Player
Jordan Love
QB · GB Packers
The apprenticeship model is nearly extinct because almost nobody survives it: a quarterback who does not play cannot be evaluated, and a front office that cannot evaluate him usually moves on. Love's 579 attempts in year one as the starter is the second-largest jump off a near-zero base in 25 years. It is the single most unusual thing about his career and the reason his sample of real football is so much shorter than his draft class.
The three-year wait
Four first-round quarterbacks since 1999 threw fewer than 150 passes in three years. Two of them turned into starters, and both were Packers.
RareFirst-round QBs since 1999 with under 150 pass attempts in their first three seasons
| Quarterback | Drafted | Pick | Attempts, years 1-3 | Attempts, year 4 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aaron Rodgers | 2005 | 24 | 59 | 536 |
| Jordan Love | 2020 | 26 | 83 | 579 |
| Trey Lance | 2021 | 3 | 102 | 41 |
| Paxton Lynch | 2016 | 26 | 128 | 0 |
Sitting a first-round quarterback for three years is close to a death sentence. Since 1999 only four of them threw fewer than 150 passes across their first three seasons, and half of that group never got a real job at all: Lance threw 41 passes in year four, Lynch threw none. The two who came out the other side were Aaron Rodgers and Jordan Love, drafted 15 years apart, by the same team, 24th and 26th overall. Green Bay has run this exact play twice and hit both times.
Why it matters. The apprenticeship model is nearly extinct because almost nobody survives it: a quarterback who does not play cannot be evaluated, and a front office that cannot evaluate him usually moves on. Love's 579 attempts in year one as the starter is the second-largest jump off a near-zero base in 25 years. It is the single most unusual thing about his career and the reason his sample of real football is so much shorter than his draft class.
Utah State has produced exactly one first-round pick since 1999. Green Bay spent the 26th pick on him.
RareFirst-round picks by college, 1999 through 2025
| College | First-rounders |
|---|---|
| Alabama | 54 |
| Ohio St. | 52 |
| Georgia | 38 |
| Miami (FL) | 37 |
| LSU | 32 |
| Utah St. | 1 (Jordan Love, 2020) |
Round one comes off a very narrow conveyor belt. Since 1999, 890 first-round picks have come from 104 different colleges, and Alabama alone accounts for 54 of them. Utah State's entire first-round history in that window is one name, and it is Love's. He was not on the pipeline; a Green Bay staff went and found him on it.
Why it matters. Scouting departments allocate their time roughly where the talent has historically been, which means a quarterback from a program that has never produced a first-rounder is graded on a thinner file. That cuts both ways: less certainty going in, and less of the polish that comes from four years of playing elite defenses. Love's three-year wait was in part a call that the raw traits would survive an unusually long finishing school.
What the throws say now
The deep ball got 15 percent more accurate in two offseasons. In 2025 only six quarterbacks got more out of a throw past 20 yards.
TrendJordan Love on throws of 20 or more air yards (regular season)
| Season | Deep attempts | Completions | Pct | TD | INT | EPA per throw |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 77 | 28 | 36.4 | 4 | 5 | 0.425 |
| 2024 | 68 | 25 | 36.8 | 4 | 2 | 0.454 |
| 2025 | 62 | 26 | 41.9 | 4 | 2 | 0.607 |
Value per deep throw, 2025 (40 or more deep attempts)
| Quarterback | Deep attempts | Pct | EPA per throw |
|---|---|---|---|
| Drake Maye | 70 | 50.0 | 1.010 |
| Sam Darnold | 53 | 52.8 | 0.987 |
| Lamar Jackson | 41 | 46.3 | 0.913 |
| Dak Prescott | 66 | 43.9 | 0.842 |
| Matthew Stafford | 90 | 43.3 | 0.775 |
| Jalen Hurts | 65 | 36.9 | 0.714 |
| Jordan Love | 62 | 41.9 | 0.607 |
The inflection is 2025: his deep completion rate jumped from 36.8 percent to 41.9 percent, a 14 percent gain in one offseason, and the value of each attempt climbed from 0.454 to 0.607 expected points. He threw the deep ball less often than he did as a first-year starter and got more out of every one of them. Among the quarterbacks who took 40 or more shots downfield, only six were worth more per attempt.
Why it matters. Deep accuracy is the last thing a quarterback usually adds, because it depends on timing with specific receivers rather than raw arm talent, and it is the skill that most changes what a play caller is willing to dial up. Love's improvement is small in raw volume, 62 attempts, but it lands on the single highest-leverage throw in football. If Green Bay keeps taking those shots, this is the number that decides whether his efficiency becomes points.
Green Bay ran the fourth-best offense in football by value per snap and the 28th-most pass plays. That gap is his whole fantasy problem.
Anomaly2025 offense, regular season
| Team | Plays run | Rank | EPA per play | Rank | Pass plays | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Green Bay | 993 | 26th | 0.115 | 4th | 519 | 28th |
| Chicago | 1,096 | 2nd | 0.079 | 8th | 600 | 16th |
| Minnesota | 943 | 30th | -0.115 | 28th | 547 | 25th |
Jordan Love's 2025 line (regular season)
| Measure | Value |
|---|---|
| Games | 15 |
| Pass attempts per game | 29.3 |
| Yards per attempt | 7.70 |
| TD to INT | 23 to 6 |
| PPR finish among QBs | 15th |
Green Bay was fourth in the NFL in expected points added per play and 28th in pass plays run. Love threw 29.3 times a game. That is the entire distance between a quarterback playing well and a quarterback finishing 15th in fantasy scoring: he was efficient inside an offense built to hand the ball off and go home early with the lead.
Why it matters. Quarterback fantasy scoring is close to linear in attempts once efficiency is decent, which is why volume-poor efficient passers keep finishing outside the top ten. Green Bay's play-caller ran the ball on 52.8 percent of early downs and finished 26th in total snaps, and neither of those is an accident of one season. Until the snap count moves, Love's ceiling is capped no matter how well he throws it.
The 2026 file
He ran it 47 times for 199 yards and did not score once. No other 400-attempt passer ran that much for nothing.
Split2025 quarterbacks with 400 or more pass attempts and zero rushing touchdowns
| Quarterback | Pass attempts | Carries | Rushing yards | Rushing TD |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jordan Love | 439 | 47 | 199 | 0 |
| Geno Smith | 448 | 41 | 109 | 0 |
| Sam Darnold | 477 | 35 | 95 | 0 |
| Matthew Stafford | 597 | 29 | 1 | 0 |
| Jared Goff | 578 | 19 | 45 | 0 |
Love's carries inside the opponent 10 by season
| Season | Carries inside the 10 | Rushing TD |
|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 6 | 4 |
| 2024 | 4 | 1 |
| 2025 | 3 | 0 |
Five quarterbacks threw 400 passes in 2025 and never scored on the ground. Love was the one who actually ran: 47 carries, 199 rushing yards, no touchdowns, more rushing production than any of the other four. The reason is a hundred feet from the end zone. He got three carries inside the opponent 10 all year, down from six in 2023, when he scored four rushing touchdowns.
Why it matters. Rushing scores are the cheapest points a fantasy quarterback can add, worth six points on a one-yard play, and they are the main reason two passers with identical throwing lines can finish eight spots apart. Green Bay took that lever away from Love and handed it entirely to its running back. It is a coaching decision rather than a skill decline, which means it can reverse in a week, but it has now moved in the same direction three years running.
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