Why is Big Ben not considered elite?
How come nobody talks about Ben Roethlisberger as an elite NFL quarterback?
Apparently people just can’t believe it’s possible to be so good so young.
The Pittsburgh signal caller stormed onto the National Football League stage in 2004, leading the Steelers to an improbable 15-1 season in his rookie campaign. For an encore in 2005, he merely became the youngest quarterback to lead his team to a Super Bowl title. After a series of well-publicized off-the-field and health issues that led to Pittsburgh’s 8-8 campaign in 2006, Big Ben is back and better than ever here in 2007.
With a 110.2 passer rating (a figure virtually unheard of just 20 years ago), Roethlisberger is second only to New England’s Tom Brady (131.8). And, with 22 TD passes, he’s third behind only Brady (33) and Dallas media-darling QB Tony Romo (23).
You wouldn’t know it if you measured the two quarterbacks by hype and headlines, but Roethlisberger is actually more productive than Romo if we look at TDs per attempt. Romo has needed 292 pass attempts to reach his 23 TDs (1 TD every 12.7 attempts). Roethlisberger has reached 22 TDs with just 242 pass attempts (1 TD every 11.0 attempts).
Roethlisberger also has a phenomenal 92.2 career passer rating – the same rating as Brady and just 2.0 points behind Peyton Manning, who’s widely perceived as a statistical juggernaut and has had the benefit of playing most of his games indoors. Given the same advantage, it’s reasonable to assume that Roethlisberger’s career passer rating would be well ahead of Manning’s right now.
The bottom line is that Roethlisberger is an elite quarterback by any measure but national media acclaim. And at just 25 years old, history tells us that Roethlisberger’s best years are still ahead of him.