Welcome to another week of NFL preseason football. This past one gave us a solid glimpse of every first-round rookie quarterback and we’re breaking their debuts down in grade format.
This is a useful exercise because it not only reviews the week that was, but looks ahead to what I’ll be watching for this week. Every quarterback, with the exception of the Minnesota Vikings’ J.J. McCarthy, now has a highly anticipated follow up.
Last week our observations were a little more scattershot. This week, we dive into the game’s most important position and a handful of players who could make or break their respective teams’ seasons. We’ll also include a section on what we’d like to see from the quarterbacks and their play-callers this coming week based on these performances.
Caleb Williams, Chicago Bears
Grade: A+
Williams’s debut was stunning. I’m not trying to be tongue and cheek here but this was the most excited I’ve been about a preseason rookie quarterback since Trey Lance. And, if you’ll remember, Lance’s first warm-up game as a San Francisco 49er was pretty electric and featured a long cross-field touchdown throw. I’m not afraid to admit that, back then, I thought Lance would change the NFL based on how he could be utilized in Kyle Shanahan’s offense. Williams’s debut was steller for different reasons, though.
Two things that I loved about him in particular:
- When Williams was pressured during his first snap, he rolled out and instinctively held the football away from any unseen pressure. You can contrast this to other rookie quarterbacks we saw last week running with the football one-handed and having the ball width-wise (palmed) in their non-sideline hand facing the defense. The fact that this was Williams’s first instinct is pretty mind blowing. He came into the game against the Buffalo Bills with a ton of expectations, knowing that every move would be watched, likely wanting everything to go perfectly. And the first snap was decidedly imperfect. His right tackle was bull-rushed, the pocket collapsed and as he rolled out, a defender left his zone responsibility to pressure Williams into a decision.
- Williams’s first completion was against a vanilla look that turned out to be not so vanilla and it converted a third-and-extra long. Damar Hamlin was one of the two safeties deep for the Bills on the play, so Williams likely saw it as a bland preseason Cover 2. However, Hamlin’s knee was pointed—almost in a sprinter’s stance—toward the line of scrimmage and Hamlin ended up rotating down into the fray, which changed the math for Williams considerably. In fact, when you slow the play down, the second that Williams realized Hamlin stepped toward his primary read, he spun his head, locked in to a solid base and ripped a frozen rope to DJ Moore for the first down.
There were other cool moments for sure. He has a grip—or at least beginner’s luck—on the kinds of Mahomes-ian circus throws that generate first downs out of thin air as we saw on the dump-off to D’Andre Swift. But the more critical part, the ability to throw intelligently into muddy situations, was already at a veteran level.
Looking ahead: This week I want to see…more of this! Again, I hate to make bad comparisons that ultimately make it look like I’m comparing Williams to quarterbacks who have yet to meet their potential but I remember watching Trevor Lawrence’s first preseason start with similar excitement. Lawrence, like Williams, had these little moments, tiny gestures or movements that I simply don’t see with other rookie quarterbacks. For Lawrence, it was the way he acted after throws and how he immediately tried to build people up. For Williams, it’s this Spiderman-like spatial awareness. I want to see him in more adverse situations just to watch how he adapts and overcomes.
Jayden Daniels, Washington Commanders
Grade: B+
I’ll begin with a little bit of a gripe. I saw some criticism of Daniels airmailing his first professional throw but I put the charge to offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury and ask: Why are you calling a dinky little screen for the No. 2 pick on his first professional throw knowing full well he’s going to be loaded with adrenaline and possesses one of the great cannons in the sport? Let it rip, Kliff!
Like we mentioned with Williams above, one of the neat aspects of Daniels’s game is the recognition of an event and the immediate reaction. When the Commanders and Jets practiced against one another, I saw him hit Dyami Brown in a downpour during 7-on-7 on a go ball and he leaned on that experience during his first big completion with the Commanders. On third-and-6, the Jets showed a heavy pressure look with seven defenders at the line of scrimmage. Daniels saw Brown in press coverage to his right and literally the second the Jets’ only deep safety flipped his hips to the left side of the field to aid on another receiver beating press coverage, Daniels pulled the trigger on the deep ball to Brown and put it on the numbers.
Outside of this, during Daniels’s first designed run, he did a great job of selling the run fake to the point where the conflicted defensive end is completely rotated and, thus, unable to beat Daniels in a footrace to the end zone.
I think with Daniels, in particular, it’s going to be nearly impossible to judge him until we see him in the context of the full offense. I’m guessing the run and pass are going to be intimately tied together, with the Commanders looking a little bit like the old Washington team under Shanahan and Robert Griffin III. Still, when he needed to react on his own and without any run gimmicks or motion, he hit the difficult pass.
Looking ahead: I’d like to see more of Daniels throwing the ball on plays tied to the run and out of these shotgun-pistol-zone read looks. Let’s see him operate the RPO game a little bit more. A big challenge for Kingsbury is going to be his own spin on RPO football as it relates to Daniels. I am curious to see how he plans on creating quick throws for a quarterback who vastly improved his reaction time in college.
Drake Maye, New England Patriots
Grade: B
Okay, so, in fairness to Kingsburry, even a 20-yard throw for one of a rookie’s first few NFL pass attempts can come out a little hot (Alex Van Pelt also opted to begin with a screen, which, why!?). That was the case with Drake Maye, who rifled a ball toward Jalen Reagor in wet conditions just a bit over Reagor’s head, making it difficult to catch. There’s not a ton to digest from Maye’s debut other than the ball from Reagor came out on time, the play fake was good and Maye looked comfortable under center.
My one complaint, again, is directed at the coaching staff. Maye hits a checkdown on third-and-12, which was the right move. His other receivers were covered and his running back had a swath of open space. The back got the ball to within five yards of the first-down marker…why the hell are we punting? It’s the preseason. Put Maye in a difficult spot against one of the league’s best defensive coordinators and see if he can’t figure it out.
Looking ahead: Let’s put Maye through the ringer. Let him go for it. Let him throw. The screen game isn’t nearly as important as allowing him to see more diverse coverages and to react to movement in the secondary.
Michael Penix Jr., Atlanta Falcons
Grade: A-
If Williams gets an A-plus for his debut, Penix gets a very close grade as well, though just slightly under what I would give the most impressive debut of the weekend. I remember a few years back talking to a quarterback’s personal QB coach before his preseason debut and asking about the kinds of throws he was hoping to see. The answer was deep outs, which have long been considered an “NFL-style” throw for quarterbacks given the high degree of difficulty. Penix did not complete his first one and I’m sure there are some little issues with the Shanahan-style outside zone run fake he made. But man. Watch Penix’s debut back and see the moment his back foot hits the turf. His arm came through like a rocket and, across his body, he put the ball onto the ring finger of his receiver, who toe-dragged on the sideline. That was a beautiful pass.
Penix was impressive in muddy pockets against the Dolphins, and made movements I don’t think a lot of other rookie quarterbacks can physically do. He had a completion to Casey Washington where he was standing almost parallel to the play (meaning chest facing the defense) and then he simply put his foot down, cocked his shoulders like a sprinkler head and whipped a ball for a completion.
Kudos to the team’s coaching staff, too. Penix threw the ball inside the 20. He threw the ball at the goal line. He threw the ball backed up inside his own 10. This is what a rookie debut should look like.
Looking ahead: I won’t take credit for this one. JT O’Sullivan, who does an amazing job on his YouTube channel, the QB School, picked off this nugget about Penix in Week 1: He was slow getting into and coming out of his play-action fakes—especially the outside zone style handoffs that involve a lot of steps. Compare that to J.J. McCarthy, who looked like he was being shot out of a cannon, Penix needed to be quicker to the handoff point and may have jumbled the timing on some of his plays.
Bo Nix, Denver Broncos
Grade: C+
Nix is one of my favorite players in this class and let’s be clear on one thing: C.J. Stroud had my least favorite rookie debut of the 2023 season. These games are not at all close to indicative of overall success.
My complaint with Nix was this steady undercurrent of franticness. Nix must have sprinted the equivalent of a 5K during his first professional snaps against the Indianapolis Colts. Even when he’s banging a quick out to the sideline, there was a kind of Kobe Bryant fade step tacked on. I suppose you can say this is what happens the first time you see something truly NFL-esque and at 7/10ths speed.
Still, Nix made some excellent throws. He nearly missed a touchdown to Josh Reynolds and he did something I’m not quite sure I’ve ever seen before: On a clearly busted screen, he used his athleticism to pivot out of the play and fired a strike to Lucas Krull. My guess, and, take this for what it’s worth given my complete lack of NFL quarterbacking experience, is that Sean Payton is drilling into Nix in his next start the importance of throwing from a foundation and setting his feet.
Again, it’s not like Nix doesn’t know this. Bullets are flying. The intensity has been turned up 300%. And, wildly enough, he still completed many of those throws from bad platforms. If nothing else, Nix’s debut showed us just how much more of a threat he can be as a runner.
Looking ahead: Let’s see more plays in structure now that the bullet train has slowed down for Nix.
J.J. McCarthy, Minnesota Vikings
Grade: A-
A thought all the more devastating considering the fact that McCarthy is now out for the remainder of the season.
There was one word that came to mind when I saw McCarthy’s first preseason completion, a fastball to Jalen Nailor: Joe Burrow. Go back and watch how McCarthy moved through the pocket, which is especially instructive given how quickly we saw some of McCarthy’s rookie counterparts bail on these plays and fling the ball from uneven platforms.
Burrow, as I wrote a few years back, is the modern Brady in terms of being the master of pocket navigation while maintaining a sturdy throwing platform. McCarthy’s first pass is like a clinic in those pre-game QB exercises, the ones where quarterbacks seem to be sideways cha-cha sliding everywhere. When it mattered most, McCarthy maintained total control of his body and the ball, so when he finally cleared himself into open space, he unleashed some absolute gas with no fear of getting the ball tipped.
My favorite moment, though, was in the second quarter on a second-and-6. McCarthy completed his drop, eyed the free running linebacker, took a step forward to avoid the rush and delivered a dime to Trishton Jackson. This reminded me of Clint Eastwood’s final scene in Gran Torino. Facing down the inevitable horror, he patted his jacket pocket for a cigarette lighter. The ball to Jackson, too, was probably about as good as it could possibly be. Jackson doesn’t have to stop moving at all. He looked like a member of an Olympic relay team (just not the USA., I guess) seamlessly taking the baton and into full stride.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as NFL Preseason 2024 Week 2: QB Reviews, Grades and What’s Ahead.
