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Athlon Sports took on a big project. They ranked all of the quarterbacks 1-130 for the 2017 college football season. We don’t even know who the starters are going to be for some squads (like Tennessee), but they did their best to read the tealeaves and draw some conclusions.
First things first, Tennessee’s Quinten Dormady checked in a No. 62 overall. The junior signal caller hasn’t been named the starter yet, but just about anyone you talk to will tell you that he’s got the momentum to win the job.
Here’s what Athlon had to say.
Dormady gets the nod here, but redshirt freshman Jarrett Guarantano is likely to see plenty of action for the Volunteers in 2017. Dormady has spent the last two years as a backup to Joshua Dobbs and completed 24 of 39 passes for 357 yards and one score in limited work. The Texas native ranked as the No. 262 recruit and a four-star prospect in the 2015 247Sports Composite. Both Dormady and Guarantano have upside and could finish a couple of spots higher on this list by December.
Georgia Tech’s Matthew Jordan — Tennessee’s week one opponent — checked in at No. 71, for reference.
2016 Heisman Trophy winner Lamar Jackson was ranked first. Baker Mayfield, Sam Darnold, J.T. Barrett and Jake Browning rounded out the top five.
Interestingly enough, Alabama’s Jalen Hurts just missed the top ten, coming in at 11th overall. He just barely edged out Auburn’s Jarrett Stidham, who transferred from Baylor. These two SEC quarterbacks were joined by Mississippi State’s Nick Fitzgerald along with Arkansas’ Austin Allen inside the top 15.
Dormady edged out Nick Starkel (Texas A&M), Stephen Johnson (Kentucky), Malik Zaire (Florida) and Danny Etling (LSU) in the SEC rankings to check in 10th overall in the conference.
Former Tennessee Volunteer Riley Ferguson was ranked 25th. Ferguson came to Tennessee in that same 2013 class as Joshua Dobbs, but he had some growing up to do. It’s cool to see Ferguson blossom with Memphis now after his journey.
I don’t agree with all of these, but that’s the fun of ranking 130 quarterbacks. Hats off to Steven Lassan for this massive piece. You can view his entire rankings here.