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Matthew Stafford turns back the clock, more Week 14 thoughts: Quick Outs

11 December 2024Last Update :
Matthew Stafford turns back the clock, more Week 14 thoughts: Quick Outs

Temperatures are dropping, and the playoff picture is coming into focus. Week 14 in the NFL provided a seismic slate of games, both in terms of the standings and with performances that could shape how we feel about these teams as they head into the postseason.

To that end, Matthew Stafford gets the quarterback spotlight this week with his latest surge to push this Rams team toward the playoffs. We’ll also cover Ernest Jones’ crafty interception versus the Cardinals, gauge the panic meter on the Eagles’ dropback passing game and check in on the abnormally large bunch of teams without a shred of hope of playing meaningful games in January.

QB charting: Matthew Stafford

Stafford played the single best game of any quarterback this season Sunday against the Buffalo Bills. I’m comfortable saying that. Stafford was lights out from start to finish in a performance that felt every bit as dominant as stretches of his 2021 Super Bowl run.

Moreover, Stafford’s best is a unique spectacle. Think about all of the best games from the league’s top quarterbacks, like Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, and Lamar Jackson. They obviously can (and do) win from the pocket, but they also hurt defenses with mobility and creativity on the run.

Not Stafford. He is a creative passer — almost exclusively from the pocket. Stafford is the last vestige of a bygone era of gunslinging quarterbacks, and he stretched that play style to its limits in Week 14.

Stafford was accurate on 25-of-30 (83.3 percent) pass attempts against the Bills. A few well-designed screens to Puka Nacua are in that mix, including the game-winning touchdown, but don’t let that distract you from the dozen intermediate throws Stafford made to pull off this upset.

Matthew Stafford’s Week 14 numbers
Comp Att TDs WR Adj. Pass def.
Total
25 (2 drops)
30
2
1
2
Under pressure
5 (1 drop)
7
0
1
1
Out of pocket
6 (1 drop)
7
0
0
1
5-plus pass rushers
5
8
1
0
2
Man coverage
7 (1 drop)
9
0
0
1
Zone coverage
13 (1 drop)
16
1
1
1
Tight window
6 (2 drops)
10
1
1
2
Open window
14
15
0
0
0

He was accurate on 10-of-13 attempts of between 11 and 20 yards. Not only do 13 attempts to that area form an outsized portion of his attempts, he was money on almost all of them. Even one of his “misses” could be argued away as Cooper Kupp not doing a good enough job getting back to the ball on a comeback route Stafford had to throw early.

It’s not like those throws were all schemed open, either. The Bills were playing a lot of good, tight coverage, despite the results. Stafford just continued to pin the ball into improbable locations, and his receivers consistently made good on those chances.

Stafford put six of his 10 throws into tight windows on the money. Two of them ended up being dropped, including a sensational deep-corner attempt to Demarcus Robinson early in the game. Drops aside, though, Stafford’s willingness and talent to make those throws are what allowed Nacua to bring in two remarkable sideline catches and Kupp to snag a seam route in traffic for a touchdown.

Stafford and Sean McVay’s ability to stay one step ahead of the Bills’ defense stood out, as well. The Rams were always the aggressor. When the Bills were in two-high zones, the Rams had an answer; when the Bills showed man coverage, the Rams had something cooked up or Stafford was able to check into it. Stafford was excellent under pressure and when blitzed.

There are better quarterbacks than Stafford, but nobody’s “A” game is as honorable as his. He just hangs in tough pockets and lets that thing rip. That style of play never gets old, if you can do it like Stafford does.

Stat check: A lot of bad teams

The worst teams in the league are losing more than ever in the modern era. A quarter of the league had absolutely nothing to play for even before Thanksgiving. Through 13 games this season, there are eight teams with three or fewer wins — the Raiders and Giants with two each, six other teams with three.

According to TruMedia, there have not been more than six teams with three or fewer wins at this point in the season since at least 2000. (There were exactly six in 2000, 2008, 2014 and 2019 — once every six or so years.)

Even having six of those teams is pretty uncommon. Last year, for example, there were three teams with just three or fewer wins by this point: the Panthers, Cardinals and Patriots.

This unprecedented group of losing teams got me thinking, though. If all these teams are losing more than before, are they also worse by point differential than bottom-feeders of years past? Or are there roughly the same amount and quality of bad teams, and this year’s versions are just a little unluckier when it comes to finishing games?

The answer seems to be the latter.

As things stand, there are 10 teams with a point differential of minus-49 or worse right now — the eight teams with three or fewer wins plus the Cowboys and Falcons. Atlanta is the weirdest case, because it has a respectable 6-7 record but has lost in some embarrassing blowouts.

Still, it’s not unusual to have 10 teams with that kind of point differential. Between 2017 and 2021, for comparison, there were at least nine teams with a minus-49 or worse point differential through 13 games, per Pro Football Reference.

The pits of the NFL both are and are not worse than they have been before. The worst teams are probably about as competitive as ever, maybe even more so since there aren’t any zero- or one-win squads. The difference now is there are more teams that are both bad and incapable of squeezing out a couple lucky wins.

Anatomy of a highlight: Ernest Jones’ interception

Turnovers were the difference in Sunday’s divisional rematch between the Cardinals and Seahawks. Both offenses moved the ball relatively well, but a pair of Kyler Murray interceptions in the first quarter put the Cardinals in an early hole out of which they couldn’t quite dig themselves.

On first glance, the first of Murray’s two interceptions looked as ugly as it gets. On a second-and-19 late in the first quarter, Murray fired a ball right at Jones over the middle of the field — a Jimmy Garoppolo classic, seemingly.

A little more inspection, however, reveals that play was more of an exceptional effort from Jones than anything else.

The Cardinals line up in a 3-by-1 formation with the back away from the passing strength. The isolated receiver to the weakside of the formation is also in a cut split inside the numbers. This weakside alignment — the receiver in a tight split with the back to his side — is a classic tell for some type of high-low combination with the receiver running a dig route over the middle.

Jones keeps that info in the back of his mind as the play gets rolling.

At the snap, Jones opens with his shoulders towards the passing strength and his eyes on the tight end. He is making sure there aren’t going to be any in-breaking routes back his way from the trips side.

The instant Jones sees the tight end stay vertical and work through the outside shoulder of the strong hook defender (safety Coby Bryant, No. 8), Jones knows he is free to work back to the dig. Jones wastes zero time pivoting towards the back side and melting into the dig window. Murray almost certainly thinks he can fit the ball behind Jones, because Jones’ shoulders are turned the other way — but Jones shuts the window before Murray can realize it.

From the moment the ball is snapped to when the pass hits his hands, Jones plays with perfect eyes, depth and awareness of the entire passing concept rather than just what he can see in front of him. It is a teach-tape coverage rep from a player operating at a borderline All-Pro level since heading to Seattle at the trade deadline.

Jones has glued this Seahawks defense together. A lot of the team’s resurgence is thanks to its defensive line finally getting healthy, but Jones’ stabilizing play in the run game has had an effect on everyone around him, as has his coverage presence over the middle.

Scramble drill: I am worried about the Eagles’ passing offense

In the locker room following Sunday’s near-loss to the Carolina Panthers, Philadelphia Eagles receiver AJ Brown was asked what the offense needs to improve. Brown was blunt: “Passing.”

We can’t put the burden on Brown to point fingers or explain in depth what exactly about the passing game needs to be better — it’s not a player’s job to spell that out to the media. Brown did mention later that it’s hard to get into a rhythm with a relatively low number of passing attempts, but that’s about it.

Unpacking a comment like that is exactly what this column is for, though, and Brown isn’t wrong in his assessment. Passing the ball, especially without the guardrails of screens or play action, is the shakiest part of this Eagles team as we creep towards January football.

For starters, the Eagles’ offense relies on some of those guardrails — screens, play-action shots and RPOs — more than other offenses. Even when the Eagles do go to pure dropback concepts, it’s a lot of simple vertical routes outside the numbers or mesh concepts. The heavy lifting is done by the offensive line and the skill players.

And when the Eagles have gotten into pure passing situations — meaning no screens or play action — they have been just okay. Quarterback Jalen Hurts’ 46.2 percent success rate on those plays is a hair above the league average (45.5), per TruMedia, while his 0.02 EPA per play there is just below the league average (0.04). That’s not painfully bad or anything, but it is worse than Hurts’ performance if you include all dropbacks.

The real pain point is Hurts’ propensity to hold the ball and take sacks in pure dropback situations. In those instances, Hurts has an average time to throw of 3.02 seconds, second highest in the league. Jackson is the only player above him, which may sound worrisome for Jackson — but the difference is in each QB’s respective sack rates. Jackson takes a sack just 6.0 percent of the time on those plays compared to 12.2 percent for Hurts.

Jackson’s rate is one of the best in the league; Hurts’ is one of the worst. In fact, only Will Levis, Deshaun Watson and Caleb Williams have a higher sack rate in pure dropback situations than Hurts does right now. Those plays are the primary source of instability with the Eagles’ passing game, and they mostly stem from Hurts being a little late or unwilling to trigger on tight-window throws that aren’t vertical shots.

The question now is how much of an issue this really poses for the Eagles. If they continue to field a top-eight defense and mash teams on the ground — thanks in part to Hurts’ massive increase in scrambling value this season — there is a world in which their shortcomings won’t be enough to sink them against most teams. They have shown the ability to control the clock and the scoreboard in most of their games this season, especially since mid-October.

Realistically, this won’t matter until January. The Eagles are only a game back of the first seed in the NFC and should be favored in their remaining four games. It’s more likely than not that they will lock up homefield advantage for at least two playoff games, and they still have a shot at stealing the bye from the Lions.

Against the best teams in the league, however, the passing game being worse than the sum of its parts may well be what does in the Eagles.

(Top photo of Matthew Stafford: Katelyn Mulcahy / Getty Images)

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