Much of the anticipation and excitement surrounding the opening of the NCAA Transfer Portal for college football players on January 2nd centered on the robust, inflated, pick-your-superlative quarterback market.
Such a market is generally described by agents and personnel members as “hidden” due to the undisclosed specifics of the deals, unlike its NFL counterpart, where contract details are available and often made public.
Harvard Transfer Quarterback Jaden Craig Signs With TCU
Speculation about the cost of quarterbacks’ services on Saturdays has only intensified as talented players opt for Sundays over Sundays for a final opportunity with a new collegiate program. And a particularly exciting quarterback has joined that group.
After incumbent starting quarterback Josh Hoover announced his intentions to transfer to Indiana, the Horned Frogs had to pivot. And did. TCU officially announced the signing of Craig on Jan. 7, marking one of the biggest quarterback dominoes in this transfer portal cycle.
Craig’s list of honors is extensive. His 78.4 PFSN College QB Impact score ranks 18th among quarterbacks in the transfer portal. He entered the 2025 campaign with a Day 3 (5th-7th Round) NFL Draft grade from National Football Scouting Inc. (NFS), along with Senior Bowl Top 300 and Shrine Bowl 1000 Watch List honors, on the back of a 2024 campaign that saw him finish as a Walter Payton Award finalist and second team All-Ivy League selection.
Craig would go on to set seasonal highs in completion percentage, passing yards, and passing touchdowns in 2025 en route to first-team all-conference honors. The 52 career passing touchdowns to his name established a new program record.
Whew! Lengthy list. Let’s get to the film to dissect what makes such a move so noteworthy.
The best place to start with his evaluation is the combination of aggression and risk-aversion with which he plays. His average depth of target (ADOT) finished at 12.1 yards, 12th amongst FCS quarterbacks with a minimum 100 passing attempts, and 65% of his passing yards were the product of air yards (yards before the catch divided by total passing yards), the 13th most amongst those qualifying passers.
The windows in the montage above will naturally shrink in the Big 12, but it is clear that Craig will not shy away from testing defenses vertically.
That’s the aggression. It helps paint a picture as to why his completion percentage is lower than desired, as longer throws are generally lower percentage throws probabilistically. As for the risk aversion component, Craig has posted an impressive 48:10 TD:INT ratio in his two seasons as a full-time starter, along with a lowly Turnover Worthy Play of three percent in each of those seasons. Simply put, it’s inaccurate to label him as someone who’s going to put the ball in harm’s way.
Despite his strengths, Craig isn’t infallible. His sack rates have improved year-over-year in his three seasons with the Crimson, albeit with a handful of head-scratchers for someone with his experience and noted aggression at his disposal.
In the clip above, we see Harvard motion into a bunch set with a defensive response that indicates man coverage. We receive confirmation of this when the ball is snapped, with Craig’s drop synchronized with the concept: he’s ready to pull the trigger as the receiver initiates his break, but never fully does so.
It’s fair to assume he saw the speed at which the defensive back was closing over the top, particularly in relation to the speed at which the out-breaker is unfolding, but this is a quick-hitting concept. The ball has to come out! Instead, his frontside never ideally aligns to the route, and he doubles back into a sack.
Here, we see Harvard is running a vertical concept as Princeton rotates into a 3 Buzz look. Number one in the trips set (counting from outside in) is going to settle his route against the dropping corner, number two is going to push vertically along the hash, while number three is running a bender over the hook dropper and under the post safety. The concept essentially does its job by putting the post safety in conflict: does he nail down on the bender or carry the vertical from number two?
We can see Craig work his eyes to said safety while working within a clean pocket before, inexplicably, really, compromising his readiness and transitioning to a runner/extender. The safety’s hips are never in a position to reliably drive on that bender despite a window opening between the two hook droppers and away from the post safety. That’s a window that a draftable quarterback prospect is expected to attack.
MORE: Harvard’s Jaden Craig Brings 6,074 Career Yards to Power Four Transfer Portal
Craig isn’t the only notable new face in Fort Worth, as he joins offensive coordinator Gordon Sammis, the former UConn OC who has been tabbed as the replacement for Kendal Briles, who will serve in the same role at South Carolina. Sammis became a popular name throughout 2025 due to his work with fellow FCS-turned-FBS quarterback Joe Fagnano.
Sammis employed a heavy straight-dropback passing game with elements of RPOs and move-the-pocket throws sprinkled in, an offense the 6-foot-3, 230-pound Craig will be expected to operate seamlessly.