The QB GOAT Series: No. 3

The greatest postseason quarterback ever, who also performed at the highest level in the regular season

I wrote up the methodology for how I measure quarterback career value and highlighted a few honorable mentions in a post to start the series.

I don’t agree 100% with all the rankings, but the beauty of stats-based analysis is that we can take representative data from nearly one million quarterback dropbacks over a century of the modern NFL to rank-order quarterbacks by value. Good luck watching, grading and comparing every quarterback snap from 1947 to 2022 and then forming your own film-watcher list.

I’m going to take this list in smallish chucks, going three-at-a-time until I get to the final few, who you might be able to guess, though the ordering may remain a mystery.

We’re down to the final three of the QB GOAT series, each of whom, I believe, have a real case as the greatest quarterback of all time.

Links to past posts:

• 50-48, 47-45, 44-42, 41-39,

• 38-36, 35-33, 32-30, 29-27,

• 26-24, 23-21, 20-18, 17-15,

• 14-12, 11-9, 8-6, 5-4

No. 3: JOE MONTANA

Regular: 6th, Peak: 6th, Playoffs: 1st

Some would argue that Joe Montana is disqualified from GOAT status after Tom Brady took away his trump card of most Super Bowls, and then expanded on his lead. Yes, Montana’s four Super Bowl now look somewhat quaint in comparison to Brady’s seven, but the key difference between the two is how the former was the decisive factor in his teams’ playoff runs, whereas Brady (more on this later) was really along for the ride for a few, and wasn’t a particularly efficient passer in the postseason overall.

Montana was the fourth quarterback selected in the 1979 NFL draft, after Jack Thompson (Bengals), Phil Simms (Giants) and Steve Fuller (Chiefs), who all went in the first round. Montana only threw 23 passes as a rookie, backing up Steve DeBerg for a woeful 49ers team that finished 2-14. That was also the rookie head coaching season for legend Bill Walsh, whose own legacy is inextricably tied together with Montana’s. Walsh elevated Montana - who he drafted - to starter the following year, after a 59-14 defeat to the Dallas Cowboys dropped the team to 3-3. The 49ers started Montana for a few losses, then went back to DeBerg, before finally letting Montana finished out the final four games as starter. Montana was much more efficient than DeBerg that season (5.5 ANY/A to 4.0), and, in particular, displayed the accuracy that was a core tenet of Walsh’s West Coast offense, leading the NFL with a 64.5% completion rate, while the league average was only 56.2%.