Jared Goff and Carson Wentz are expected to be the first two picks in the draft tomorrow night. One thing you might not know about the two is that Goff is nearly two years younger than Wentz. Goff, who played three years at California but did not redshirt, was born on October 14, 1994; as a result, he’ll be 21.88 years old on September 1st of this season. Wentz was a fifth year senior for the North Dakota State Bison last year, and was born on December 27th, 1992.

There have been 103 quarterbacks drafted since 1967 in the first round of the NFL draft. Goff will be the 15th youngest as of September 1 of that season, while Wentz will be 15th oldest by that same measure.

Some notable age divergences among top-5 QBs in the same class:

In 1971, Jim Plunkett, Archie Manning, and Dan Pastroni went 1-2-3 in the draft: Plunkett was the oldest, at 23.74 years as of September 1st, 1971, while Manning and Pastorini were a year-and-a-half younger.

In 1993, Drew Bledsoe and Rick Mirer were the first two picks, but Mirer was born 25 months earlier than Bledsoe.

In 1999, Tim Couch, Donovan McNabb, and Akili Smith were the first three picks: Couch was 22.1 years old as of September ’99, making him the youngest in the group, while Smith had just turned 24 before the start of the season.

Eli Manning and Philip Rivers were traded for each other, of course, and both were born in 1981. But Manning was born in January, and Rivers in December, so Rivers is actually 11 months younger than Manning.

Mark Sanchez was born 15 months before Matt Stafford, and both went in the top 5 of the ’09 draft.

There’s no real trend about the younger player going first (or second) or being better (or worse), but the sample size is obviously really small. I do think it’s interesting when the older quarterback goes first, as their college production may have been inflated by because more physically mature. Was that enough to vault Plunkett over Manning or Pastorini? Or Manning over Rivers? On the other hand, do teams place a high value on youth, leading to things like Bledsoe over Mirer, Smith falling behind Couch and McNabb, and Stafford over Sanchez? It’s impossible to say, since age is one of hundreds of factors that go into draft choices.

But it is worth noting that Goff is on the younger end of the spectrum for a quarterback prospect, and Wentz is on the older end. All else being equal, I’d go for the younger guy, but obviously all else is not equal when discussing a Pac-12 prospect and an FCS prospect. Especially when the FCS prospect ended his college career with five rings.