FanPost

Russell Wilson's 15,000 Yard Milestone

Yo.

Russell Wilson threw for 309 yards on Sunday against the Jets and in doing so surpassed the 15,000 yard milestone in his career.

Fewer than 150 quarterbacks have ever thrown for more 15,000 yards. Russell Wilson was the 143rd to do it.

#141 Mark Sanchez - 15,126 yards

#143 Russell Wilson - 15, 038 yards

#144 Kordell Stewart - 14,746 yards

#145 Doug Flutie - 14,715 yards

(For what it's worth, it looks Blake Bortles and/or David Carr might be the next quarterbacks to reach the 15k milestone. But they're each just over halfway there and who can say what might happen in their next two or three seasons.)

So there sits young Russell Wilson just ahead of long-retired Pro Bowlers Kordell Stewart and Doug Flutie and their combined thirty-one NFL seasons. Wilson is in his fifth NFL season. He has played in 68 regular season games. If he is able to start for the remaining twelve regular season game this year he'll have 80 games in his first five seasons and likely have at least 17,000 yards. (With 17-18k yards Wilson and Andrew Luck and Ryan Tannehill will each likely move into the top 125 by the end of this season. Somewhere ahead of #125 Doug Williams and #122 Don Meredith but probably still behind #116 Jim McMahon.)

This is all about what you might expect when comparing Wilson's prolific NFL salad days with some of the all-time goods-but-not-greats.

How does Wilson compare to the greats in their first five seasons? Let's take a look.

Peyton Manning threw for 20,618 yards in his first five seasons (80 games). In the first five seasons of Dan Marino's career he threw for 19,422 yards (in only 71 games). Russell Wilson might expect to have at least 17,000 yards at the end of this season (80 games).

Tom Brady, Brett Favre, Kurt Warner, Eli Manning, and Ben Roethlesberger all came in at less than 15,000 yards in their first five seasons. Warner only played in 51 games. Brady and Favre 65 and 64 respectively. All of these greats had numbers similar to Wilson's. Well, other than the fact that they threw nearly twice the interceptions that Wilson has. The INT numbers are not even close. (Joe Montana attempted 1645 passes in his first 72 games [49 starts?] and threw 44 picks.

TDs/INTs

#1 Marino 168 / 80

#2 Manning 138 / 100

#7 Russell Wilson 111 / 35 ... on pace to finish with 126 / 39

It's worth noting here that in Manning's first five seasons he rushed for only 556 yards. Marino ran for 6. Yes, six. Six yards in five seasons.

John Elway played in 70 games in his first five seasons and just missed hitting 15,000 yards but he did surpass 1000 yards rushing. You know who else had numbers nearly identical to Elway's (ahem..other than the 105! interceptions)? Jim Zorn. That's who.

Russell Wilson is approaching 2500 rushing yards in his first five seasons. He'll pass Randall Cunningham sometime this season and he'll be third behind only Cam Newton and Michael Vick (unless he also passes Vick at 2,820).

Yeah, here's the thing...Cam Newton was a machine for his first five seasons and though he did throw 64 interceptions in his first 78 games he also threw for 18,263 yards and ran for another 3,207. Wilson's completion percentage is higher than Newton's, Wilson's touchdown percentage is higher, Wilson's interception rate is lower, and Wilson has been sacked fewer times. But man, Cam's numbers are just better. Unless you're counting Super Bowl wins over Peyton Manning.

I could go on but it's late and I'm tired and I didn't include any pictures so I'm sure you're all thinking grrrrrr..tl;dr at me and my first Field Gulls FanPost.

Here: http://pfref.com/tiny/uaRHJ

Check it out and poke around if you need to see more numbers and names. It's kinda fun.