accurate as ever (CPOE 8th) but 13 interceptions and a QB11 finish, priced QB8. The Mike McDaniel scheme upside cancels the turnover-prone, no-rushing-floor risk.
Justin Herbert 2026 Season Preview — a new scheme balances a turnover year
Show notes & transcript▾
Justin Herbert was accurate as ever last season — and threw thirteen interceptions and finished QB11. Now he's got a brand-new offense and a wave of new weapons. The pluses and minuses cancel out almost exactly at his price. The Muffed 2026 preview.
The 2025 season was a tale of accuracy undone by mistakes: sixteen games, seventeen-nine a game, QB11 per game, on thirty-seven hundred passing yards and twenty-six touchdowns — but thirteen interceptions, the number that capped him. His completion percentage over expected ranked eighth, genuinely good; his adjusted net yards per attempt only twenty-fourth, dragged down by the picks and sacks. The signature was a thirty point, three-hundred-yard, two-score game with a rushing touchdown against Dallas in Week 16. The talent's never been the question.
The arc is a slide from an elite start: twenty-two a game in each of his first two seasons, then four straight years in the sixteen-to-eighteen range. He's been a good-not-great fantasy quarterback for a while now, and the early ceiling hasn't returned.
What the data says: he's a pocket passer — about twenty percent rushing share — so he lacks the structural rushing floor that makes the position's safest bets safe, and his fantasy value rides on passing volume and turnovers, the more variable stuff. The accuracy says the talent is intact; the interceptions and the middling efficiency say the production has a leak.
The situation, per the reports, is the bull case that balances it: a new coordinator in Mike McDaniel — whose scheme has produced big passing numbers — plus a wave of added weapons and a healthy elite offensive line. There's real "bounce-back" buzz, even MVP talk. New scheme, better protection, more help.
The price: pick seventy-seven and a half, QB8. Verdict: NO CALL — he finished QB10-to-11, he's priced QB8, and the modest premium is the market fairly pricing the McDaniel-scheme upside against a turnover-prone, no-rushing-floor profile. The counter both ways: if McDaniel unlocks the efficiency, QB8 is cheap; if the interceptions persist, the price is a touch high. A fair number on a high-variance bet — and one you can wait on at quarterback.
September watch: the interception rate — the one thing that has to improve; and the passing efficiency in McDaniel's scheme, the source of any leap. Your guys, every week. Next preview's queued.
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2025: 3,727 passing yards, 26 passing TDs, 13 INTs; 498 rushing yards on 83 carries, 2 rushing TDs (16 games)
More episodes
2025 ReviewMay 11, 2026Justin Herbert 2025 Season in Review
QB10 on the season — 16 games, 17.9 PPR/game
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Justin Herbert 2025 Season in Review
QB10 on the season — 16 games, 17.9 PPR/game
Show notes & transcript
Justin Herbert finished 2025 as the number 10 quarterback in total PPR scoring and the number 11 quarterback per game. Solid mid-range starter territory — not elite, but firmly in the every-week conversation. The identity of the year? Herbert was a high-volume, high-pressure passer carrying an offense that couldn't get out of its own way, and he made up real fantasy ground with his legs. The Chargers went 11 and 6 and grabbed a wild card, but the offense as a whole graded as a bottom-ten unit by expected points added — Herbert was the reason they scored, not a passenger on a humming machine. He took 54 sacks in 16 games behind a bottom-third pass-protection unit and still pushed the ball downfield for top-ten touchdown volume.
Now let's dig into the numbers. Herbert threw for 3,727 yards on 512 attempts with 26 touchdowns and 13 interceptions — that touchdown total tied for eighth in the league. He completed 66.4 percent against an expected completion rate of 63.1, putting his completion percentage over expectation at plus 3.3 — eighth among qualified passers, which tells you the accuracy was genuinely above the bar for the difficulty of his throws. The rushing profile is what separates him from a replacement-level passer: 83 carries, 498 yards at 6.0 a pop, plus 2 scores on the ground. But the efficiency drag is real. His adjusted net yards per attempt was 5.9, 24th among qualified starters — that's the sack tax showing up. And the week-to-week was boom-or-bust underneath a 17.9 PPR average: four games of 25-plus, but also six games under 15, including a 3.3-point disaster against the Jaguars and back-to-back single-digit weeks midseason. The ceiling weeks tilted leagues. The floor weeks were unstartable.
The defining stat for Herbert's fantasy year isn't a single play — it's the gap between his individual numbers and his team's offensive context. The Chargers ranked 30th in red-zone touchdown rate at 52.2 percent, bottom ten at turning trips inside the 20 into six. For a quarterback ranked eighth in passing touchdowns inside that environment, the takeaway is clear: Herbert was creating scores on volume and downfield connections, not easy red-zone layups. The 60-yard touchdown bomb to Quentin Johnston against the Raiders in Week 2 was the template — explosive plays were the engine. When they hit, Herbert smashed your weekly score. When they didn't, the offense bogged down and he got muffed.
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