Week 16 Quick Reads

by Vincent Verhei

Only ten pass plays in all of 2016 have gained 80 yards or more, and three of them came in Week 16. The longest of those was an 86-yarder from Andy Dalton to Brandon LaFell in the fourth quarter of Cincinnati's loss to Houston. There were also a pair of 80-yard plays: Carson Palmer to J.J. Nelson in the second quarter of Arizona's win over Seattle, and Alex Smith to Travis Kelce in the first quarter of Kansas City's Christmas Day win over Denver. There was also a 71-yard passing play this week, from Sam Bradford to Adam Thielen in the second quarter of Minnesota's loss to Green Bay.

Four plays, 317 total yards gained. Must have been a bunch of deep-ball passes out of seven-step drops, right? Well, wrong. Palmer's pass to Nelson was caught 46 yards past the line of scrimmage, with 36 yards after the catch. Bradford's big play was also caught deep downfield, gaining almost as many yards through the air (33) as after the catch (38). LaFell's catch, though, was caught only 5 yards downfield, while Kelce's ball was actually caught right at the line of scrimmage.

Going down the list of explosive completions this week, we continue to find a mix of dumpoffs, bombs, and everything in between:

• DeSean Jackson: 15 yards in the air, 42 YAC, 57 total.
• DeVante Parker: 4 yards in the air, 52 YAC, 56 total.
• Sammy Watkins: 49 yards in the air, 4 YAC, 53 total.
• Travis Benjamin: 45 yards in the air, 5 YAC, 50 total.
• Jordy Nelson: 22 yards in the air, 26 YAC, 48 total.

When you think about it, it's kind of silly to just bundle all these together and put them in a bin called "passing plays." Obviously, the less distance a pass travels down the field, the more likely it is to be completed, but the more reliant it is upon the receiver to gain yards on the ground. Deeper passes, meanwhile, are reliant on a quarterback's arm strength and accuracy to get to the right place at the right time, and any yards they produce after that point are just icing on the cake. This is an oversimplification, of course -- an accurate quarterback will give his receivers more opportunities to make big plays out of short routes than one who is constantly throwing behind his guys, while receivers like Mike Evans can help their quarterbacks by winning 50-50 jump balls downfield. Regardless, we can probably learn something about quarterbacks by analyzing their throws at various distances rather than lumping all their passes together.

So… let's try to learn something about quarterbacks by analyzing their throws at various distances. The following tables show the passing stats for each of the 34 quarterbacks this year with at least 200 pass plays. (This list is unlikely to grow -- Josh McCown and Blaine Gabbert are next in line with 186 and 175 pass plays respectively, but both have been healthy scratches as of late.) I then checked the DVOA for each quarterback in each of the following ranges:

• Short: Passes thrown to receivers within 5 yards of the line of scrimmage.
• Medium: Passes thrown to receivers 6 to 15 yards downfield.
• Deep: Passes thrown to receivers 16 to 25 yards downfield.
• Bomb: Passes thrown to receivers 26-plus yards downfield.

For this essay, we are looking only at completions, incompletions, interceptions, defensive pass interference calls, and incomplete laterals -- in other words, plays where quarterbacks actually attempted to throw to someone. No scrambles, sacks, aborted snaps, or other weirdness. For that reason, the DVOAs in these tables will be somewhat inflated, because we are comparing each pass at each distance to all passing plays -- including those sacks and aborted snaps.

Without any further ado, here are the best and worst passers this year when it comes to short-range throws:

These plays include things like screen and swing passes to receivers behind the line of scrimmage, as well as very quick curl and slant routes. They are almost entirely reliant on the receiver making plays with the ball in his hands to gain significant yardage.

In Matt Ryan's case, the primary receiver on those routes has been Devonta Freeman (51 targets), though Tevin Coleman, Julio Jones, and Mohamed Sanu have each seen 30-plus targets at this range. This is one of the reasons Atlanta's offense has been so successful this year -- they have multiple weapons who can make a big play out of nothing.

Dak Prescott's top targets on short passes have been Jason Witten, Cole Beasley, and Ezekiel Elliott; Carson Palmer has leaned on David Johnson and Larry Fitzgerald. On the other hand, Brian Hoyer (five players with 11 to 21 targets) and Drew Brees (six with 34 to 58) have spread the ball around more. With the notable exception of Prescott, the best quarterbacks at this range are all in their 30s, which suggests that success here is largely based on having the experience to know when to throw short -- and when not to.

Jared Goff's numbers are based on only 201 pass plays in six starts and are going to be a little hinky, but it's surprising to see that his top receivers on short throws have been Lance Kendricks and Kenny Britt, not Tavon Austin and Todd Gurley. Matt Barkley's presence here is a surprise, considering the success his teammate Hoyer had on similar short throws. Perhaps it's because Barkley focused so much on Cameron Meredith (21 targets) and Jordan Howard (18) and didn't look for other options. On the other hand, Cam Newton had seven players between 12 and 28 targets, and it didn't do him any good. Trevor Siemian and Brock Osweiler bring up the rear, showing again that young quarterbacks seem to struggle here -- and that the 2015 Broncos won the Super Bowl with some really bad quarterbacks on their roster.

And now, the medium passers.

At this distance we're looking at things like crossing routes, ins, and some shorter curls. These are more difficult for a quarterback to complete, but often still give a receiver a chance to get some yards after the catch.

And on that note, Julian Edelman has been a big reason Tom Brady has been so successful at this distance, with twice as many targets at this range as any other Patriots player. Drew Brees has gotten big results by throwing to Brandin Cooks, Michael Thomas, and Willie Snead. Philip Rivers has often targeted Antonio Gates here, but also Dontrelle Inman and Tyrell Williams. You can probably guess Kirk Cousins' top targets: Pierre Garcon, DeSean Jackson, and Jordan Reed. And this is the range in which Marcus Mariota excels, throwing to Rishard Mathews, Tajae Sharpe, and Delanie Walker.

The Rams' Jared Goff shows up in last place again -- though Case Keenum's struggles at the same distance indicate that the troubles in Los Angeles go beyond the quarterback. Like Keenum, Ryan Fitzpatrick and Colin Kaepernick have spent parts of 2016 on the bench, so no shock to see their names on this list. But Eli Manning? What's he doing here? Perhaps the problem is that he has been forcing the ball to his favorite receiver -- Odell Beckham has 60 targets at this range, 12 more than any other Giants receiver.

As for the deep routes…

Now we're moving deep into the defensive backfield. These are the deep outs and seam routes that test the limits of secondaries. In some cases they require more arm strength than even long bombs, because throws must hit receivers in tight windows in the defense that usually don't stay open for long.

And this, in turn, suggests that Brady's arm strength is just fine at age 39. And it's not just because Rob Gronkowski was making big catches downfield before he got hurt -- Edelman has actually been Brady's most frequent target at this distance. Derek Carr got the Raiders into the playoffs in large part by throwing deep balls to Amari Cooper and Michael Crabtree -- we'll see if Matt McGloin can have similar success. Ryan Tannehill, like Carr, was at his best on deep passes -- and like Carr, he will be watching the playoffs from the sidelines (or will he?). Sam Bradford's name here is unexpected, considering that Minnesota's sorry offensive line would theoretically give him few chances to make plays downfield. As for Cody Kessler, he is listed here mainly due to Terrelle Pryor, who was the target on 11 of Kessler's 30 deep passes.

When you look at the names on the right side of this table, you find some of the NFL's most overpaid players. Joe Flacco, in particular, was given $44 million guaranteed mainly because his strong arm was supposed to deliver big results downfield. Philip Rivers and Eli Manning were once traded for each other, and both have had their arm strength questioned in recent years. As for Brock Osweiler and Blake Bortles, well, who knows if either will be starting in 2017.

We'll close out with the home run hitters.

Now we're talking the highlight patterns -- corner, fly, and post routes designed to flip field position in an instant.

So, in conclusion, Ryan has been at his best throwing very short and very long. (He was eighth in medium throws and sixth in long passes, so he's good at those too.) Ryan has had some big games without Julio Jones this year, but not many big catches -- Jones has been the target on 17 of Ryan's 34 bomb passes. It's a similar story for Kirk Cousins (DeSean Jackson has been the target on 21 of 42 bombs) and Andy Dalton (A.J. Green 16 of 33). Andrew Luck and Matthew Stafford, though, have split the bulk of their bombs between two players each: T.Y. Hilton (15) and Phillip Dorsett (14) in Indianapolis, Marvin Jones (13) and Golden Tate (12) in Detroit.

We opened this analysis noting the difference between Hoyer and Barkley, but they did have one thing in common: miserable results on home-run balls. The first order of business in Chicago is figuring out who is going to play quarterback next year, but the next item on the to-do list might be finding a reliable downfield threat. We shouldn't put too much stock in Goff's numbers, especially here, where he has thrown only eight bomb passes all year. (Ben Roethlisberger threw nine in one game against Week 9 against Baltimore.) Bortles is, well, Bortles, while the inability to connect on home-run balls is the biggest hole in Carson Wentz's game.