Bryce's Achilles Heel Is Not What You Think It Is

[strato]

27 minutes ago, Manna said:

Whenever I watch non-Alabama QBs in the NFL throw I find myself marveling at the velocity and intensity of their passes. I have to ground myself because those are what NFL arms are supposed to look like and I’m just so used to seeing a weak noodle arm passer. He makes good throws here and there, but his norm is that weak arm. 
If it’s not genetically impossible, is it “bad” for a QB to develop arm strength in the offseason? 

I think at some point you top out what God gave you. 
He can use leverage via his mechanics to maximize what he has and When he pays attention to it the throws are better. 
 

IMO as a layman a lot of it is what kind of ‘headroom’ you have.

The guys who are gifted don’t have to use maximum effort to get good results and stay within themselves but they have it in reserve. They can do an arm throw for substantial distance without max effort. 
 

I think what we may be seeing with these ‘lasers’ is a throw that Bryce puts the max effort into and does his mechanics right and has his base right and it works together. 
 

To get to the payoff here, I think his best velocity throws take dall that whereas  a naturally gifted guy doesn’t need to go full effort to get that same velocity.

I have said this three or four times over the years and it never gets picked up on but the accuracy is more consistent with an easier motion and max effort can produce less predictable location.

It is a baseball pitcher thing but it applies to throwing a pass too. It isn’t that you can’t make an accurate throw with full effort it is just not as reliably accurate to the same degree.

Someone said something about his pro day and that is where I saw it too. He took a little extra step on the deep throws. Some call it a hitch but I don’t see it that way because I don’t see it on shorter throws. He does it trying to get distance.

I saw that and just wanted no part of it at 1.1 . That is not tne characteristic of a 1.1 passer. 
He should have been at best, late first  I had him second day. Of course I am no one and certainly not a pro evaluator, it is just that he was so easy to suss out. It is kind of in your face obvious. 

They must have thought they could fix him. Changing a lifelong throwing motion with the footwork tied into it is not fuging easy. Anyone that had decent success with ‘their’ way and tried to change it to get more, can tell you that. 

 

 

Edited 6 hours ago by strato

[Cpt slay a ho]

He’s overthrown WRs numerous times deep,I don’t think his arm strength there is a problem, def seems to be and issue in the 20-30 yard range, I don’t see a lot of outbreaking routes being completed, whether that’s due to his lack of ability to drive the ball to the outside hash or our WRs, especially XL cornering at the top of there routes.

regardless of his weaknesses, the question is can a team be built around him to mask them, or can he overcome those weaknesses and adapt.

I know it’s beating a dead horse, but something big is missing from Bryce’s qb play that’s leading to so many sub 200 yard passing games, all signs lead to a physical trait that’s the cause of this, wether it’s arm strength or his height

 

[fieryprophet]

42 minutes ago, Manna said:

Whenever I watch non-Alabama QBs in the NFL throw I find myself marveling at the velocity and intensity of their passes. I have to ground myself because those are what NFL arms are supposed to look like and I’m just so used to seeing a weak noodle arm passer. He makes good throws here and there, but his norm is that weak arm. 
If it’s not genetically impossible, is it “bad” for a QB to develop arm strength in the offseason? 

The majority of the velocity on a throw is based around a player's core, so developing "arm" strength is really a function of developing one's ability to rotate the entire body, accentuate the transfer of weight over the hips, and apply that momentum to generate force on the ball. All of these things alter the placement of the ball and accuracy without thousands of reps to realign to the new mechanics. The hope then with young quarterbacks is that they simply grow into their bodies and that experience allows them to optimize their natural mechanics to eliminate wasted motion and with repetition expand both their power and accuracy.

[strato]

33 minutes ago, Tbe said:

See, I think one of his biggest issues is he bails too early. 

His instinct has been to bail as soon as defenders get behind him and the pocket starts to close in.

Taller QBs hang in there for that extra second or two and throw over guys as the pocket collapses in the QBs lap. 

BY runs as soon as this starts to happen, which means routes don’t have time to develop and the field gets cut in half as soon as he runs.

This last game I saw some signs of him being willing to hang in the pocket when the defense gets behind him, but that has been rare.

 

He has done it before. Stand in and plant and step up into pressure making the throw. There was a pretty good play on Sunday where he was in tight quarters and hung in there.

He did it when he came back last year. But in preseason he was bailing again plain as day. Hearing footsteps, avoiding being hit. 
 

I don’t know. He just doesn’t stick with it. 

[fieryprophet]

29 minutes ago, strato said:

It is a baseball pitcher thing but it applies to throwing a pass too. It isn’t that you can’t make an accurate throw with full effort it is just not as reliably accurate to the same degree.

There's a reason Greg Maddux was never a flamethrower but still one of the most feared pitchers of all time, because accuracy beats velocity far more often then vice versa. Once you exceed a certain minimum capability, you can thrive with extreme traits elsewhere, its not strictly about power in any sport but powerlifting.

[strato]

13 minutes ago, fieryprophet said:

There's a reason Greg Maddux was never a flamethrower but still one of the most feared pitchers of all time, because accuracy beats velocity far more often then vice versa. Once you exceed a certain minimum capability, you can thrive with extreme traits elsewhere, its not strictly about power in any sport but powerlifting.

Exactly. And the flame throwers as well, get location benefits from not going all out. But they have it in reserve. 
Not sure how much Greg had but he was an artist. 

There was a YouTube I came across last year or maybe even 2023 and I don’t how to even find now but it had two NFL QBs I want say one was Carr from the Raiders but I don’t really remember

 The point of it is they stood side by side throwing identical distances to identical targets. Radar gun was used. 
They threw the normal effort (not all out) and it was measured etc.

Then they were asked to throw their ‘fastball’. They were missing and most often they were missing high. It demonstrated the same principle. 
 

edit: and applying that to arm strength, give me the guy that doesn’t need max effort to have good velocity. The margins are so narrow with less velocity in tne NFL the defenders can Close on it and this is a league where they value down to the 100th of a second level. It is that tight 

Edited 5 hours ago by strato

[Beast_3000]

7 hours ago, tukafan21 said:

No, it's his arm, plain and simple.  

He has the weakest arm of any starting QB in the NFL, that will always be an issue for him no matter what else he improves on.

And don't point to him zipping in that 4th down pass this weekend as to him having a strong enough arm, that's not the same thing.  He's unable to drive balls into spots downfield like almost every other starting QB, which is a problem.  But even more than that, it's when he has to throw off base, as he doesn't have the adequate arm strength to still make those throws at a high enough level like most other QB's can.  

It's why we see so many of those throws come up short of the WR, sometimes well short, and not on purpose by him, but you can just see he's putting his all behind the throw but he's off base and doesn't have the arm to make up for it.

And yes, I know he does still make some good throws when he's on the move, but that's still only the case when he's able to have a balanced and purposeful throw.  You know the plays I"m talking about, they're painfully obvious, and they're throws all the good QB's are able to make because of the difference in arm (and just body) strength.

In addition to his weak arm he has to compensate in the pocket by throwing off his toes due to his height. Respectfully, its a handicap. 

[TD alt]

I mean, you're acting like we don't see the tippy-toe bunny hops, jump throws more than normal (with both feet dangling in the air every which a way), and off-platform but off-balance throws that arrive short or sail high. Could that be bad mechanics due to being short? Could a seeming propensity to bail the pocket towards the sidelines early as opposed to sitting in the pocket tall and strong, surveying his reads, be an attempt at trying to see an open throwing lane?

I'm not saying that what you're saying isn't a contributing factor to what has been an underwhelming display of executing the QB position, but this is year three, and if the lightbulb hasn't switched on by now---if you haven't figured out that guys are faster, stronger and generally more athletic, then what's it going to take? It's hard to forget that "mental processing" was supposed to be Bryce Young's superpower. Are you telling me that he can't nail down such an easy concept as, "I can't get away with the things I did in college at the pro level," is that right? If he can't get past that, then that surely limits his ability to successfully execute all the other stuff. 

Look, I'm not trying to be flippant. I acknowledge that playing pro football is more complex than a lot of fans realize, but all we can do, as fans, is observe. One of my favorite things to do is just look at the greater picture and think what part human nature is playing in the many decisions that are being made or have to be made. You're absolutely correct that fans don't know exactly what's going on, but that is by design, and in many ways it's just the nature of the beast. Some things we can't know. That being said, the professionals screw the hell up all the time. The professionals disagree all the time. These disagreements can be within the same franchise or from franchise to franchise. And sometimes these decisions are all over the place, so excuse me if I ain't exactly buying the I-know-more-than-thee sentiment and that that means that professionals always make better decisions than fans would about certain players. Some of this stuff is simply luck or a crapshoot.

Edited 4 minutes ago by TD alt