Matt Ryan has had the unfortunate luck of playing in an area with Tom Brady, Drew Brees, Peyton Manning, and Aaron Rodgers, four quarterbacks who will go down as among the 15 or so best to ever play the position. Manning entered the NFL in ’98, Brady in ’00, and Brees in ’01; Ben Roethlisberger, another very likely future HOFer, was drafted in ’04, and then Rodgers in ’05.

But then there’s a gap.

The best quarterback drafted in ’06, by far, was Jay Cutler.
There are no quarterbacks of note from 2007, the year JaMarcus Russell and Brady Quinn were first round picks.
Ryan was drafted in 2008, as was Joe Flacco.
In 2009, we have Matthew Stafford and Mark Sanchez.
In 2010, it’s Sam Bradford and nothing else.
In 2011, we get Cam Newton and Andy Dalton. We probably should have seen Russell Wilson, and Andrew Luck nearly declared this year but did not.

As a result, when we look at the 6-year period from 2006 to 2011, Ryan and Newton stand out as the best quarterbacks of that era. And at this point in time, Ryan is the heavy favorite to finish his career as the best quarterback to enter the league during this 6-year period.

And that’s because there’s no reason to think Ryan won’t age very well. He entered the league at age 23, and just finished his 11th (age 33) season. Ryan also has thrown for the most yards in history during any players age 23 through 33 seasons.

Will Ryan get to 70,000 passing yards? Right now, only four players have done that — Brett Favre, Brady, Manning and Brees. Ryan has not been at that caliber, but it would require just 23,280 yards the rest of his career. At this point in time, I would suggest that he’s more likely than not to get there.

Passing stats aren’t everything, especially when not adjusting for era. But Ryan’s stats stand up when you adjust for era as very good, and very good for a looooong time. He will finish perhaps with a career similar to that of Fran Tarkenton, just slightly worse.  Or maybe it’s more accurate to suggest that he’s Ken Anderson without the underwhelming years in the middle.   Both of those fictional players would be Hall of Famers.

Ryan has already had 8 really good years — with 2009, 2013, and 2015 standing out as just average seasons.   If he finishes his career with 11 really good years, that would seem like more than enough to have a Jason Witten-like claim for the Hall of Fame.  Ryan already has one historically great season: one more of those, or a Super Bowl, would be enough to get him in without question.  But if he continues chugging along like the good versions of Stafford or Eli Manning, he will have no problem getting into the Hall of Fame one day without more.

What do you think?