With QBs that have retired in the last 5 years, there are some interesting HOF debates that I see coming up. Right now the sure-fire HOF guys are Brady, Brees, and Rodgers when he retires. The next tier, however, is a lot more interesting. You have Matt Ryan, Big Ben, and Rivers who are all very close. What's interesting is that according to Pro Football Reference's HOF Monitor, they all have fairly similar scores even though they have different resumes. Ryan has the MVP/All-Pro 1 season which is pretty much required unless you have 2 Super Bowls. Ben doesn't have a crazy MVP season, but he does have those 2 Super Bowls and 17 good years. Then Rivers has some crazy counting stats. I think that Ryan and Roethlisberger have a slight edge over Rivers but it is very hard to separate the 3. So my question is do we think any of them make it? If they do it opens up the debate for a lot of players in the future. Also, how do we think the HOF committee weighs Rings/MVPS/All-Pro teams? The media is always so focused on the rings but looking at the resumes of HOF QBs there are a lot more without rings than there are without All-Pro seasons.
Edit: Here is the PFR Monitor. The average HOF QB has a score of 108. Ryan has a score of 106, Ben has a score of 100, and Rivers is at 98.
Oddly enough I think Ben gets in because he had the best traits of Ryan and Rivers. He could put the ball in the tightest windows like Matt in his prime but also had more willingness to take risks like Rivers. He would air it out and give his playmakers a chance.
For me the most frustrating thing about Matt is when he got in his own head and wouldn’t force the Ball to Julio when he was in the end zone. The guy was so dominant but Ryan was too timid.
Rivers was a gunslinger. High risk high reward. He had awesome weapons in his career. I think his downfall was he was always in a really tough division for the best years of his career