Kordell is a weak comparison because he was a bad passer. He never eclipsed 7.0 yards per attempt in his entire career (Cam is averaging 7.9 right now). In Kordell's first three seasons of extensive playing time he averaged 6.9, 5.6, and 5.3. That's really bad. He was a terrible QB.
Same with Vick, to a lesser extent. Not a good thrower despite his arm strength. Even factoring in last year's explosion in a very friendly offense, he still only averages 7.0 yards per attempt and 55.9% completions on his career. Cam is doing much better than that right now.
Culpepper is closer when you look at the numbers. I think Cam is a better runner and passer. He doesn't benefit from the crutch named Randy Moss, who made every QB look good (although Steve Smith is no slouch). If Cam turns out to be a slightly better version of Culpepper then he should have a very nice run as an elite FF player.
This is a poor comparison because you're applying what people are worried about happening with Cam to the guys it already happened to.Forget the first 3 years. The first 3 years aren't the point because the fear with Cam is predicated on a running QB that shows promise passing the ball but either regresses or fails to improve.
The entire argument for Cam at 1.01 is that in his first year as the starter he has showed great promise as a passer and if he can improve those numbers and become elite in that category it will make him unstoppable alongside his rushing numbers. That is the
exact argument that was used on all those other guys you're now berating as "obviously not very good passers". They all showed the same promise that Cam did. They all teased us with "if he can just improve those passing numbers, which at this point looks like it's obviously going to happen".
They all looked promising passing the ball based on their first year, just like Cam does now. The only major difference is in attempts per game, where Cam's attempts through 11 games are about what they threw in 16. A large part of that is likely the Panthers' porous defense which may or may not be something you can bank on going forward.
Here are the stats of each in their first year as a starter. Looks pretty darn similar to me.
Cam: 239-392 3,093yds 7.9ypa 12td 14int 81.1rat
Kordell: 236-440 3,020yds 7.0ypa 21td 17int 75.2rat
Vick: 231-421 2,936yds 7.0ypa 16td 8int 81.6rat
Cpep: 297-464 3,937yds 8.3ypa 33td 16int 98.0rat
If we sort the four of them by efficiency numbers then Cam is 2nd out of 4 in ypa, 3rd out of 4 in QB rating, and last out of 4 in TD/INT ratio. That hardly leaves him in uncharted territory.
The point you're making is just hindsight, plain and simple. You know now that guys like Vick and Kordell never developed into good passers so you're forgetting that they also looked promising in their first season as starters. The numbers they put up are solid starts to a career even for a pocket quarterback, so the idea of them continuing to improve as a passer was there for them every bit as much as it is for Cam now.
Seriously, where are you getting these numbers? They're completely and totally fabricated.It didn't make sense to me that Marino's 58.5% was the 2nd best rookie completion percentage of all time heading into this year so I randomly typed in two guys that I thought had better (Ryan and Bradford) and sure enough they both did.I would imagine the passer rating stat is equally as fabricated. A quick check of those two shows that Matt Ryan's was much better. Heck, even Tim "the worst passer ever" Tebow's was better, albeit in only 3 starts, so I doubt it's top 4 of all-time.Andy Dalton is also ahead in passer rating and basically tied (0.9% behind) in completion pct.
