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The SEC produces NFL-caliber quarterbacks on seemingly an annual basis, but these eight players ascended to even greater stardom at the professional level than they ever attained in college.
With that in mind, we gathered our list of the best former SEC quarterbacks at the NFL level throughout history:
THE ALL-TIME LEGEND
Peyton Manning: A former No. 1 overall NFL Draft pick, Manning has not only had the best career of any former SEC quarterback, but perhaps the greatest career of any NFL quarterback ever regardless of alma mater. He’s the league’s all-time leader in passing yards in a season, passing touchdowns in a season and passing touchdowns for a career, and although he’s often criticized for his postseason failures he’s made the playoffs 14 times in 16 seasons as a starter including three Super Bowl appearances and one championship.
No quarterback in league history has been given the freedoms Manning enjoys on the field during games, including his ability to call plays and change plays at the line of scrimmage in a greater capacity than other star quarterbacks of the 2000s. As a result, he’s the best statistical quarterback ever and likely the best regular season quarterback ever. As far as SEC signal callers are concerned, he was the only player considered to top this list.
FROM TUSCALOOSA TO BROADWAY
Joe Namath: Before Namath became Broadway Joe he was a star quarterback for Paul “Bear” Bryant at the University of Alabama in the early 1960s. He went on to enjoy a 12-year career, the first 11 of which were spent leading the New York Jets. His combination of on-field talent and off-field charisma earned him the Broadway Joe nickname, and he was among the first polarizing off-field personalities in league history at that time, a time when the media circus was far less than it is today.
He’s best remembered for guaranteeing a victory over the heavily favored Baltimore Colts, led by Johnny Unitas at the time, prior to their matchup in Super Bowl III. The Jets ended up pulling out the improbable victory, and Namath was regarded as a hero in the aftermath of the upset.
He became the first quarterback in NFL history to throw for at least 4,000 yards in a single season, achieving the feat in 1967, only his third year in the league. His No. 12 is retired by the Jets, and like every other member of this list except one (Peyton’s father, Archie) he’s been inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
THE ORIGINAL SUPER BOWL CHAMP
Bart Starr: Starr was far from a star during his days at Alabama, but he had a much better career in the NFL with the Green Bay Packers. He started for three years at Alabama, posting just one winning season in that time and closing his career with a winless senior season. He was a 17th round pick in the 1956 NFL Draft, but for what it’s worth he was taken 200th overall, only two picks later than Tom Brady was drafted in the sixth round of the 1998 draft.
Starr rode the bench in Green Bay and split time with the starter for three years until Vince Lombardi was hired in 1959, when he named Starr the starter. The former Alabama great led Green Bay to the 1960 NFL Championship Game, where his team lost to the Philadelphia Eagles, but he began his own run of titles in 1961 by winning back to back NFL Championships.
A few years later, the Super Bowl was instituted as a championship game between the best teams from the NFL and AFL. Starr led the Packers to the first two Super Bowl championships in NFL history, and his legacy is largely based on those achievements. His numbers wouldn’t stack up against the best quarterbacks of the modern pass-happy NFL, but his accomplishments as an individual and team leader speak for themselves.
SCRAMBLIN’ FRAN
Fran Tarkenton: As one of the NFL’s first truly mobile quarterbacks, Tarkenton battled to change the way the quarterback position was played. Elements of his game are now prominent tools used by quarterbacks throughout the league, especially as dual-threat signal callers and read-option looks become more popular league-wide.
He played in the league for 18 years, which is in itself a sign of his greatness, and during that time he threw for at least 2,000 yards (a mark of a successful season in those days) in 16 of those seasons, falling only three yards shy of 2,000 in one of those two years. He also averaged at least 4.9 yards per carry in 13 of his first 15 seasons in the league, all while head coach Norm Van Brocklin battled to keep Tarkenton in the pocket like most quarterbacks during that era of the sport.
However, it was Tarkenton’s running that made him such a special player. He had the ability to run downfield, but became a fan favorite due to his epic scrambles from sideline to sideline to avoid taking a sack. Those plays often ended with a dazzling run down field or a long completion beyond the disjointed defense trying to contain the athletic quarterback. He was a three-time league MVP and is both a College and Pro Football Hall of Fame inductee, cementing his greatness as not only a talented player but a pioneer at his position.
THE OTHER MANNINGS
Archie and Eli: Peyton’s father, Archie, spent much of his college career at Ole Miss compensating for a lack of talent around him, and in the NFL he endured the same challenges as the leader of the New Orleans Saints. The Saints were the NFL’s worst franchise for much of Archie’s career, and he was the lone bright spot and fan favorite on the team for a decade, which kept his legacy afloat despite a lack of team success.
He’s not a Pro Football Hall of Famer, but because his stardom in the NFL so closely resembled his stardom in college, and because his pro city and college town were located in the same region, he’s regarded as a great NFL quarterback, especially among the pool of former SEC signal callers who played in the league.
Eli, Archie’s youngest son, followed in Peyton’s footsteps as the No. 1 pick of the 2004 NFL Draft. He’s been inconsistent in the regular season as the quarterback of the New York Giants, but has two Super Bowl titles under his belt, twice as many as his legendary brother. He won those titles after closing out mediocre regular seasons that saw the Giants sneak into the playoff field as a wild card team, but his postseason success has elevated his legacy beyond his father’s and closer to his brother’s than many would have predicted when he was first drafted.
Manning, like his brother, remains active in the league, but with a pair of titles it seems near certain he’ll be inducted into the Hall of Fame one day. Even as his stats regress in his 30s, he remains one of the NFL’s most prominent quarterbacks and off-field figures, and to achieve that beneath the enormous shadow cast by his family is simply remarkable.
Y.A. All Day
Y.A. Tittle: Like Tarkenton, Tittle is another quarterback with impressive longevity and even more impressive numbers during his NFL career. The former LSU Tiger played from 1948-64 and won two NFL MVP awards along the way. He was also the first quarterback in league history to throw for 30-plus touchdowns in consecutive seasons when he did so in 1962 and ’63, and when he retired in 1964 his 242 career touchdowns were an NFL record (they now rank a mere 21st all-time).
Tittle, a longtime Baltimore Colt (pre-Unitas), San Francisco 49er and New York Giant, led the NFL in completions twice, in touchdowns three times, in completion percentage twice and in total offense once. He threw for more than 33,000 yards in his career, and was eventually named to the NFL’s Top 100 Greatest Players list in 2010.
He’s a Pro Football Hall of Fame inductee, and is the only quarterback since World War II to reach the Hall of Fame without a postseason victory, indicating just how dynamic of an individual talent he truly was.
The NFL’s Iron Man
George Blanda: While we mentioned the longevity of Tarkenton and Tittle above, no professional in history, regardless of position of collegiate affiliation, has matched the longevity of former Kentucky star George Blanda. His 26 seasons in the NFL and AFL (with the Chicago Bears, Baltimore Colts, Houston Oilers and Oakland Raiders) are a record that will almost certainly never be snapped; he played at least one full season in four different decades, but spent most of the last 10 years of his career primarily as a place kicker, attempting only 235 passes from 1967-1975 (he attempted 271 in the 1966 season alone).
Nevertheless, Blanda was still among the NFL’s premier quarterbacks for more than a decade of his career from 1952-66. Depending on the team he played for at the time he led the NFL/AFL in completions four times, in yards twice and in touchdowns once. He was a league MVP in the NFL and AFL, and was named the Associated Press Male Athlete of the Year in 1970 at the age of 43.
He spent his latter years as a kicker, leading the league in field goal accuracy three times while attempting at least 15 kicks per year in each of his 26 seasons in the professional ranks. He was truly a complete player in every sense, and one of the best SEC alums at any position in the history of professional football.
A former newspaper reporter who has roamed the southeastern United States for years covering football and eating way too many barbecue ribs, if there is such a thing.
