As teams gear up for an offseason of roster maneuvering, teams are beginning to the arduous process of lining up their salary caps to retain key players on expiring contracts, sign free agents, and their draft picks. Teams are forced to make especially difficult salary-cap decisions when they have a chance at an elite player through free agency.
While many of the top players currently set for free agency will surely sign an extension with their current team or receive either the franchise or transition tag, it is always a fun exercise to examine who is currently the best player set to be available through unrestricted free agency.
It’s no secret that this year’s offseason will be dominated by quarterback storylines. Philip Rivers, Jameis Winston, and Teddy Bridgewater are all set to be unrestricted free agents and had success as starters last season. Yet, none of them have the pedigree of future Hall of Famers Drew Brees and Tom Brady, the 
combination of youth and sustained success like Dak Prescott, or match the recent performance of Ryan Tannehill.
Brady has obviously asserted himself as one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time over his Patriots career, but he will be 43 before the start of next season and looked abnormally average at the close of this season. New England finished the season with back-to-back losses to finish out the regular season (against the 5-11 Dolphins) and in the first round of the playoffs (at home against the Titans).
Brady played a role in both losses, completing just 36 of his 66 attempts (good for a 54.5% completion percentage) for 430 yards, two touchdowns, and two interceptions. At the same time, Brady amassed over 4,000 passing yards for the third consecutive season and produced his best touchdown-to-interception ratio (24 to 8) since 2017.
Brees is in a similar boat. He’ll be 41 next season, but just led the league in completion percentage for the third consecutive season and posted the best touchdown-to-interception ratio of his career. With that said, the Saints did not look much different in the 5 games Brees missed early in the season with backup Teddy Bridgewater in his place.
Prescott has been surrounded by the hoopla of quarterbacking America’s Team, but the Cowboys signal-caller has taken consistent strides under the bright lights. At just 26 last season, Prescott fell just 98 yards shy of reaching the 5000-yard mark. He set a career-high with 30 touchdown throws and even while throwing a career-high 596 attempts, was sacked a career-low 23 times.
Of course, unlike Brees and Brady, Prescott has yet to reach the historic status they both already have. In fact, Prescott has yet to play in a conference championship game. Furthermore, his career year this season came while Dallas struggled to an 8-8 record in a wide-open NFC East. Does he deserve credit for performing despite a difficult surrounding, or was he responsible for the team’s struggles?
Finally, one of the most interesting stories of the season surrounded the quarterback position in Tennessee. Many around the league scoffed when the Titans benched Marcus Mariota for Ryan Tannehill. It seemed like they were just replacing one disappointing quarterback with another. However, the once highly regarded prospect led the Titans to a 7-3 surge to close the regular season, upset the Patriots in the first round of the playoffs, and almost upset the eventual Super Bowl champion Chiefs.
Tannehill threw for 2742 yards in just 10 regular season starts, throwing 22 touchdowns and just 6 interceptions. He led the league in yards per attempt (9.6) and quarterback rating (117.5) while helping young wideout A.J. Brown emerge as one of the best receivers in football. However, it’s fair to wonder how much of Tannehill’s success was a side-effect of a fantastic run game (led by Derrick Henry) and his receivers (like Brown). With the shortest resume of the group, Tannehill surely represents the largest risk but may have one of the highest rewards.
With all that said, what do you think? Who is the best unrestricted free agent quarterback this offseason? Submit your answer in the poll below and voice in your opinion in the comments.
Jeff
After watching the bumbling Bears offense last season… even Jay Cutler looks good.
Prescott is probably worth the most of the QBs consider age and stuff. Brees is the best of that bunch if you have a set team ready to win and you have to pick a QB from these guys. Brady is the GOAT.
What I like most about the QBs entering FA is that thee is a bunch of old guys (Rivers Brady) that will be joining new teams so that can basically pick which team suits them best. There is also a couple younger guys (Prescott Winston) that have shown the league what they can do and they now want a good contract and aren’t afraid to leave their current teams either.
Think there will be lots of QBs traded like Dalton will be after FA and the draft to find new homes and fill spaces.
As much as i trend towards Brady here, gotta go with Brees
It’s a loaded question. A few of these guys could be one and dones. One year I’ll take Brees he still looked really good last year. Longer term my brain says Prescott but I really like Bridgewater he’s just less proven. I think Prescott ends up back with the Cowboys anyway though. A young up and coming team should be going after Bridgewater. Spend their first round pick on talent to build around him. But that’s just what I’ve seen from him in limited time and my opinion. I would take Bridgewater over a lot of qbs out there. Wouldn’t call the guy elite by any means but you can almost throw Dalton into this class. He’s going to be on the move and wouldn’t cost much in the way of draft capital. Bengals are so bad and poorly run it’s hard to know what Dalton could do. He and AJ Green has some good years when he had more talent around him. Not saying I’d go that direction but he’s a wild card
I like dak Prescott he is the best quarter back the NFL has ever seen I hope he get paid the most money in nfl he deserves is he has amazing games all year and barely loses any games
Lol
I like dak Prescott he is the best quarter back the NFL has ever seen I hope he get paid the most money in nfl he deserves it he has amazing games all year and barely loses any games
sorry everybody, my son was playing around. as an Eagles fan I hate Dak and dallas
Haha. Your son is awesome.
What Poll ???
The telephone poll!!
Stripper pole
Not seeing a poll on the mobile app either.
Can’t wait for cowboys to overpay for Prescott and watch him regress to the point JONES head explodes
If you mean all time, I think it’s obvious.
If you’re giving a qb equal/solid wr’s, Brady.
I’m a Pats fan and therefore a Brady fan for life. I will always love him for what he has done for us. But I’m sorry, given the same WRs I’d take Brees or Prescott. Brady had WRs this year. He just refused to work with any young guys and pouted all year. N’Keal Harry is a beast and Jakobi Meyers has skills. Go back and look at how many they dropped, very few. I counted at least ten times in the last few regular season games that Brady looked at a wide open N’Keal and progressed through his reads like N’Keal was invisible then tried to force it into a double covered injured Edleman. Brady wanted AB and couldn’t have him so he acted like a three year old and threw a temper tantrum. He didn’t want to work with the rookies, because they weren’t on the same page. Maybe they would’ve been if he was at OTAs, but he has more important things to do apparently. I never wanted to see it end this way, but it’s time to move on. If anyone else had been the QB this year, the whole world would be able to see the talent of Harry and Meyers. The reason why TB12 is the goat is because he has always put the team first. I don’t know why, but that guy is gone. The new TB12 is an expectatious crybaby that wants everyone else to catch up to meet his expectations without helping them and stomps his feet when he doesn’t get his way. His selfishness wasted the best defense Belichick ever assembled, and now it will be impossible to keep together. If I were Bill I’d be Pissed and wouldn’t re-sign him for a dollar.
Based on age and recent performance, I’d say Tannehill looks like the best long term investment here. Prescott can’t seem to win the games which matter, which is a very bad thing in an established young quarterback. Prescott also seems to have become very greedy, asking for $40 million/year. He’s putting his own ego and personal needs above the team as a whole. Not what you want in a leader. He hasn’t earned that level of compensation either.
A transition tag might be in order here. I don’t think anyone wants to pay Dak Prescott more than $30 million/year to play football.
AK – Prescott doesn’t play D. Dallas can’t stop anyone when it counts. And his camp is on record saying that he doesn’t want $40MM. He’s every bit the leader, which you’d see if you watched the games. And btw, he had a throwing shoulder injury down the stretch: an injury he played through.
And you saying that you “don’t think that anyone wants to pay Dak Prescott more than $30MM/year” could be abbreviated to you don’t think. He’ll get paid $33-$35.5MM per year and will outperform the contract by contract’s end.
I follow the NFC East closely so this is a story we’ll get to see play out in real time. Unless Dak and his damn agent botch the resigning completely. Exile Dak to Cincinatti and I won’t have to watch him any more! (Dak’s a fairly boring quarterback to watch).