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The view on rookie quarterbacks has probably changed over the years, especially with the way coaches are getting fired at a faster rate. Peyton Manning and Troy Aikman noted that it's better that quarterbacks get reps so they can learn from their mistakes, but Mel Kiper offered a different view on the First Draft Podcast.
“The problem with evaluating and developing quarterbacks. Troy Aikman, Peyton Manning said you’re better playing through your mistakes, you learn by playing,” Kiper said. “Well not in this league anymore you don’t, because if you’re making mistakes your done. You can’t make mistakes, you can’t be playing like a rookie anymore. So that notion that you can play through them, Jordan Love sat for how many years? How many years did Aaron Rodgers sit? Mahomes sat for a year. There’s no perfect formula, how they’ll rank them, there’s no perfect formula for how to develop them. Once they start and finish some guys look better earlier than later. There’s nothing perfect about this, it’s very difficult. But what’s in place now is not working.”
In the most recent case, three quarterbacks from the 2023 draft have been benched. Bryce Young was benched earlier this year for his struggles, Anthony Richardson was benched recently for Joe Flacco, and Will Levis is recovering from injury, but it's not certain if he will get his starting back job when he returns.
On the other hand, quarterbacks such as Jordan Love and Patrick Mahomes sat during their rookie seasons, and now they're thriving.
Peyton Manning thinks rookie QBs should play
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Peyton Manning noted earlier in the season that he thought rookie quarterbacks should play after Tom Brady made a comment saying that the only reason teams play them is because they've dumbed the game down.
“The problem is, if the rookie quarterbacks struggle early, what do they do? They take him out,” Manning said during an appearance on The Stephen A. Smith Show. “I go, ‘No, no, leave him in there. Let him learn the hard way.'
“The game is still hard. NFL coaches, I think smartly, are doing the best job they can of adapting their offense to the quarterback that is playing. If that means putting in some plays that the player ran in college, I’m for it.”
When Manning was a rookie, he set the record for most interceptions by a rookie with 28. Obviously, Manning went on to be one of the best quarterbacks in NFL history, but if that happened now, he may have been benched.
