QB Competitions

[marino613]

Hi everyone,

New here.

I had a general question or two about the history of QB competitions and there outcomes. By QB competition, of course, I mean a situation where during the course of training camp and the preseason, the coaches do not have a clear intended starter for the position, so they give relatively equal reps to at least 2 different QBs with the first team to see who can win the job.

Does anyone know the answers to the following?

1) Has there have been an elite QB in NFL history not to have been groomed, or come in after injury (ala warner/brady) or terrible play by the assumed starter? That is to say, has an elite QB ever come out of a situation where he had question marks going in but won the starting job in a true QB competition by showing his abilities in camp over the competitors?

2) Same question but replace elite with good/competent starter.

3) If the answer is yes to 1 or 2, is that a common phenomenon or is it rare.

4) If the answer is no or rare (I can't really think of any in recent history), why do you think that is? I had 2 thoughts on the matter. The first is that more reps with the first team does lead to more success, but I am hesitant to accept this answer because it does not explain the backup coming in after injury situation. I also wonder if the reason might be a correlation between QB competitions and a general lack of clear talent at the position. If you have a QB competition, that means you have no clear starter which often means that no one shows clear ability, so almost by definition you are generally dealing with mediocrity at best. I am not comfortable with this explanation either because, again, the backup coming in due to injury to take the starting spot shows that the coaches don't always know what they have and one would assume that these unknown diamonds in the rough (like a brady) would show some of that ability with the first team in camp.

With all that, if the answer is rare or no, are there still reasons to have a QB competition?

Thanks!