Classic NFL Quarterbacks by LorinBurte

When Ray Guy entered the NFL Hall of Fame in 2014, he commented that the Hall now had a 'complete team'. This Hall of Fame QB no doubt spun in his grave, having led the league in punting four times, including the all time record for single season punting average.

This New Mexico State QB attained his master’s in 1963 and went on to spend two years on active army duty. During his time with the US Army, he worked at the Langley Research Center in Virginia, where he was assigned to NASA. Somehow, he also managed to play on Sundays, throwing 171 TD passes in his career. He earned his PhD in 1971 , although I could not find the title of his chemical engineering dissertation.

This Santa Clara QB, drafted 3rd in 1971, could throw a spiral over 90 yards and was the first to wear a flak jacket. He also appeared on Fantasy Island, in a nude Playgirl photo spread and has won NHRA Top Fuel Dragster races.

In a 1973 Doonesbury strip, in which B.D. is writing a paper on Vietnam, he writes that Lyndon Johnson 'showed courage, audacity and great leadership. It would be difficult not to compare him to' what NFL QB?

Bill Walsh said of this U of Cincinnati product that he 'could very well have been remembered or noted as the greatest quarterback of all time'. He led football with an 88.3 passer rating in his rookie year, but a torn rotator cuff and other injuries limited his career to 12 games, which included wins over his rookie year's Super Bowl champion and other marquee teams.

This Penn State alum and member of the Calgary Stampeders Wall of Fame got no respect in the NFL when he played for the Philadelphia Eagles. The column The Bottom 10 remarked that mothers rushed their children out of the stands when he dropped back to pass for fear than he would hit them with his misguided throws.

This QB, selected as Kansas U's Player of the Century, is ranked with his favorite receiver by Fansided.com as one of the top 12 passing/receiving combos of all time. He is the only QB of the group with a higher uniform number than his receiver.

This cannon-armed QB, also from Kansas, held the NFL season record for rushing yards as a QB for 34 years. He could never remember the plays sent in from the sideline, but I remember him running right on a play, shrugging off a high tackle, and running over 40 yards downfield without his helmet!

This Columbia alum and NFL Hall of Famer co-holds the record for most TD passes in a game. He starred for Erasmus High in Brooklyn, arch-rival of Lafayette High, alma mater of Sandy Koufax and my mother.

This Rice product won an NFL title and had a legendary feud with lineman Gino Marchetti. His PhD dissertation, in mathematics, was 'Characterization of the Set of Asymptotic Values of a Function Holomorphic in the Unit Disc'. He later taught math and was Athletic Director and VP for Institutional Planning at Yale.

Many star athletes (Michael Jordan, Johnny Bench for example) delude themselves by thinking they can play tournament level professional golf after retirement. This Stanford alum and NFL MVP did win on the Senior PGA Tour, beating George Archer and Chi Chi Rodriguez in the 1991 Security Pacific Senior Classic. Turns out he had always been a golfer, choosing football over golf as a young man because there was less pressure.

This Ohio State alum played running back in the NFL, but famously and capably stepped in as the Baltimore Colts QB for a famous playoff game against Green Bay when Johnny Unitas and Gary Cuozzo went down with injuries. He had the plays listed on his wrist band before that became a common occurrence.

In 1976, the first Saturday Night Live Jeopardy spoof, 'Jeopardy 1999', had an answer 'First Man Cloned', to which the question was 'Who is...' this Georgia product.

Several NFL QBs have entered politics after their footballs careers. This Occidental College alum, whose son also played in the NFL, very graciously signed two of his old football cards for me at a charity dinner.

This Tulsa product had a 99 yard touchdown pass and a Pro Bowl appearance, but nothing else he did compared to him spraining his neck by ramming his head into a padded cement wall during a touchdown celebration on Sunday Night Football.