Position framework
Quarterback
Rush attempts against fantasy points per game
Updated
Methodology
Quarterback is the position where the fantasy answer and the football answer come apart hardest. The passing numbers that describe a good quarterback, such as accuracy over expected and time to throw, barely move fantasy scoring, while a carry is worth several times a pass attempt. What follows takes that in four steps: what rushing is actually worth, why the count of runs matters and the rate does not, where efficiency and scoring part company, and how little a pass-happy offense tells you. It is one season, so it is evidence rather than a law, and the page says where the source needed correcting.
The evidence
2025 productionFour charts, each followed by what it says. One caution first, because it governs all of them: this is a single season of 36 passers. The tight end page can lean on fifteen years; this cannot. Everything below describes what happened in 2025, which is evidence, not a law.
A carry is worth more than a completion
r = +0.56 across 33 quarterbacks
Rushing attempts track scoring at +0.56, and the per-attempt arithmetic is the striking part: holding passing volume constant, a rush attempt is worth 6.1 times a pass attempt (0.0722 points per carry against 0.0119 per throw, 26 quarterbacks). That is the whole case for drafting the runners: they collect the same points as everyone else and are handed a second, denser source of them.
2025 quarterback rushing
| Quarterback | Attempts | Yards | TDs |
|---|---|---|---|
| Josh Allen | 112 | 579 | 14 |
| Justin Herbert | 83 | 498 | 2 |
| Jaxson Dart | 86 | 487 | 9 |
| Drake Maye | 103 | 450 | 4 |
| Patrick Mahomes | 64 | 422 | 5 |
| Jalen Hurts | 105 | 421 | 8 |
| Caleb Williams | 77 | 388 | 3 |
| Justin Fields | 71 | 383 | 4 |
| Trevor Lawrence | 82 | 359 | 9 |
| Bo Nix | 83 | 356 | 5 |
| Lamar Jackson | 67 | 349 | 2 |
| Jayden Daniels | 58 | 278 | 2 |
| Bryce Young | 54 | 216 | 2 |
| Tyler Shough | 45 | 186 | 3 |
| J.J. McCarthy | 37 | 181 | 4 |
| Dak Prescott | 53 | 177 | 2 |
| Daniel Jones | 45 | 164 | 5 |
| Cam Ward | 39 | 159 | 2 |
| Brock Purdy | 33 | 147 | 3 |
| Malik Willis | 22 | 123 | 2 |
| Aaron Rodgers | 21 | 61 | 1 |
| Josh Johnson | 12 | 55 | 1 |
| Joe Flacco | 21 | 35 | 1 |
| Riley Leonard | 6 | 27 | 2 |
| Kirk Cousins | 14 | 7 | 1 |
It is the number of scrambles, not the rate
scrambles r = +0.56 · scramble rate r = +0.24
The workbook charts scramble rate, and it is close to useless at +0.24. The count of scrambles is a different matter at +0.56. A rate says how often a quarterback takes off when he drops back, and says nothing about how often he drops back. Designed carries land in between at +0.52. The lesson is not that one kind of run is better; it is that a percentage discards the volume that makes the runs worth having.
The best quarterback and the best fantasy quarterback are different players
r = +0.67 · points per dropback r = +0.77
Efficiency per dropback is the strongest single passing signal here at +0.67, and it still leaves the position badly split. Jordan Love posted the second-best EPA per dropback in the set and finished outside the top twelve in scoring; Justin Herbert and Bo Nix were near the bottom of it and both cleared 17.9 points a game. Efficiency describes how well a man plays. Fantasy scoring is efficiency multiplied by how much he is asked to do, and the multiplication is where drafts are won.
A pass-happy offense is a weaker signal than it sounds
r = +0.41 across 30 teams
Team pass rate over expected explains far less of quarterback scoring than its prominence suggests. The reason sits in the bottom-left of the chart: Buffalo, Philadelphia and Chicago all throw less than expected and all produced top-eight scoring, because their quarterbacks ran. A run-heavy team is not a quarterback-proof team when the quarterback is the run.