with a few months before the regular season starts, how does each team’s starter stack up against the others?
1. Patrick Mahomes
There shouldn’t be any debate about this one as Mahomes is the best quarterback in the league, partially because he’s on a Tom Brady-like run with three Super Bowl wins and four appearances in six seasons as a starter. Also, even in a “down year” the two-time MVP still managed to throw for nearly 4,200 yards and 27 touchdowns in 16 regular season starts last year.
2. Justin Herbert
While Mahomes is in a higher tier than Herbert, there’s no denying that the latter is worthy of the second spot in the division. He’s widely considered to be in the top ten — if not, top five — passers in the NFL primarily due to his jaw-dropping arm talent. In 2023, Pro Football Focus credited the former Oregon Duck with a 5.0 ‘big-time’ throw rate and 24 BTTs overall. Those numbers ranked tied for 11th and tied for 14th respectively among quarterbacks and the latter is impressive considering Herbert only played in 13 games.
3. Aidan O’Connell/Gardner Minshew
We still don’t know who the Raiders’ starting quarterback will be this year and won’t know for about two months, but Minshew and O’Connell at least have decent track records as professionals to go off of.
Minshew was a solid signal-caller for the Indianapolis Colts last season, appearing in all 17 games with 13 starts while throwing for 3,305 yards and 15 touchdowns. Also, he did what a backup quarterback is supposed to do while filling in as the starter, posting a 7-6 record and giving the Colts a chance to make the playoffs at the end of the year.
As for O’Connell, he got thrown into the fire by being named the starter in Las Vegas about halfway through the season after head coach Josh McDaniels got fired. The fourth-round pick faced plenty of adversity as a rookie and had his ups and downs, but he showed resolve and kept the Raiders competitive.
While O’Connell’s stat line was modest with just under 215 passing yards per start and 13 total touchdowns, he showed enough promise that the organization didn’t feel pressured to “sell the farm” for another quarterback in the offseason. Granted, time will if the latter was the correct move.
4. Bo Nix
To be honest, Nix could easily and quickly move up this list with an impressive start to the campaign. He has a strong enough skill set for the Broncos to use one of their two top-100 picks on him and be the team’s presumptive Week 1 starter. However, the rookie still has to prove himself at the highest level before he can jump ahead of any veteran on this list.