Rivers, not Manning, best of the AFC West

By Tony Cocco
Cold, Hard Football Facts man behind the scenes

The “Where Will Peyton Go?”soap opera is now over. And with the future Hall-of-Fame QB taking his talents to the Rocky Mountains, the football “pundits,” and a few Denver players are beside themselves with orgasmic joy at the thought of what a healthy Manning can do for a Broncos team that came out of nowhere to win the AFC West in 2011.

You might say they've contracted a dangerous case of Spinal Manningitis, a 14-year-old pigskin parasite that can be cured only with a huge dose of the Cold, Hard Football Facts.
 
Of course, we’ve already done our best Lee Corso impression (“not so fast, my friends”) by pointing out the fact that Manning is joining a Denver team with a bad defense -- a defense that was worse than most of the “bad” defenses that allegedly hampered Eli’s older brother’s ability to win more than a single Super Bowl during all those 12- and 14-win seasons in Indianapolis.
 
What we haven’t done yet since Manning agreed to rid John Elway of the Tim Tebow monster that lurks under his bed every night, is to point out something that should be obvious if one would just bother to examine the statistical evidence:
 
San Diego’s Philip Rivers is still the most productive quarterback in the AFC West.
 
Before the angry, pitchfork-carrying mobs of Manning worshippers descend upon the CHFF cardboard box world-headquarters, let us do what we always do and simply point out the facts.
 
Rivers has been a better QB than Manning in each of the last three regular seasons in which both men  played a full slate.  As the table below shows, between 2008 and 2010, Rivers threw just one fewer TD pass than Manning – with 300 fewer attempts!  
 
Rivers also tossed fewer interceptions (33 vs. 45) with a lower INT rate (2.2 vs. 2.5) had significantly higher passer ratings and, quite impressively, pulled off a rare “three-peat” on the CHFF Quality Stats tote board, as he topped the NFL in Real Passing Yards Per Pass Attempt (which takes into account the impact of sacks) each of those three seasons.

2008	Comp.	Att	Pct.	Yards	YPA	Real YPA	TD	INT	Rating
Rivers	312	478	65.3	4009	8.39	7.67	34	11	105.5
Manning	371	555	66.8	4002	7.21	6.83	27	12	95
2009	Comp.	Att	Pct.	Yards	YPA	Real YPA	TD	INT	Rating
Rivers	317	486	65.2	4254	8.75	7.96	28	9	104.4
Manning	393	571	68.8	4500	7.88	7.35	33	16	99.9
2010	Comp.	Att	Pct.	Yards	YPA	Real YPA	TD	INT	Rating
Rivers	357	541	66.0	4710	8.71	7.76	30	13	101.8
Manning	450	679	66.3	4700	6.92	6.62	33	17	91.9

The 2010 season was a particularly dominating performance by Rivers. He averaged nearly 2.0 yards MORE per attempt than Manning, passing for 10 more yards over the course of the season on 138 fewer attempts.

Rivers' personal average per attempt topped 8.3 yards per toss all three years, putting him on a very short list of elite passers to accomplish this feat three years in a row. This list includes:

• Johnny Unitas (1963-65)
• Kurt Warner (1999-2001)
• and Steve Young, who did it four straight seasons (1991-94).

Topping 8.3 YPA is truly an impressive feat, especially over such a high number of pass attempts. Even many of the greats fail to do it consistently.
 
Dan Marino topped 8.3 YPA in his career only once, in his legendary 1984 season (9.01 YPA). Same for Peyton Manning. He, too, has topped 8.3 YPA only once in his career, back in his record-setting 2004 campaign (9.17 YPA).
 
Bottom line: purely in terms of passing the ball over the past several seasons, Rivers has been far more productive on fewer opportunities, and has been especially superior in his ability to get the ball downfield.
 
Rivers is 30 and in the “meaty” part of an NFL quarterback’s prime years.He’s coming off a “down” year in which he still completed 63 percent of his passes, threw for more than 4,600 yards, tossed 27 TD passes (20 INTs) and had a passer rating of 88.7, while finishing fifth in the NFL in Real Passing Yards Per Attempt.
 
Manning, on the other hand, turns 36 in a few days, hasn’t played a real football game since January 2011, and has had anywhere from two to five neck surgeries in the last 18 months, depending on whom you believe. Obviously, if you were going to start a franchise today and needed a QB, Rivers would be the smarter choice.
 
Rivers and the Chargers consistently beat Manning and the Colts.Rivers is 4-1 against Manning’s Colts since taking over as San Diego’s full-time QB in 2006, including a 2-0 record in the post-season. It should be noted Rivers had help at QB in one game: In the 2007 AFC divisional playoffs at Indianapolis, Rivers was having a sensational game (14 of 19, 264 yards, 3 TD, 1 INT, 133.2 passer rating) but had to leave with a knee injury. It fell to backup QB Billy Volek to lead San Diego’s offense on the winning TD drive late in the fourth quarter.
 
Rivers’ numbers in those five games against Manning’s Colts: 90 for 133, 1,058 yards, 5 TD, 4 INT, 91.6 passer rating.
 
No NFL squad has given Manning more trouble over his career in Indianapolis than the Chargers, a team that Manning’s Broncos will have to face twice per season. If one includes the Chargers’ shocking upset win against a then 13-0 Indy team late in the 2005 regular season (Drew Brees, not Rivers, was the starting QB for SD that day), Manning is just 1-5 in his last six games against San Diego (1-4 against Rivers; 0-2 in the post-season).
 
His numbers in those six games: 181 for 283, 1,916 yards, 11 TD, 15 INT, 74.5 passer rating.
 
Sure, Rivers took something of a step back in 2011, with 20 INT and an 88.7 passer rating. But he was still on the field. Manning was not, of course. And Rivers was still getting the ball down the field fairly pretty well, with 4,624 passing yards and 7.3 YPA. Manning averaged 6.8 YPA in his last season on the field.
 
We know. We can see the hate mail coming already. Peyton Manning is above reproach. And anyone that challenges the “Denver Broncos are going to win the Super Bowl” hysteria deserves to die of cancer, as one eloquent Twitter fan posted to us recently.
 
But the reality of the situation, here in March 2012, is this: Manning’s been on a slow decline over the past several seasons, he’s well into the back-nine of his productive years by any rational definition, he joins a team that had a very bad defense in 2011, he's historically struggled against the Chargers, and he’s not even the most productive quarterback in his new division, the AFC West.
 
That title belongs to Philip Rivers.

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