Cowboys’ Tony Romo: ‘Highest Grade’ Ever in PFF Category?
One of the dangers of becoming one of the NFL's most prominent broadcasters after your playing career is that you start to be more associated with your work in the booth than what you did as a player, especially to younger fans.
To a certain generation of NFL fans, Troy Aikman is less associated with the three Super Bowl titles he helped guide the Dallas Cowboys to, and most known as Joe Buck's color commentator on FOX and now ESPN. Tony Romo obviously didn't have the same level of team success during his 13-year career in Dallas, but was an excellent quarterback nonetheless. However, in less than five years as Jim Nantz's right-hand-man on CBS's No. 1 NFL broadcast team, Romo has arguably become more known as a broadcaster than as a former star quarterback.
So in case you needed a reminder of Romo's acumen at quarterback -- or are part of the increasing amount of young fans who don't remember much from his playing career -- here's a statistic that puts into perspective the improbability of his time in the NFL. According to Pro Football Focus, Romo is the highest-graded undrafted quarterback since the grading company's inception in 2006.
"Thirteen undrafted quarterbacks have attempted 500 or more passes in the PFF era, and Romo leads the pack — including Hall of Famer Kurt Warner — in overall grade," PFF wrote. "Romo didn't earn a season grade below 65.0 from 2006 to 2014, and he recorded 152 more big-time throws than the next-highest-ranked undrafted quarterback, Case Keenum."
Of course, there is a bit of an asterisk here, because before PFF was founded, the aforementioned Warner won two NFL MVP Awards and a Super Bowl title as part of the "Greatest Show on Turf" St. Louis Rams. If the entirety of Warner's career was included here, he almost certainly would have been the highest-graded undrafted quarterback.
Still, Warner punched his ticket to Canton as a member of the Arizona Cardinals, with the bulk of his success there coming from 2007-2009. In 2008, he tossed 30 touchdowns and racked up 4,583 passing yards for a Cardinals team that reached the Super Bowl. And still, Warner finds himself as the runner-up to Romo in terms of undrafted quarterbacks in the PFF Era.
Undrafted out of Eastern Illinois, it took until Romo's third season in Dallas in 2006 for him to really get an extended look at quarterback. But he parlayed that into being the starter for the star in parts of 10 seasons. During that period, Romo tossed 247 touchdowns, accumulated over 34,000 passing yards, made four Pro Bowl appearances and finished third in NFL MVP voting in 2014.
While it never translated to much playoff success, Dallas did go 78-49 (.614) in games that he started in his career. And Tony Romo is a modern "greatest ever'' in a notable department.
You can follow Tim Kelly (@TimKellySports) on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
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