Only 67 quarterbacks in NFL history have finished a game with a perfect passer rating. It’s certainly a rarity. But does this make it an impressive accomplishment? That is a complicated question because it is sort of an arbitrary feat contrived by statisticians back in the day.
All you have to do is glance at the list of players who have managed to finish a game with a perfect passer rating. You have your usual suspects. Aaron Rodgers, Peyton Manning and Tom Brady all have this feather in their cap.
Then some truly random names show up. Geno Smith has a perfect passer rating game to his credit. So too do Chris Chandler and Dave Krieg. If these quarterbacks can do it, surely it’s not an NFL accomplishment worth celebrating.
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How is a perfect passer rating obtained?
It’s a very outdated, convoluted and mathematical process that makes no sense. You can read an in-depth breakdown on how it’s formulated here, but long story short, completion percentage, yards per attempt, touchdown percentage and interception percentage are all scored. Those scores are then added to tabulate a passer rating.
Any quarterback who finishes a game with a 77.5 percent completion percentage, 12.5 yards per attempt, a touchdown pass for at least every 8.421 attempts and zero interceptions earns a perfect passer rating.
How rare is a perfect passer rating?
Not as rare as a pitcher throwing a perfect game in baseball. There have only been 23 of those. It is rarer than a no-hitter. That’s happened 306 times. A perfect passer rating happens almost as often as a 60-point game in the NBA, a mark that’s been surpassed on 77 occasions.
The perfect passer rating problem
The perfect passer rating rewards efficiency which is fine. However, it is tabulated in such a way that artificially caps perfection. Obviously, the historic Nick Foles 7-touchdown game earned a perfect passer rating. But this random game from Chad Pennington in 2003 also qualified. Just look at these numbers:
| Comp/Att | Yards | TD | INT | |
| Nick Foles | 22/28 | 406 | 7 | 0 |
| Chad Pennington | 11/14 | 219 | 3 | 0 |
Foles essentially doubled Pennington’s statline and they both finished with a perfect passer rating. That’s utterly ridiculous and shows the system’s biggest flaw. It rewards low-volume efficiency more than anything else.
This is highlighted by the fact only six quarterbacks have managed a perfect passer rating with 30 or more attempts in a game. In fact, many of these contests are blowouts where a team works with a short field. This allows the QB to throw for a few quick touchdowns in the first half while racing out to an early lead. In turn, he is required to throw the ball less which makes it more likely for him to meet the completion percentage and no interception thresholds.
And this is why finishing a game with a perfect passer rating isn’t a particularly impressive accomplishment. In most cases, it was a product of situation and not football skill.
