Deep Ball in Cyclical Decline

[NAS]

Across the league.  5 straight years of decline. Deep pass attempts have fallen to just 7.7 per game in 2024, down from that 2019 peak. Air yards per attempt are at 7.7 yards this year—the lowest in over a decade. Overall passing yards per game have tanked too, from 496 in 2020’s early weeks to a  403 in 2024. 
 

This trend is a result of defenses playing with two-high safety schemes designed to prevent deep passes, forcing offenses to seek yards after the catch on shorter throws.  Two-high safety calls are everywhere now—up from 44% of dropbacks in 2019 to 63% in 2024—forcing QBs to take shorter throws instead of risking picks on bombs. Add in more presnap disguises, faster pass rushes (QB pressure up to 30.1% of dropbacks), and lighter, quicker D-linemen, and it’s a nightmare for deep shots. 
 

Offenses have adapted with emphasizing power run games to counter deep coverage and fast but leaner pass rushers.  Rushing attempts per game are up to 27.9 per game average with top teams significantly in the 30+ attempts.  QBs are emphasizing more short and intermediate throws so that the few deep passes they attempt have a higher completion percentage overall than in years past. 
 

So to everyone who is frustrated with lack of deep passing, it’s all cyclical and right now emphasis on the run and taking more calculated shots is the way to go.  

Edited October 24 by NAS

[mrcompletely11]

any port in a storm I guess

[LinvilleGorge]

But the threat of the deep ball still sets up the underneath stuff. When the defense only has to worry about covering about 20 yards of grass the underneath stuff gets a lot harder.

[NAS]

11 minutes ago, LinvilleGorge said:

But the threat of the deep ball still sets up the underneath stuff. When the defense only has to worry about covering about 20 yards of grass the underneath stuff gets a lot harder.

The threat is there. Execution requires more than QB, adequate protection, separation and timing.

[LinvilleGorge]

9 minutes ago, NAS said:

The threat is there. Execution requires more than QB, adequate protection, separation and timing.

The way opposing teams are playing us says otherwise. If you have the QB, protection, separation, and timing what else do you need? You acting like completing a deep ball in the NFL is pulling off some exercise of black magic.

[TN05]

It's actually incredibly funny how we had an effective power run offense under Wilkes and then Tepper blew it up and we're only just now winning again once we shifted back to a power run offense.

[TD alt]

I ain't buying it. You run to set up the pass and pass to set up the run. You gotta have at least the threat of legit deep shots. And, last I looked, a deep pass is only 20 yards, so what are we doing here?

 

Football 101 by Top Dawg:

Look, you draft the best players (and that's perhaps even more important at offensive skill positions).  You develop them. You keep your pipeline active year after year. On game days, you run to set up the pass, and pass to set up the run. If they can't stop the run, you run it down their throats. When they do stop the run, pass it, even if you dink and dunk it. But, you have to pepper in deep shots to keep them honest. When they get comfortable with stopping or trying to stop the pass, you run it. 

Rinse and repeat and rinse and repeat. Being a one-winged bird on offense is not optimal. 

 

[Shotgun]

Wow, Young really brought the league average down that far? 

[CRA]

the deep ball is going away overall because teams are going out of their way to take it away from opponents via their coverage and S play.   Big armed QBs and freak WRs you couldn't touch could flip games too easy and everyone went to conservative 2 high looks playing the deep ball trying to erase it. 

Every D isn't doing that to every QB. 

that's not what is happening with the Panther deep ball.  We know S play vs the Panthers cheats down to play intermediate not respecting or trying to take away the deep stuff. 

[LinvilleGorge]

23 minutes ago, TN05 said:

It's actually incredibly funny how we had an effective power run offense under Wilkes and then Tepper blew it up and we're only just now winning again once we shifted back to a power run offense.

"They're playing the way they have to play on offense with Bryce Young at QB." - Greg Cosell 

[strato]

19 minutes ago, NAS said:

The threat is there. Execution requires more than QB, adequate protection, separation and timing.

We pretty much spent a fortune on the OL to buy time in the pocket, which okay right now they are out.
But normally we should not be incapable of protecting long enough for a guy to take a drop and step up and send the ball down the field. We aren’t talking about Hail Mary stuff here. Just deeper than red zone depth. 

Right now we don’t have the guy for that. Ours is slow to get back and when he does he needs time to turn his hips and get his feet set before he steps into the throw. or he has to bail out and concede one side of the field so he can get a run up to launch the ball down the half he left himself to work with. Seems like that  is where most of the issue is with having that in the playbook. 

And trends. One thing thing about football trends is going too far with that leaves you open to be exploited somewhere else. As we always see eventually. Someone bucks the trend and it works. Now you have a new trend. 
 

 

[strato]

28 minutes ago, TN05 said:

It's actually incredibly funny how we had an effective power run offense under Wilkes and then Tepper blew it up and we're only just now winning again once we shifted back to a power run offense.

You need a good sense of humor to call that funny. But I was lamenting that the other day. We are winning some games with that approach. Took us two and a half years to get back to where we started from. 

[Chaos]

5 minutes ago, LinvilleGorge said:

"They're playing the way they have to play on offense with Bryce Young at QB." - Greg Cosell 

Next week it’s “they’re playing the way they have to play on offense with Andy Dalton at QB”

[CRA]

6 minutes ago, Chaos said:

Next week it’s “they’re playing the way they have to play on offense with Andy Dalton at QB”

I mean, there already are pretty of tag lines out there addressing that.....saying nothing changes in the gameplan w/ Dalton really.  Generally, you have to nerf things down for a backup but given Bryce has been the QB.....we don't have to dial anything back/down when a backup comes in. 

if history holds, we actually ramp things up in the passing game for the backups becaue even backups (bad ones) can do more in the pass attack.