WHAT IS THE SUPPLY ELASTICITY OF QUARTERBACKS?

Chicago analyst Hub Arkush breaks down the first two decades of the ongoing century.

There can be little or no argument that the most valuable commodity in the NFL is a franchise quarterback, and there is absolutely no argument they are few and far between and awfully hard to come by.

By my count, there have been only 13 of them over the past 20 seasons, 14 if you include Tony Romo, who I probably wouldn’t, but I suppose is on the cusp.

Those 13 are Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Brett Favre, Drew Brees, Aaron Rodgers, Kurt Warner, Ben Roethlisberger, Russell Wilson, Eli Manning, Patrick Mahomes, Philip Rivers, Donovan McNabb and Andrew Luck.

Ten of them have rings, and the fact that Rivers, McNabb, Luck and Romo don’t probably is more about the teams they played with than their own performances.

Twenty-one teams haven’t had a franchise quarterback in the past 20 years, and only two – the Packers and the Colts – have had more than one.

Not that the Packers or the Colts have made a lot of appearances in the Super Bowl lately, and there's more than one way to get to that game and win it.

Finding a franchise QB is not the only way to win a Super Bowl, just check the ring fingers on Nick Foles, Joe Flacco, Brad Johnson, Trent Dilfer, Mark Rypien, Jeff Hostetler, Doug Williams ... and, yes, Jim McMahon.

But it probably is the best way, as only Foles, Flacco, Johnson and Dilfer are guys who weren’t franchise QBs to win a Super Bowl in the past 20 seasons.

Some of the franchise quarterbacks have more than one title on their record. Do the math: twenty Super Bowls, fourteen "franchise" quarterbacks per Mr Arkush's reckoning, four of whom never had the right sort of team around them, and I leave as an exercise the inventory of highly-touted quarterbacks, including Heisman Trophy winners, who were high draft choices and then undone by injuries or what have you.

Just more evidence, dear reader, that a general manager going all in to put a championship calibre team on the field stat is likely to be a disappointed general manager.