Marcus Locker

[nine]

5 hours ago, rns90 said:

This needs to be watched again.  A lot of these passes had no chance of being completed.  He's throwing into double and triple coverage.  That's what gets me.  He can't read the defense.  A few of these are mechanical issue related (ie floaters) but most of them you shake your head and say "WTF?"  

  

That's kind of why I don't buy the "he has had X coordinators in X years excuse" or the OL/WR sucks argument.

 

We always hear terms like "throwing a receiver open", "threading the needle, or "throwing into coverage".    After watching a bunch of film on various QBs, I've come to realize there's very little difference in these terms;  in most cases it's the same play and the QB is making the same decision...the main thing that sets them apart is the quality of the throw.   A great throw results in a great play;  a poor throw results in disaster.

 

If a receiver is covered and the QB puts the ball where the defender can't reach it, we say he "threw the receiver open".   If he squeezes the ball between multiple defenders before they can get there, we say he "threaded the needle".     But if we see the same exact plays with throws that arrive a beat late or  slightly off target, we say he "made a bad read" or  "threw into coverage".     It's not necessarily about a bad read or bad decision;   in many cases, the difference between a good/bad play is the throw itself.

 

The video of Mariota's INTs from 2017....a lot of those were just flat-out bad throws.   He had a small window to get the ball to the receiver and he simply missed it.     We also saw a plays where the decision and throw weren't bad, but a defender showed remarkable recognition and/or athleticism and made a tremendous defensive play.   There were a couple poorly designed plays where the routes were spaced so close together, a single defender was able to cover multiple routes/receivers.     (However, on those plays Mariota should have recognized the bad route combo and not made the throw....so those were definitely bad reads and/or bad decisions.   He took a bad play and made it worse.)

[nine]

43 minutes ago, OILERMAN said:

20 passes? That's nothing in today's NFL plus the context in those games is glaring. I wonder if the Texans game when he padded his stats playing safe with no threat of coming back pads those numbers? Of course it does. He had 24 passes vs NE, which was a very good game but it was hardly opened up. 

 

 Against the Ravens, disaster, they def pulled him from the Colts blowout because of what happened in the Ravens game and had him play super conservative down big against the Texans. 

 

 The idea he does better with more pass attempts or with a more wide open passing attack is absolutely laughable. The coaches keep him from those situations at all cost. 

 

Fair enough.   Something I posted a couple weeks ago in another thread:

 

In 2018, (Mariota)  had only two games with 33+ attempts....vs Eagles and Jets.   His production in those games (64% completion rate, 313 yds/game, 4 TD, 2 INT, 95.2 rating...5.1% TD, 2.6% INT) wasn't spectacular, but it was solid and quite respectable.   

 

His next two highest pitch counts came against the Chargers (24/32, 75% compl, 237 yds, 1 TD, 1 INT) and Dallas (21/29, 240 yds, 2 TD, 0 INT)....also solid performances.   

 

Mariota's numbers for the four games where he threw the most:

 

95/139, 1103 yds, 7 TD, 3 INT.     68% comp, 34.8 att/game, 7.9 YPA, 275 yds/gm,  5.0% TD,  2.2% INT,  99.9 passer rating.

 

It ain't Aaron Rodgers, but it's pretty good.  Very solid.

 

It's also worth noting taht these games are a dramatic improvement over 2017, when he had 9 games of 30+ attempts...and in those game he threw a combined 7 TDs and 9 INTs.   (I won't bother running the other numbers....suffice to say, they were pretty bad.)

[StephenIsLegend]

Yawn.