Dude he was 8/24 for 124 yards and two interceptions through the third quarter. Five first downs. In what world was he not awful through three quarters?
I remember while watching I thought he was garbage... But going back he was running for his life and the team had about 5 drops before the 4th. He had three or four throws that were bad, but otherwise he actually played much better than the numbers. In cautiously optimistic of a big game coming up, so naturally my heart is going to get ripped out and stomped on.
the old passer rating is wack... top score = 154?? All TDs and INTS count equal? QBR is better. As such, ZW had 3 gamesd with QBR over 50. vs Pitts 53, 50 is a measure by whcih the rating says the QB gives your team a 50% chance of winning. ie- we neeed him to be 50+, whcih is basically a plus player at the posistion,
My rating is better. I call it the swear rating. The less I swear at the TV after a throw the higher the rating.
Hall coulda helped him out with that deep pass... he had his eyes onc the ball and the D did not, came back for catch and missed it. not a great throw, but certain;ly in the catchable category. if we are gonna holdhim to this standard no receiver will everf have to make a back shoulder catch. but in general yeah, buncha dicey throws that could be better.
In the world where you watch the game rather than just quote stats. If you watched the game, you would know that the problem was that the OL gave no protection, so Zach was showing amazing ability and athleticism by managing to throw the ball into the bleachers without taking a sack. As any competent NFL coach (or fan) would tell you, sometimes a good play is to throw it away and live to play another day. With our OL,that was the play Zach had to make over and over for the first three quarters. PFF graded Zach way higher for this game than Trevor Lawrence YTD. Maybe they're also looking at something other than just stats.
the problem with looking at stats is they can be deceiving. In the third quarter Zach was 2 for 8 with one INT. The stats are awful but he actually played really well. Of the 6 incompletions 2 were throwaway and 4 were drops. using your eyes you can see that drops stopped two drives and caused am INT that resulted in negative 6 points. The first half there were some bad throws and by my count two awful throws, three turnover worthy plays along with the game changing INT. In the second half he only made one inaccurate throw. As good as Zach played in the 2nd half we can't gibe him a pass for that bad INT. It completely changed the game.
btw., its been stated but i concur... throwing it low and away from the D on that pass to CD was really nice. and CD finally didnt play like a schmuck.
You don't go 8-24 for 124 yds and 2 interceptions when you're playing well. He was awful for about 2 quarters. He had the lowest completion percentage over expectation in the NFL on Sunday according to Next Gen. I don't think one good quarter necessarily changes things, but it was his first game back from injury, so maybe the rust narrative applies.
One good quarter surely changed the outcome against the Steelers. Might not be enough going forward...
Consider the context. 6 dropped passes and 6+ throwaways along with being pressured on 22 snaps where he only took 1 sack. On the negative he had three turnover worthy passes as well as two other bad throws on the day. For the most part he was very accurate and very good. When given time he was tearing up the defense. I understand the the number of turnover worthy plays is not acceptable but given the pressure somewhat understandable. If you look at stats he was 2 for 8 with an INT in third quarter but if you look at his actual play he was very good with 4 dropped passes and 2 throwaways. Zero inaccurate passes. So it's context. in the 2nd half out of 20 passes he only had one inaccurate pass on a throw to Hall caused by bad mechanics with his left foot. The INT in the first half was horrible and it changed the entire game. I can't say how bad that was and that throw negates most of his good play. But, outside a few throws he was very very good all game. The two best thing he did was not taking sacks and no fumbles. He has a 26 percent sack rate when pressured last year yesterday he had a 4 percent rate and that sack was on his first pressure. That was huge. The second best thing he did was not fold up. He made the big mistake in the first half that let Pitt back in the game. He Played a really good third QB but did not get upset at the drops and played a great 4th quarter. He never gave up which would have been easy to do.
I’m pretty tired of these snide remarks about not watching the game. Yes I watched the game. I have a different opinion than most of you guys, I could live with giving him credit for holding the fort if he played in a monsoon or snow storm. There is no context where completing 30% of your passes is in anyway a good three quarters of football. I gave him lots of credit for not being rattled after those three quarters of football or even during those three quarters of football. But he in no way shape or form had a good quarter. For what it’s worth, NFL receivers drop passes. It’s baked into every quarterbacks statistical output and overall performance. Ja’Marr Chase lead the league in drops last year. Do we handicap Burrows performance because of it? The Chargers top two wideouts were within the top ten in drops. Do we bring that up when we talk about Herbert? https://www.fantasypros.com/nfl/advanced-stats-wr.php?year=2021
I think this is pretty fair, and I generally agree with it. I will say though, when watching the game I don't recall thinking he was getting killed by drops other than a couple of times. I'm still concerned about two things with Zach - his internal clock is too slow and he cannot hit a guy running laterally near the LoS to save his life. Those were two glaring issues last year and they were issues this game too. I think he can probably overcome the short accuracy stuff because he's somehow very accurate down the field, but if his internal clock doesn't speed up he's going to be too prone to getting hit/hurt. Glass half full would say he was shaking off rust from missing preseason and the first few games, glass half empty would say he has an innate inability to hit lateral short passes and an incurable case of hero ball. Only time will tell. Also - how has no one told Zach he needs to take some mustard off the short passes yet? He has to stop rifling those to guys.
I think he is throwing the ball hard to try and get it there quicker, a sort of panic mode reflex, it was one of his faults last year, stinging the hands of the WR's isn't a good thing from 5-10 yards, it will only lead to drops.
Lots of good posts here on all sides honestly some thoughts as I read through these comments - stats matter, but context matters too. - over the long haul, stats mean more…so a 50% completion rate over 4 games or 8 games or a season is more accurate, and would be terrible in todays NFL (unlike when I started watching football in the 1970s where best QBs had like a 50%-55% completion rate), but for shorter stretches like a quarter or a half or even a game, they may not be the full story - for example, watching the game live I didn’t feel like Zach was shitting the bed for three quarters….yes the pick was bad and he was off target on 2 or 3 short throws (one to Hall, one to GW) but I wasn’t screaming “fucking QB!” at the screen, and in fact was a bit surprised to see his completion rate was so bad…so context matters - I’m a bit tired of hearing about drops … yes we had some drops, but so does every QB…like another poster said earlier, that’s already reflected in every QBs stats…are they factors? Sure. But it’s that way for all QBs. Plus, it’s kind of subjective in determining what is called a drop…and many times it’s a bad placed ball by the QB, so hard to get real equity in that stat. If a ball hits the receiver square in the hands then sure it’s a drop…but what if the ball is slightly tall, or behind the receiver, or a bit too far? It’s subjective all in all, I think Zach did ok behind a really suspect line, and in the end, he was perfect on two drives to win the game…cant ask much more of him….I’ve been probably more critical of Zach than most as I’m so frustrated by his continued inability to make the simple throws that could put us in third and short instead of third and long, but at least this week, he did what was needed to win the damn game. Behind a rough OL… at least our weapons look legit…we have enough talent at RB and WR and yeah even at TE … if our OL can come together as we get some people back we should be decent on O and should get a good read on Zach this year
Both those short throws, the one to Wilson and the one to Hall that he missed he rushed with bad mechanics. He left his left foot pointing left not facing the target and threw with his arm not his body. He rushed both throws and did not move the left foot. Same thing he did all last year. Something to monitor as we go on. Hopefully, it will fix with him being more calm. Interesting that he did the second bad one at the end of the game to Hall at the 10 yard line.
