Did Max Brosmer have the worst debut in NFL history?

On Sunday, November 30, former NFL coach and current analyst Steve Mariucci made a lofty prediction on NFL Network.

Mariucci boldly stated that undrafted Vikings rookie Max Brosmer, making his first NFL start, would throw for 485 yards against the Seattle Seahawks, breaking the record for passing yards in a game by an undrafted player.

Brosmer… did not quite reach this mark.

In a nightmare of an offensive game, Minnesota was shut out by Seattle 26-0. Max Brosmer threw for 126 yards and four interceptions while getting sacked an additional four times.

His passer rating was 33.6. His QBR was 6.2. This surely has to be the worst debut in NFL history, right? Not so fast.

There is one quarterback performance that negatively tops this performance, but it’s also important to look at ghastly debuts at other positions in the sport, as well as anomalies of games from quarterbacks of different eras.

In 1961, Sam Etcheverry made his NFL debut at the age of 31 for the St. Louis Cardinals.

Etcheverry was a star in the Interprovincial Rugby Football Union for the Montreal Alouettes to begin his football career. Now a member of the Canadian Football Hall of Fame, Sam looked to try his hand at the top league in America.

In his first game against the New York Giants. Etcheverry fumbled the ball six times. That is not a typo. It is the most that anyone has fumbled the ball in their debut.

However, despite the turnovers, the Cardinals won this game 21-10. Etcheverry even finished with 97 passing yards and a touchdown.

So, while this is a record-breaking game for the wrong reason, it’s certainly not the worst debut ever.

How about a punter? In 1975, 28-year-old rookie Steve Broussard made his punting debut with the Green Bay Packers.

Against the Detroit Lions, Broussard punted nine times, with three getting blocked. One was returned for a touchdown, and another was recovered in the endzone for another score. This remains the NFL record for most blocked punts in one game.

In all fairness to Broussard, blocked punts are more on the fault of the protection team rather than the punter. Broussard played just three more games, averaged 31.8 gross yards per punt, and never played in the NFL again.

Let’s look at the other phase of special teams. Tom Jurich was a 10th-round draft pick in 1978, but was released before the season began. He was signed in Week 7 by the Saints in an attempt to remedy a disastrous kicking season for New Orleans.

Despite winning 14-7, Jurich was terrible. He made both of his extra point attempts, but missed three field goals from 42, 23 and 22 yards, respectively.

Jurich is the only kicker since 1970 to miss three field goals in his debut. This was the only game he would ever play in the NFL.

Now, I’d be hesitant to say any of these games were worse than the one Max Brosmer played against Seattle, but he did not top the grandaddy of bad NFL debuts: Nathan Peterman.

I find it hard to see a debut being worse than his. In just one half of football, Peterman threw five interceptions on just 14 pass attempts for the Bills.

To fully appreciate how bad this game was, let’s imagine that Peterman played for the Chargers in this game, treating his one pick-six as a touchdown pass and interception return yardage as passing yardage. His stat line would have been 5/14, one touchdown and six interceptions, yielding a passer rating of 41.1

Peterman’s actual passer rating was 17.9. He would have had a better passer rating if he were playing for the other team.

Max Brosmer played quite badly against the Seahawks. In most worlds, we would be talking about this debut as the worst ever. Thankfully, this world has Nathan Peterman.

Brendan Kern is a second-year majoring in Broadcast Journalism. To contact him, email bwk5372@psu.edu