Comparing 2016 Player Performances to History: Part Four-Quarterbacks

History wasn't made at football's most important position in 2016, but some very nice years were had.  Aaron Rodgers led QB's and all scorers with 418 points; the 24th best season in fantasy football history.  Rodgers is beginning to climb up the career scoring leaderboard.  He now has 3,820 total career points which is the 15th highest.  Among active players, only Drew Brees, Tom Brady, Ben Roethlisberger, Eli Manning and Philip Rivers have scored more points.

The all-time top five:

1.  Peyton Manning-Indianapolis/Denver (6,483)
2.  Brett Favre-Atlanta/Green Bay/NY Jets/Minnesota (6269)
3.  Drew Brees-San Diego/New Orleans (5763)
4.  Tom Brady-New England (5665)
5.  Dan Marino-Miami (5090)

Rodgers now has the 3rd, 16th, 18th, 24th, and 33rd, highest scoring seasons since 1970.  Looking back, fantasy football statistics tell the history of how the NFL has changed.  Primarily a running league, the first 300-point quarterback season didn't occur until 1976 when Bert Jones of Baltimore scored 311 points.  It took five years for the first 400-point QB season when Dan Fouts scored 402 in 1981 at the helm of Air Coryell.  From there, 22 seasons passed before Peyton Manning set what may be the unassailable record of 531 in 2013.

As in the other three categories, scoring was down among QB's in 2016.  There were no 400-point QB's besides Rodgers.

The top five QB's in 2016:

1.  Aaron Rodgers-Green Bay (418)
2.  Matt Ryan-Atlanta (386)
3.  Drew Brees-New Orleans (383)
4.  Andrew Luck-Indianapolis (347)
5.  Kirk Cousins-Washington (337)

The fantasy QBs of the future also began to emerge in 2016.  Rookie Dak Prescott, a fourth-rounder by Dallas in 2016, finished sixth among quarterbacks with 330 points.  In my mind, as good as Ezekiel Elliott was in 2016, Prescott deserves the Rookie of the Year trophy for a 13-3 season and the top seed in the NFC.  That Dallas lost to Green Bay in the Divisional Round is immaterial.  Dallas came back from 21-3 to tie the game at 28.  After a Packer field goal, Prescott answered again, leading the Cowboys to a game-tying field goal with :35 left in regulation.  The problem was Green Bay got the ball back with two timeouts remaining and Aaron Rodgers was playing in video game mode.  Quite simply, when a guy can ring the bell for 35 yards on 3rd-and-20 with :03 left in the game, he's really hard to beat.  And when it's a throw and catch like this....you get the idea.

Young Derek Carr of Oakland finished seventh overall at 326.  The Raiders, like the Cowboys, are going to give people fits for years to come.  Oakland's playoff run was regrettably short primarily because of Carr's broken leg at the end of the season.  With Michael Crabtree and Amari Cooper outside, Carr is going to be a top-five fantasy QB before long.  Rounding out the top ten...Marcus Mariota (312), Ben Roethlisberger (311), and Philip Rivers (306).  Tom Brady, finished out of the top ten, but averaged 25.8 points per start over 11 games to finish at 283.  Only leader Aaron Rodgers scored more per game (27.9).

This concludes our series comparing the 2016 season to historical fantasy-football seasons.  I hope you have enjoyed it.  Over the off-season, look for more history as I delve into my nerd-vault and explore some of the best, and worst, seasons since 1970.