The AFC is a daunting road with 4 unicorn QBs

There were rumblings this week that the Tennessee Titans, holders of the first overall pick in April's NFL draft, are starting to lean toward selecting Miami quarterback Cam Ward.

This was ridiculous for a simple reason: the Titans did not, at the time, have a general manager. They fired Ran Carthon after the season concluded, went through interviews, and have since struck a deal with Chiefs executive Mike Borgonzi. Team owner Amy Adams Strunk is quickly building a reputation as a hands-on fiddler, but surely Borgonzi will at least have some input on a hugely important first decision.

On the flip side, one can see why the Titans may already be thinking quarterback. They play in the AFC, where the road to playoff success is occupied by Patrick Mahomes, Lamar Jackson, Josh Allen, and, in most years, Joe Burrow. That's four MVP-level quarterbacks in the prime of their careers. In most seasons, an AFC team would have to go through at least two of them in the playoffs.

It's a nightmare. Ask the Steelers or Broncos how much fun it is to try to win a playoff game against one of those guys.

Interestingly, the same is not true of the NFC. The three best teams in that conference this season - Detroit, Philadelphia, and Minnesota - all piled up gaudy win totals but were led by QBs who were asked to do the opposite of hero ball.

Jared Goff piloted an inventive Lions offense on a team characterized by coach Dan Campbell's hyperaggressive style. Sam Darnold was a castoff/draft bust who fell into the Vikings' starting job and suddenly became Joe Montana in Kevin O'Connell's system (right up until the last two games of the season, when he reverted to Sam Darnold). Jalen Hurts averaged fewer than 200 passing yards per game in the run-heavy Eagles offense and threw for 18 touchdowns, less than half that of the league leaders. His key asset continues to be the ability to be shoved across the goal line by his teammates. (Which is not nothing.)

The trend in which the AFC is dominated by QB unicorns and the NFC is, well, not, goes back some years. The San Francisco 49ers made Super Bowls with Brock Purdy and Jimmy Garoppolo, both of whom can fairly be called system guys. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers won one with Tom Brady, who was a unicorn in his way but was well into the phase of his career where he was getting by on smarts and guile. The Los Angeles Rams won with Matthew Stafford, who on his day can throw it with anyone, but he's not close to being an all-around weapon like the big AFC guns.

Nick Foles? Matt Ryan? You have to go back a decade to Cam Newton on the Carolina Panthers to find an NFC example of a team being built around dazzling QB play.

What does all of this mean? For the next couple of weekends, not much. The AFC will be decided by whichever of the Avengers playing QB manages to outduel the other two. (And if the fourth guy, Houston's C.J. Stroud, ends up being the last one standing, he'll have catapulted himself into the upper tier after what was clear regression in his second season.)

And in the NFC, it's not that QB play won't be important, but nor will it be a case of Goff, Hurts, or Stafford having to put their teams on their back to win games. The fourth guy in that conference, rookie Jayden Daniels in Washington, is actually the most Avenger-like of the bunch, a player who already has a ridiculous collection of did-you-see-that plays with his arm and legs. That he isn't slugging it out with Mahomes and Allen in the AFC seems like some kind of accident.

The showdown of contrasting team-building styles will come three weeks from now in New Orleans, with a superstar QB against more of a system player (unless Houston or Washington pull off some major upsets).

But the relevance of the difference between the conferences will come in the weeks that follow, as QB-needy teams figure out their plans for next season. Whoever ends up running the Las Vegas Raiders will not just have Mahomes staring them in the face, but two guys in Jackson and Allen who will almost certainly finish 1-2 in MVP voting in some order. Trying to get by with a competent game manager at QB in the AFC feels like bringing a fly swatter to a gunfight.

But over in the NFC, if you are, say, the New Orleans Saints? The task doesn't look quite so daunting. Could Derek Carr be next year's Darnold? Probably not. But it may be more likely than finding a QB unicorn of their own.

Scott Stinson is a contributing writer for theScore.