College Football's Luckiest Player Revealed After 3,600-Yard Season

Quarterbacks are a lightning rod within a college football team-- getting praise and acclaim with success and massive blame with defeat. But sometimes, there's more than talent, a good offensive scheme, and talented teammates going on. Sometimes, the best players also benefit from an impressive run of good luck.

In the case of a quarterback, success or failure depends on a ton of variables, but the most direct one is receivers who catch the football. Even the best passers can be hamstrung by receivers who drop passes. And one of college football's best players also happened to be the one who was least often impaired by dropped passes.

2025's Luckiest QB

According to recent data from CBS Sports, the collegiate quarterback who benefitted from the smallest percentage of dropped passes in 2025 was Ohio State QB Julian Sayin. Sayin completed 77% of his passes, and suffered from drops on just 1.18% of his passes That's around a fifth of the drop percentage of the most unlucky FBS quarterbacks.

Some Factors in Sayin's "Luck"

Granted, there are a multitude of factors that partially account for Sayin's luck. First, his own accuracy-- Sayin not only led the nation in completion percentage, but he topped second-place Carson Beck by nearly 5%. Second, he played behind an outstanding offensive line. OSU allowed just 16 sacks in 14 games, which tied for 12th nationally in sacks allowed per game.

Third, Sayin benefitted from throwing to arguably the two best wide receivers in football. Carnell Tate, who caught 51 passes for 875 yards, is probably the under-appreciated half of the duo, but he still was drafted fourth in the NFL Draft by the Tennessee Titans, top among all wide receivers. One of only a handful of other top receivers who might be more highly regarded than Tate is Jeremiah Smith, who had 87 catches for 1,243 yards and is all but certain to the be the top pick of the 2027 NFL Draft once he is eligible to go pro.

Former Indiana QB Fernando Mendoza also benefitted from a low drop rate in 2025. | Rich Janzaruk/Herald-Times / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Surprising Passers in Drop Stats

But there's no denying the fact that Sayin also is just lucky. Several quarterbacks from excellent teams didn't enjoy such good luck in terms of drops. Michigan's Bryce Underwood, South Florida's Byrum Brown (who is now at Auburn), and Texas A&M's Marcel Reed, for instance, all were on CBS Sports's list of most unlucky quarterbacks, each with over 4% drop rates.

Meanwhile, some of the luckiest quarterbacks weren't necessarily on top teams gifted with extraordinary talent. While Fernando Mendoza was second behind Sayin on the lowest drop percentage, others like Temple's Evan Simon and Southern Miss's Braylon Braxton were in the top five with the fewest drops.

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