2024 Best NFL quarterbacks: Patrick Mahomes, Lamar Jackson lead rankings

The NFL season is officially here, with the Chiefs and Ravens kicking off 2024 on Thursday night. The FOX Sports NFL staff has been rolling out their annual position rankings to get you acquainted with the biggest names in the sport.

Over the past few weeks, we’ve covered the top off-ball linebackers, cornerbacks, edge rushers, running backs and wide receivers. Now we’ll dive into quarterbacks. Members of the FOX Sports NFL staff listed their 10 best in order heading into the 2024 season. A first-place vote merited 10 points in our methodology and descended from there, down to a single point for 10th place. We then combined the scores to determine our rankings.

[RELATED: QB Confidential: NFL quarterbacks pick the league’s smartest passer]

This year’s wide receiver list saw seven returning players from last year’s rankings, with quarterbacks being a similar story. Two new faces entered the picture in 2023, with eight returning.

For the second straight year, Patrick Mahomes earned the top spot on the list after another incredible Super Bowl run in 2023.

The position is also filled with young talent, as seven of the 10 are 28 or younger. Three players over age 30 managed to crack the list.

We’ll continue to roll out the best players at other positions between now and the start of the season. For now, here are the NFL’s best quarterbacks.

2023 Top NFL Quarterbacks

1. Patrick Mahomes, Kansas City Chiefs

Henry McKenna: I don’t think there’s any question whether Mahomes is the best quarterback. He’s a three-time Super Bowl champion and will pursue the first-ever three-peat this year. The common wisdom is that wins shouldn’t be tied to quarterbacks — that it’s antiquated to track a QB’s record in that way. But Mahomes shows that, maybe, it’s not antiquated at all. Because he has a way of taking control of games in a way that shows the true power of a quarterback. He’s going to go down as one of the greatest of all time.

2023 rank: 1st

2. Lamar Jackson, Baltimore Ravens

Ben Arthur: Jackson is still a rung below Mahomes and hasn’t proved his mettle in the playoffs, but there’s no denying his first-ballot Hall of Fame-caliber résumé. He won his second MVP award last season, becoming just the 11th player to win multiple MVP awards. At his current pace, Jackson is on track to becoming the undisputed best dual-threat quarterback in league history — and he continues to grow as a passer, evident by his career year under new offensive coordinator Todd Monken. The 2018 first-round pick recorded career-highs in passing attempts, completion rate, interception rate, passing first down and yards per attempt en route to guiding Baltimore to a second No. 1 overall seed in five seasons.

2023 rank: 7th (+5)

3. Josh Allen, Buffalo Bills

McKenna: Josh Allen will spend this season working with newly promoted Joe Brady to build an offense around what they did in the second half of last season. In short, they’re figuring out how to win without Stefon Diggs. Diggs took a major backseat after Brady replaced former offensive coordinator Ken Dorsey last year. And now that Diggs is in Houston, Allen will have to get the most out of Dalton Kincaid, Khalil Shakir, Curtis Samuel and Keon Coleman. But if last season was a teaser, Allen is up for the task. He blends his strength as a runner with his strength as a passer in a way we haven’t seen in a long time. If the Bills let Josh be Josh (which they did last year), then this offense will be as dangerous as ever.

2023 rank: 3rd

4. Joe Burrow, Cincinnati Bengals

Greg Auman: Will he stay healthy in 2024? Burrow has played four NFL seasons and only been able to finish two of them. Full-season Burrow is a top-tier quarterback — he led the NFL in both completion percentage and yards per attempt in 2021, then made his first Pro Bowl in 2022, throwing for 35 touchdowns against 12 interceptions. He still has an elite 1-2 punch at receiver in Ja’Marr Chase and Tee Higgins, though this could be the last year of that with Higgins, a coveted free agent in 2025. If the Bengals can bounce back to healthy-Burrow levels, anything is possible — still only 27, he is 5-2 in the playoffs in his young career, and both losses are by three points to eventual Super Bowl champions.

2023 rank: 2nd (-2)

5. Dak Prescott, Dallas Cowboys

Ralph Vacchiano: Don’t focus on the 2-5 postseason record when it comes to the Cowboys quarterback. That may be the way he’s ultimately judged — especially if he never drags Dallas to a Super Bowl — but it doesn’t tell the story of how good and prolific Prescott is. Just look at what he did in 2023. In a season when the Cowboys’ running game abandoned him at times, and in which he had one receiver who was even above average, Prescott was one of the most dominant offensive players in the game. He threw for 4,516 yards — his third 4,000-yard season — and a league-best 36 touchdown passes. Even better, he cut way down on his interceptions, with only nine. He is what keeps the Cowboys’ offense going with his strong arm, his accuracy and his ability to throw out of the pocket. Yes, he’s been a playoff disappointment at times, but some of that is because of the lack of surrounding talent. If the Cowboys would ever spend to upgrade his receiving corps or give him a dynamic running back, maybe things would be different in the playoffs against top defenses. Until then, don’t forget that Prescott is the main reason the Cowboys have gone 12-5 and made the playoffs in each of the last three years.

2023 rank: 8th (+3)

6. Matthew Stafford, Los Angeles Rams

Eric D. Williams: The 36-year-old gunslinger still has one of the best arms in the league, proving a perfect fit in Rams head coach Sean McVay’s offense. Stafford threw for 3,965 yards and 24 touchdowns last season despite missing two games, including one due to a sprained ligament in his right thumb. The Rams did a much better job of protecting Stafford last season; his 5.4% sack rate was the lowest in his career since 2011. However, Stafford missed time during training camp with a hamstring issue, and the Rams are juggling things around up front due to a two-game suspension to left tackle Alaric Jackson and a lower leg issue for right tackle Rob Havenstein that has his availability in question for the season opener at Detroit. So protecting Stafford could be an issue to start the year.

2023 rank: 9th (+3) 

7. Brock Purdy, San Francisco 49ers

Williams: Mr. Irrelevant as the last pick in the 2022 draft, Purdy is still out to earn respect as one of the top signal-callers in the league. His statistics clearly show he belongs among the best. In 2023, Purdy finished first in passer rating (113.0), No. 2 in completion percentage (69.4%), third in touchdown passes (31) and No. 5 in passing yards (4,280). Detractors point to a talented group of playmakers surrounding Purdy on offense — along with one of the top playcallers in the game in Kyle Shanahan, making his job easier. However, Purdy’s teammates have immense confidence and respect for Purdy and what he can do on the field, particularly in late-game situations.

2023 rank: unranked 

8. C.J. Stroud, Houston Texans

Arthur: If Stroud is in the top-10 after one season, it feels like he’s destined to be a consensus top-three quarterback throughout his career. He enters 2024 after arguably the best rookie quarterback season in modern NFL history. He joined Tom Brady and Joe Montana as the only quarterbacks in the last half century to lead the league in passing yards per game (279.3) and touchdown-interception ratio (4.6). Last year’s No. 2 overall pick should continue to ascend with the juggernaut surrounding cast the Texans have given him, and an increased comfort level in the offense. But maybe the most impressive thing about him is the calm and composure he displays in high-pressure situations. He looked like a 10-year vet as a rookie. That mental maturity should continue to serve him as his career unfolds.

2023 rank: unranked 

9. Aaron Rodgers, New York Jets

Auman: When you do rankings like this, how much of it is a lifetime achievement award, and how much is who they are right now? That’s a big question for Rodgers, now 40 and coming off a major injury that cost him just about all of 2023.

Rodgers is two years removed from being a two-time defending MVP. In 2020, he threw 48 touchdowns against five interceptions; in 2021, he threw 37 touchdowns against four interceptions. Then there’s 2022: A losing record at 8-9, just 26 touchdowns against 12 picks. The three-year trend — before you even get to coming back from an Achilles tear — is 48 to 37 to 26 in touchdowns; in quarterback rating, it goes from 121.5 to 111.9 to 91.1.

So which Rodgers will Jets fans get in 2024? If he just gets back to 2022 Aaron, that could be enough to get New York back to the playoffs for the first time since 2010. That alone makes it a win for the Jets, but Rodgers will want to set the bar much higher. How about a playoff win? Rodgers only has two total over the last seven seasons, after getting nine in the previous seven.

2023 rank: 6th (-3)

10. Jalen Hurts, Philadelphia Eagles

Vacchiano: The Philly quarterback had a down year in 2023, which really just shows how good he is and how high his expectations are. Because while dealing with a bruised knee for much of the season, he still threw for a career-high 3,858 yards and 23 touchdowns, and still ran for 605 yards and 15 touchdowns. He’s the best two-way quarterback in the NFC, and one of the 2-3 best in the entire NFL. Yes, his team is loaded offensively and sometimes that makes people knock him down the list. But he’s the heart of everything the Eagles do, which is why they struggled when he struggled last season. He was a very legitimate MVP candidate in 2022 when he showed he’s capable of leading a team to the Super Bowl. There isn’t much more you can want in an NFL quarterback than that. The one problem to watch are his turnovers. His 15 interceptions last season were way too high for an elite quarterback, and if that trend continues, it could be very problematic. But he had just six the season before, and under new offensive coordinator Kellen Moore, it’s a safe bet that he’ll take better care of the ball this season. If he does that, the Eagles will do a lot of what they always do with Hurts leading the way. They’ll win. He’s 34-17 as a starter, including 25-7 over the past two seasons. He does everything the Eagles ask him to do, and he does it all well.

2023 rank: 5th (-5)

Honorable mentions: 

Justin Herbert, Los Angeles Chargers

Tua Tagovailoa, Miami Dolphins

Jordan Love, Green Bay Packers

Jared Goff, Detroit Lions

2024 NFL Positional Rankings

These rankings were compiled by:

Ben Arthur (@benyarthur)
Greg Auman (@gregauman)
David Helman (@davidhelman)
Henry McKenna (@McKennAnalysis)
Eric D. Williams (@eric_d_williams)
Ralph Vacchiano (@RalphVacchiano)
Carmen Vitali (@CarmieV)

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