As Bamagrad reminds us, ESPN put up a "who's that QB?" graphic during the game last night comparing McElroy and Tebow, so I thought I'd work one up here with the current game data from yesterday to see if the similarities still stand.
| McElroy | Tebow | |
| Comp | 153 | 128 |
| Att | 254 | 198 |
| Comp % | 60.2% | 64.6% |
| Yards | 1913 | 1730 |
| YPA | 7.53 | 8.74 |
| TD | 13 | 12 |
| INT | 4 | 4 |
| Rating | 137.24 | 154.00 |
They were much more even in ESPN's graphic last night (which I'm assuming didn't take this weekend's games into account), but it's still an interesting comparison. McElroy has more completions, attempts, yards, and TDs than Tebow, but Tebow is completing a higher percent of his throws and his completions are resulting in a better YPA average. Tebow also has the edge in total yardage and TDs if you factor in his rushing (604 yards and 10 TDs to McElroy's 100 yards rushing and 1 TD), and considering the difference in the two offenses each runs it's not much of a surprise that McElroy has the bigger "quarterback" numbers. To put it another way we're not necessarily comparing apples and oranges here, more like oranges and tangerines, but trying to compare the two's performances so far based on passing stats alone does a disservice to Tebow given the system he plays in.
And while I'm cranking out charts, check this one out:
| Opponent | Comp | Att | % | Yards | YPA | TD | INT | Rating |
| Va. Tech | 15 | 30 | 50 | 230 | 7.7 | 1 | 1 | 72.9 |
| Arkansas | 17 | 24 | 70.8 | 291 | 12.1 | 3 | 0 | 151.2 |
| Kentucky | 15 | 26 | 57.7 | 148 | 5.7 | 2 | 0 | 99.5 |
| Ole Miss | 15 | 34 | 44.1 | 147 | 4.3 | 0 | 0 | 56.9 |
| South Carolina | 10 | 20 | 50 | 92 | 4.6 | 0 | 2 | 23.3 |
| Tennessee | 18 | 29 | 62.1 | 120 | 4.1 | 0 | 0 | 71 |
| LSU | 19 | 34 | 55.9 | 276 | 8.1 | 2 | 1 | 89.8 |
| Mississippi St. | 13 | 18 | 72.2 | 192 | 10.7 | 2 | 0 | 143.8 |
Though he's had better games yardage and TD wise against BCS competition, last night was McElroy's best night as far as completion percentage goes and his second best game both relative to his QB rating and YPA average. Has he finally turned the corner? Time will tell, I suppose, but it's encouraging to the say the least.