Cody Kessler: QB · USC · #6.
Closest statistical matches, adjusted for opponent strength.
Cody Kessler
Picks you apart underneath and protects the ball. Played for two head coaches at USC: Steve Sarkisian and Clay Helton. One game to point at: 410 passing yards and 3 passing TD against Idaho — Week 2, 2015.
Play style
High-percentage passer who protects the ball. Loses the matchup on improvisation.
Checkdown vs gunslinger · 3rd-and-long
Where the completions actually land
63.0% completion on 3rd-and-8+, but only 22.2% conversion-per-dropback — 58.8% of completions land short of the sticks.
Where completions land is fact — whether incompletions were aimed deep is intent, not recorded here, so this card counts completions only. checkdown by design
Short-yardage / goal-line · enumeration
Who gets the tough yard
3 of the team's 25 inside-the-5 carries (12.0%).
No outlet on our list has written about this player by name this season.
247Sports Nov 2
USA Today Nov 1
On3 Oct 21
Yahoo Sports Oct 16Swipe the table sideways for more columns.
Game log · Week-by-week
2015 season · 14 games
Swipe the table sideways for more columns.
| Wk | Opp | CMP/ATT | YDS | TD | INT | YPA | QBR | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wk 1 | W 55-6vs Arkansas State | 19/26 | 240 | 4 | 0 | 9.2 | 55.1 | 4 TD passes |
| Wk 2 | W 59-9vs Idaho | 26/31 | 410 | 3 | 0 | 13.2 | 93.3 | Season-high 410 yds |
| Wk 3 | L 31-41vs Stanford | 25/32 | 272 | 3 | 0 | 8.5 | 92.0 | 3 TD passes |
| Wk 4 | W 42-14@ Arizona State | 19/33 | 375 | 5 | 1 | 11.4 | 86.3 | 5 TD passes |
| Wk 6 | L 12-17vs Washington | 16/29 | 156 | 0 | 2 | 5.4 | 7.9 | |
| Wk 7 | L 31-41@ No. 14 Notre Dame | 30/46 | 365 | 2 | 2 | 7.9 | 52.7 | |
| Wk 8 | W 42-24vs No. 3 Utah | 21/28 | 264 | 1 | 0 | 9.4 | 66.6 | |
| Wk 9 | W 27-21@ California | 18/22 | 186 | 0 | 0 | 8.5 | 80.2 | |
| Wk 10 | W 38-30vs Arizona | 22/36 | 243 | 2 | 0 | 6.8 | 37.2 | |
| Wk 11 | W 27-24@ Colorado | 17/27 | 204 | 3 | 1 | 7.6 | 58.1 | 3 TD passes |
| Wk 12 | L 28-48@ No. 23 Oregon | 30/41 | 238 | 2 | 0 | 5.8 | 59.2 | |
| Wk 13 | W 40-21vs No. 22 UCLA | 15/26 | 175 | 2 | 0 | 6.7 | 55.4 | |
| Wk 14 | L 22-41vs No. 7 Stanford | 22/37 | 187 | 1 | 0 | 5.1 | 60.6 | |
 Bowl | L 21-23vs No. 23 Wisconsin | 18/32 | 221 | 1 | 1 | 6.9 | 45.1 | |
| Total | 298/446 | 3536 | 29 | 7 | 7.9 | — |
Week 4 · 2015
W 42-14
375 yds · 5 TD · 1 INT · QBR 86.3
Dominant 28-point win on the road against Arizona State.
With A. Jackson — 3 rec · 131 yds · 1 TD · K. Albarado — 47 yards per punt · 5 punts · 52 long
The plays that mattered most
Pass Profile · Completions by yards gained (PBP)
Adjusted ANY/A, sack rate, and where the yards came from
Totals here are the box score's. Play-by-play lists 441 passing plays (293 completions) against the box score's 446 attempts (298 completions), and the depth buckets use play-by-play.
Adjusted ANY/A
7.3739 of 198 QBsSack rate
7.7%152 of 198 QBsSacked on 7.7% of dropbacks (152 of 198) — and still 39 of 198 in Adjusted ANY/A.
Adjusted ANY/A uses full-season box-score totals (attempts, yards, TDs, INTs); sack rate is play-by-play-derived.
Short
0–9 ydsMiddle
10–19 ydsDeep
20+ ydsOverall 66.8% completion on 446 attempts · 39 deep completions averaging 34.0 yds.
Is he a different quarterback when it matters
Each situation vs his own 2015 baseline
No situation moves him more than 38 percentile points from his baseline.
Deltas are vs. this player’s own season baseline, never a league average. League sack rate by down is shown as context because sack attribution isn’t incompletion-denominated.
Splits · Per-game
2015 season · 14 games
Home vs Road
| YDS/g | TD/g | YPA | INT/g | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Home7g | 251 | 2.1 | 8.5 | 0.3 |
| Road5g | 274 | 2.4 | 8.2 | 0.8 |
First half vs Second half
| YDS/g | TD/g | YPA | INT/g | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Weeks 1-77g | 291 | 2.6 | 8.9 | 0.9 |
| Weeks 8+7g | 214 | 1.6 | 7.1 | 0.1 |
Supporting cast · Scheme
Staff and system around the player
Head Coach
Clay Helton
Pass share
47.3%
462 pass / 515 run
Plays / game
69.8
14 games
Scheme: Balanced.
Player standing · 2015
446 pass attempts and 61 carries in 14 games, about as many passes and runs a game as a typical FBS quarterback who plays every week.
How it ended
Two seasons at USC, 7,362 passing yards — drafted at #93 overall by the Cleveland Browns.
Coaching lineage · 2011–2015
4 coachesPlayed under 4 different head coaches: Lane Kiffin, Ed Orgeron, Steve Sarkisian, and Clay Helton. Multi-era developmental context.
Next stop · NFL
Cleveland BrownsEntering 11th NFL season
Cleveland BrownsEntering 11th NFL season
