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Michigan State Football: Payton Thorne served up fresh batch of disrespect

By Connor Muldowney

Michigan State's Payton Thorne celebrates after Kenneth Walker III's touchdown during the fourth quarter in the game against Michigan on Saturday, Oct. 30, 2021, at Spartan Stadium in East Lansing.211030 Msu Michigan 232a
Michigan State's Payton Thorne celebrates after Kenneth Walker III's touchdown during the fourth quarter in the game against Michigan on Saturday, Oct. 30, 2021, at Spartan Stadium in East Lansing.211030 Msu Michigan 232a /
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Michigan State football’s QB1 was served with a fresh batch of disrespect on Wednesday as Pro Football Focus didn’t name him a top-50 quarterback.

Payton Thorne was a bad dude in 2021. In his first full season as Michigan State football’s starting quarterback, he put up some impressive numbers, passing for 3,232 yards and 27 touchdowns with just 10 picks and a completion rate of 60 percent.

Not too shabby for a first-year starter, eh?

Pro Football Focus doesn’t agree.

In fact, PFF doesn’t think Thorne is in the top-50 range of all FBS quarterbacks heading into the 2022 season. That’s right, not even top 50.

It’s hard to name 25 quarterbacks better than Thorne in college football, especially since he really is only scratching the surface and he had a fantastic first year as QB1. But naming 50-plus quarterbacks ahead of him is just journalism malpractice.

PFF released their list of top 50 FBS quarterbacks on Wednesday and here’s who sits ahead of Thorne in the Big Ten:

  • No. 4 — CJ Stroud, Ohio State (fair)
  • No. 11 — Taulia Tagovailoa, Maryland (disagree, but fair)
  • No. 15 — Aidan O’Connell, Purdue (fair)
  • No. 27 — Michael Penix Jr., former Indiana QB now at Washington (foul)
  • No. 29 — Cade McNamara, Michigan (foul)
  • No. 38 — Tanner Morgan, Minnesota (foul)
  • No. 47 — Connor Bazelak, Indiana (foul)
  • No. 48 — Adrian Martinez, former Nebraska QB now at Kansas State (foul)

This is just a horrible omission by PFF. You cannot tell me that there were at least eight better quarterbacks in the Big Ten last season than Thorne. No shot.

On top of that, the list includes guys like Zach Calzada, Bo Nix, Tanner McKee, Spencer Sanders, Jayden de Laura, Luke Altmyer, Jordan Travis, Tyler Shough, and Grant Wells who all are not as good as Thorne and the argument would be an easy one to make.

I could go on and name 20-25 guys on the list who aren’t better than Thorne.

But hey, this is what Michigan State is used to. The disrespect tour continues and it’s only going to work to Thorne’s advantage.

Six-plus better quarterbacks in the Big Ten heading into 2022 than the guy who passed for over 3,200 yards and 27 touchdowns? No chance.

Next. 3 recruits MSU could flip in 2023 class. dark

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