Ranking rookie QB performances from NFL preseason Week 3: Shedeur Sanders struggles, Dillon Gabriel shines
Here's how the rookie QBs fared in their final action of the preseason
By
Jared Dubin
•
7 min read
The NFL preseason is officially in the books, and we are just south of two weeks away from the defending Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles hosting the Dallas Cowboys to kick off the regular season on Sept. 4.
Just because the season is now right in front of us, though, doesn't mean we can't look backward to what just happened. With that in mind, we're going to once again take a look at the rookie quarterbacks and what they did in Week 3 of the preseason.
From No. 1 pick Cameron Ward to No. 231 Quinn Ewers, we're diving into what each of the 11 passers who played in Week 3 did with their opportunities.
Even though it's just preseason and most of this stuff doesn't necessarily translate to the regular season, in the space below, we're going to highlight all of the rookie quarterbacks who played this week and rank their performances.
11. Shedeur Sanders (Cleveland Browns)
- Draft status: Round 5 (No. 144 overall)
- Stats: 3-for-6, 14 yards, 5 sacks, 1 fumble
It was a very, very bad day at the office for Sanders on Saturday, low-lighted by the 24-yard sack he took early in the fourth quarter.
.@RamsNFL close in and notch their 5th sack of the day
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He repeatedly drifted in the pocket, showcasing a lack of feel for pressure. He was indecisive with the ball, bypassing opportunities for quick passes to instead try to attack later in the down, only to scramble away and lose yards on give-up sacks where he ran out of bounds. (He did that twice.) He also fumbled on one of his sacks and got lucky that it wasn't recovered by the Rams.
10. Kyle McCord (Philadelphia Eagles)
- Draft status: Round 6 (No. 181 overall)
- Stats: 15-for-35, 136 yards, 1 INT, 3 rushes, 3 yards, 2 sacks
McCord got a full game's worth of dropbacks against the Jets and didn't exactly light the world on fire. His interception was an ill-advised, no-chance throw into double coverage.
McCord repeatedly threw the ball well short of the sticks, and while he was victimized by at least one drop, he didn't really put any high-level throws on film, either. (He did have a nice toss to John Metchie along the sideline but a defensive back who got a better break on the ball could have broken it up because it was left a bit too far inside.) It was a lackluster performance, albeit one where he wasn't necessarily put in position to succeed while playing exclusively with the deep-depth-chart backups.
9. Cam Miller (Las Vegas Raiders)
- Draft status: Round 6 (No. 215 overall)
- Stats: 12-for-24,102 yards, 4 sacks
Miller entered in the second quarter against the Cardinals and didn't do very much. He did throw a nice deep ball up the right sideline at one point, but the coverage was good and it fell incomplete. He tried the exact same throw two snaps later and nearly got intercepted.
Aside from that, he spent most of his time on the field checking the ball down and running himself away from and then right back into pressure. Two of his four sacks saw him abandon the pocket and step right up into the rush. He also had a couple of near-interceptions that weren't caught.
8. Jalen Milroe (Seattle Seahawks)
- Draft status: Round 3 (No. 92 overall)
- Stats: 13-for-24, 148 yards, 1 TD, 7 rushes, 31 yards, 5 sacks, 3 fumbles lost
Milroe threw a few very pretty balls in the intermediate-to-deep range of the field and ran it fairly well when given designed-run opportunities, and his touchdown toss was a nice rip into a tight window.
Jalen Milroe's first TD of the preseason!
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But he also took five sacks on just 29 dropbacks, fumbled it away on one of them, botched a snap on another dropback and fumbled the ball again on a quarterback sneak play. All three fumbles wound up in the hands of the Packers. That's obviously less than ideal. Were it not for a few of the nice passes, he'd be lower on the list.
7. Tyler Shough (New Orleans Saints)
- Draft status: Round 2 (No. 40 overall)
- Stats: 12-for-20, 102 yards, 2 rushes, 20 yards, TD, 1 sack
Shough played with the backups behind Spencer Rattler, who was exclusively out there with the starters. That should give you a pretty good idea of whom the Saints will be starting when their season opens, which is not the best look for Shough, who was a high second-round pick on a team with very little in the way of competition.
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He didn't do much in this opportunity to dissuade the Saints from going in that direction. He did have a pass dropped on an RPO and had a deep ball down the sideline broken up at the last second, but it was an otherwise unremarkable performance during which his best throw was this hole shot to a wide-open receiver.
To his credit, Shough did also have an 11-yard rushing touchdown on a zone read to the open side of the field wherein he outran a defender to the corner of the end zone.
6. Quinn Ewers (Miami Dolphins)
- Draft status: Round 7 (No. 231 overall)
- Stats: 7-for-8, 66 yards, 2 sacks
Ewers didn't get a chance to play very much, taking only 10 dropbacks. He was sacked on two of them, and had a chance to get rid of the ball on both. His best completion of the night -- a 21-yarder over the middle, could have been intercepted as he threw it to the receiver's back shoulder and almost into the chest of a defensive back, but it also avoided a linebacker sitting underneath the route.
Still, he completed all but one of his passes, with most of them being check-downs or flat routes. Miami punted and ran out the clock on his only two drives, so he didn't get much of a chance to show what he could do in scoring range.
5. Cameron Ward (Tennessee Titans)
- Draft status: Round 1 (No. 1 overall)
- Stats: 3-for-4, 36 yards, 1 rush, 1 yard, 1 sack
The Titans ran the ball on 10 of Ward's 16 snaps in his two drives -- 11 if you count the one play on which he scrambled away from pressure. His only incompletion came on a dropped swing pass to Tyler Lockett on the game's second play, but Lockett probably wouldn't have gained many yards anyway because the Titans didn't block it up very well.
Ward did show good arm strength on a ripped pass to Van Jefferson, and also showed off his ability to change arm slots on an underneath throw to Elic Ayomanor that got the Titans down to the goal line and set up their touchdown on the next snap.
Cam Ward on a rope to Van Jefferson for 17 yards 🎯
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The Titans didn't ask Ward to do very much during the preseason, keeping things extremely vanilla, but he showed with a few of his throws why they made him the No. 1 overall pick.
4. Jaxson Dart (New York Giants)
- Draft status: Round 1 (No. 25 overall)
- Stats: 6-for-12, 81 yards, 1 TD, 1 rush, 23 yards, 1 sack, 1 fumble
Dart performed well once again in his third chance at preseason action. He fell victim to a couple of drops, which accounts for his lowly completion rate. His best play came on this scramble drill throw to Gunner Olszewski, who turned it into a massive catch-and-run gain.
Jaxson Dart finds Gunner Olszewski for a huge gain! pic.twitter.com/gKHOuKdqTs
— Bobby Skinner (@BobbySkinner_) August 22, 2025
He also tossed another touchdown pass, and officially finished the preseason 32 of 47 for 372 yards and three scores. He wasn't intercepted and took only two sacks. The Giants kept things very simple for him throughout, but he also made some really nice throws, including in Week 3.
3. Riley Leonard (Indianapolis Colts)
- Draft status: Round 6 (No. 189 overall)
- Stats: 15-for-20, 189 yards, 1 TD, 1 rush, 12 yards, 1 sack
Leonard worked efficiently and on time throughout his afternoon, and he hooked up with Laquon Treadwell for this extremely pretty 59-yard touchdown pass late in the second quarter.
Riley Leonard's first preseason TD!
— NFL (@NFL) August 23, 2025
He goes 59 yards to Laquon Treadwell 🎯
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Treadwell had himself a monster game (6 catches for 119 yards and the above score) while working with Leonard, who also found him for gains of 22, 11 and 16 yards with intermediate throws, one of which came on a scramble drill play where Leonard threw it back across his body but kept it safely away from coverage.
2. Dillon Gabriel (Cleveland Browns)
- Draft status: Round 3 (No. 94 overall)
- Stats: 12-for-19, 129 yards, 1 TD
Gabriel did what he does best: got the ball out quickly and accurately within the structure of the offense. His two-minute drill to get the Browns a touchdown just before halftime was a thing of beauty.
Dillon Gabriel showing what he can do in the 2-minute drill
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As usual, Gabriel mostly worked the underneath areas of the field, but he did rip one intermediate throw over the top of a few defenders and in front of another to set the Browns up just outside the goal line. His touchdown pass was to a wide-open receiver, but the work he did getting the Browns into possession for the score was highly impressive.
1. Graham Mertz (Houston Texans)
- Draft status: Round 6 (No. 197 overall)
- Stats: 14-for-16, 145 yards, 1 TD, 2 rushes, 20 yards, 1 sack
Mertz barely got to play in Week 2 of the preseason but got an extended look in Week 3 and ran with the opportunity against the Lions' backups. He made a nice back-shoulder fade throw to Quintez Cephus for a touchdown late in the second quarter.
Quintez Cephus scores against his former team!
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He also fit a really nice throw to Xavier Hutchinson into a tight window on a crossing route and stoood in the pocket to find Juwann Winfree on another crosser later in the game. He also picked up a first down with an 11-yard scramble on third-and-7 and another with a nine-yard run on second-and-8. All in all, he did a very nice job.
