After a couple weeks of watching an Indianapolis Colts’ passing game helmed by Joe Flacco, we saw Anthony Richardson back under center (or in shotgun or whatever) this week against the Miami Dolphins.
How did it look? About what you probably thought it would look like going in. Let’s look at his passing chart.
Leaning left overall, with his best completion percentage coming behind the line of scrimmage to the right. His 41.7% completion percentage was the worst of the season and his second sub-50% game this year (he completed 47.4% of his passes against the Texans in Week 1).
Richardson’s ADOT (Average Depth of Target) was 10.4 yards in this game (per PFF). While that’s a high number in terms of the rest of the league, it’s actually the second-lowest mark of this year for Richardson (his lowest being 9.6 yards against the Bears in Week 3). As it currently stands, Richardson has the highest ADOT in the league (for QBs who have taken at least 20% of the snaps) at 12.4. Brock Purdy is second at 10.2 yards.
The Dolphins blitzed Richardson early and often. Per PFF, Richardson was blitzed on 65.5% of his dropbacks. On those plays, he was 6/14 for 59 yards and an ADOT of 10.5, with an average time to throw of 3.4 seconds. Those numbers tell a story of a defense who couldn’t get home with 4, sent blitzes and still couldn’t get home.
In what is a less-than-stellar stat, Richardson was kept clean on 17 dropbacks. On those dropbacks, he was 8/16 (50%) for 110 yards (6.9 YPA) for a QB Rating of 72.4. As a reference, Tyler Huntley was clean on 11 dropbacks and went 6/9 (66.7%) and 72 yards (8.0 YPA) for a QB Rating of 128.0. Even when clean, Richardson is struggling with consistency. I’m hoping he stays healthy for the rest of the season and we can start seeing some more consistency.
But enough of all that. Let’s get to the film! We’re looking at one play today, and it’s a fun one.
The Dolphins kicked a field goal with 0:25 seconds remaining in the 1st half to take a 10-0 lead. The Colts were looking to at least get into field goal range and come away with some points before the half.
Richardson’s pass on 1st down was a beauty to Alec Pierce on the left sideline, but it glanced off Pierce’s hands and fell harmlessly incomplete.
It was now 2nd & 10 with 16 seconds remaining. With 2 timeouts in their back pockets, the Colts decided to stay aggressive, knowing the entire field was at their disposal.
They come out in 11 personnel (1 RB, 1 TE, 3 WR) shotgun. They’re in a 3×1 alignment with Trips to the right and Trey Sermon [27] aligned to Anthony Richardson’s [5] left. They’re running a follow concept from the right that plays out a bit like Cross Country Dagger, with the #3 receiver in trips (Josh Downs) running a crossing route to clear space for the in-cutting route behind it. The main difference here is that Michael Pittman [11] is running a deeper crosser from the #2 spot, while the #1 receiver (Will Mallory [86]) runs an in-cutter behind Pittman. To finish things off, Alec Pierce [14] is running a vertical route from his spot as the lone receiver on the left.
The Dolphins are in a two-high coverage to prevent against the big play, and they’re dropping their linebackers deep to the middle of the field. Pierce’s route pulls the safety deep and the route from Downs drags the linebacker out of the middle of the field. Pittman pushes vertically then cuts inside and has a little pocket to work in.
Richardson throws a really nice ball here, layering it over the underneath defender without leading Pittman into the closing safety.
Pittman makes the catch then gets upfield for a few more yards. When the dust has settled, the Colts had a 33 yard gain. Matt Gay kicked a 52 yard field goal 2 plays later and the Colts went into halftime down 10-3 instead of 10-0. Not too shabby.
Richardson layered this sucker in there perfectly. pic.twitter.com/e2k3RjVlMF
— Dusty (@DustyEvely) October 24, 2024
Albums listened to: Cursive – Devourer; Jaden Evans & Bill Evans – Evans on Evans
