Payton Thorne compares favorably through 7 starts to Cook, Cousins, Lewerke

We are officially seven games into the Payton Thorne era (dating back to last season’s Penn State start) of Michigan State football, and it’s going quite well.

Thorne showed flashes of brilliance in his first start last season against the Nittany Lions, actually giving the Spartans a big road lead in the first half before Penn State stormed back and escaped with a win to end the year. It was still a good sign for the redshirt freshman quarterback.

Mel Tucker didn’t want to be complacent, so he brought in Temple transfer Anthony Russo in the portal to battle with Thorne for the starting job.

After a heated quarterback battle in the offseason, Thorne won the job and he hasn’t looked back. Through six games, he’s 6-0 and has over 1,500 yards and 14 touchdowns with a 62 percent completion rate. He looks like one of the best quarterbacks in the country despite Pro Football Focus ranking him No. 53 last week.

An argument could be made for him being the second-best quarterback in the Big Ten behind Ohio State’s CJ Stroud. He’s been that good this year.

But how does he compare to past MSU quarterback greats?

Comparing Payton Thorne to Cousins, Lewerke, Cook

Thorne compares more favorably to Connor Cook, Kirk Cousins, and Brian Lewerke through seven starts than you might think.

In fact, Michigan State fan Reed Baker posted these comparisons on Twitter Monday and they are pretty shocking.

No, those numbers aren’t wrong. Thorne has the best record (tied with Cook and Lewerke) through seven games, the best completion percentage, more yards, more touchdowns, and the least amount of picks (tied with Lewerke) through seven starts. It’s shocking that no one is talking about this other than Reed.

Just because you may be a Michigan State fan, your belief that Thorne is really, really good is not actually biased. He has been borderline elite.

And if he keeps this pace up, Cook’s numbers may be broken by a new Spartan great.