As anyone who tuned in was able to see, most of the pressure Darnold faced came from defenders who were lined up against Jets back up right tackle Brent Qvale, (who was forced in to action at left tackle), against one of the team’s tight ends or as an extra rusher with no blocker to impede them. Up the middle, it was a different story. For the third consecutive game, left guard James Carpenter looked excellent in pass protection. Carpenter and the rest of the starters played 39 snaps as a group, 22 of which were on pass plays according to pro football focus. On those 22 pass plays, Carpenter didn’t allow a single pressure up the middle. On the same exact number of snaps, starting center Spencer Long surrendered 1 hit on Sam Darnold while right guard Brian Winters allowed just a single quarterback hurry. In looking at right tackle Brandon Shell just to get the full picture of how the starting offensive linemen performed, the third year tackle allowed one quarterback hit, but no sacks. In fact, the only offensive lineman to allow a sack against the Giants was the aforementioned Qvale who was playing out of position in place of Kelvin Beachum. Even when Darnold was feeling the heat against the Giants, it wasn’t necessarily because of poor blocking, but due to good coverage down the field. For example, Darnold had almost 4.5 seconds to get rid of the ball on one of his throws for which he was hit with an intentional grounding penalty. By NFL standards, that much time (4.43 seconds by our count) is more than enough to make a play. OLINE PROTECTION isn't going to get any better until '19 and you can't expect to sit him for a year so I say...... START SAM DAY 1 I worry more about run blocking......I HATE ZONE BLOCKING
Sam looks wise beyond his years. reading a defense , changing plays at the line, buying time, standing in the pocket, going through progressions. running and sliding when he has to and making pretty much every throw regardless where he is or if he's on the move. My only concern right now is his lack of timing on the deep ball especially with robbie. Darnold hasn't thrown many deep at all in preseason and the few he did looked bad
I am not worried about his timing on deep balls because he hasn't attempted any. I have watched each game 5 times and haven't seen Sam or Teddy throw 1 go route to anyone. I really feel Bates has left the long ball out of his play calling for the preseason. I hear them talking how so & so hit so & so on a deep TD pass in practice. So it is in his playbook, just not in preseason. I will be more worried if the deep ball is non existent come regular season when they open up the playbook.
If the plan is to dink & dunk to matriculate down the field....I'm gonna get bored. I realize it eats up the clock and shit, but I'm begging to see some balls deep coked up Kenny Stabler vertical action. Run it in from the 5 ... take your time.
At this point I think it's more about Sam getting the timing down with his receivers than not wanting to go downfield. Dink and dunk helps open up the vertical passing game - Brady's made a career of it. If Sam dinks and dunks us to victory, I will not complain one bit.
did u 2 watch the game? he's made about 2 or 3 in preseason and they were all pretty ugly. the one to cannon stands out alot
Fuck it then. Bring in McCown once in a while to throw it deep. He's just standing around doing nuthin' anyways. It'll be like the anti-wildcat...
I'm glad you posted this. Puts things in perspective. It's easy to say the oline sucks or struggles, but it is another thing seeing data. I've said from the beginning to start him week 1 if he's our best chance to win. I felt great about the situation after hearing the interview with Bowles on Francesa's radio show. Bowles simply said, if Darnold gives us the best chance to win in week 1, then he plays week 1. He said that he doesn't take the whole "rookie" mindset with any other position so why take it with him. I LOVED that. If Darnold is ready, put him out there and let him shine.
That was because Cannon didn't run the route correctly. He was too far inside on the go route, you have to be more towards the boundary. A QB is taught to throw it close to the sideline, which mitigates the chances of the ball being intercepted.
Good post! Since I was unable to see the game I'll go with your analysis and feel a bit better about the pass protection.
LOL Don't recall ever seeing that patch, but sure I must have at some point. I was just being facetious. I could have just as easily said that our avatars should be octagonal or in the shape of a trapezoid.
