John Mateer

Mateer arrived at Oklahoma as the Washington State transfer nobody in the SEC had film on, and for the first month of 2025 he looked like the most dangerous quarterback in the country. Then came the broken throwing hand against the Tigers, and what followed was 14 touchdowns against 11 interceptions on a compromised release — numbers that understate both how good he'd been and how bad the injury was.

The play-by-play data cuts through the noise. As a runner, Mateer graded at the 91st percentile in rushing touchdown rate and the 89th in success rate on scrambles and designed runs — he converts, he doesn't just accumulate. As a passer, his 81st-percentile explosive pass rate signals genuine downfield ability; the 59th-percentile EPA per dropback is the injury hangover, not the baseline. The 31st-percentile interception rate is the number that has to move in 2026, and it almost certainly will with a healthy hand.

He has returned for his final season with Ben Arbuckle calling plays in Year 2 together. He's on the Maxwell and Heisman preseason watch lists, the weapons around him are better, and the system fits his dual-threat profile as well as any offense in college football. The question isn't whether the talent is there. It's whether the thumb is.