OBR Film Room: Why Baker Mayfield Struggled And Processing A Path Forward
(Photo: (AP Photograph/David Richard))
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- It's truly tough to believe we are here. I'm sitting downward trying to write this, trying to explain to you how 2021 bankrupt Baker Mayfield and potentially the Cleveland Browns' future. Yous can call that statement dramatic, simply the reality is the Browns are now questioning a position many in the industry started to feel had been solidified past the end of 2020's playoff run.
The platitude "quarterbacks get besides much of the credit and too much of the arraign" will always concur true with me. I'thou someone who values the nuance and process over the results. Nonetheless, this sport is not candy in a singular frame of reference. I view quarterback play differently than yous do, and you view it differently than me. Nosotros all bring our personal biases and experiences to the tabular array and then we form our opinion.
That deviation in consumption and analysis is why there is a clear split happening right now among those who support Mayfield through anything and those who feel the Browns title window is now and they can't permit another flavor of quarterback play happen as it did in 2021.
The root of the issue is that Mayfield has failed to exist the version you started to abound comfortable with at the cease of 2020. He was one of the cardinal reasons, from Week seven on, that the crime, and Mayfield, found success en route to a playoff advent.
This is what all quarterbacks hunt - consistent success. Find your all-time way to motion the football for your offense, your identity as a quarterback, and repeat that formula. For Mayfield it was simple - Kevin Stefanski'due south scheme keeps it that way for the quarterback. Above all else, brand the schemed throws, hit your downfield opportunities, manage the game without turnovers, and catechumen a handful of those "creation" plays when everything falls apart. Mayfield did most of this at a high level from 2020 Week 7 on, and information technology provided the light to a path forward after a disastrous 2019 and start to 2020.
While no bargain was struck in the offseason betwixt Mayfield and the Browns, they were conspicuously on the right path. Duplicate your success in isolated quarterback play in 2021 and the balance will have care of itself. The front office was starving for Mayfield to show that his formula was repeatable but the formula bankrupt downward early. Mayfield started strong in Kansas City earlier the concluding iii drives of the game concluded punt, punt, and an interception.
The Calendar week 17 loss in Pittsburgh, including nine sacks, was the type of ugly ending that manifested the erstwhile fear of change and has forced the states to await back and try to figure out if Mayfield is too far gone to come back from what is either just a lost twelvemonth or something more.
This article will tendency into the negative in Mayfield's game because in gild to figure out how he moves frontwards, we have to pinpoint what has gone wrong for the 4th year quarterback through his career and so far and in 2021 specifically.
In that location is proof Mayfield tin can find NFL success. There is recent tape of it. The problem remains in the consistency. He has to clean up these bug to move forrad every bit not simply the Browns' starter in 2022, but to re-establish himself as the future for the franchise at the position.
At present we shift to the study of where Mayfield's mechanics take led him off-target this season. There are two areas that stand out to me: how he aligns his torso to his throwing targets and issues he has getting his sequencing right in order to deliver the football with accurateness on a consistent basis.
The bug for Mayfield are certainly non isolated to just himself, but others across the league as well. Zach Hicks of Horseshoe Huddle did a fantastic study on Carson Wentz terminal year when he was traded to Indianapolis. While non every part of the Wentz report translates, a few key areas do.
The first is a concept known as "setting the hallway."
Hicks spent time discussing the concept with Dub Maddox who is the QB Autobus and Offensive Coordinator at Union Loftier School and has authored many books on quarterback play. He is likewise thefounder of the R4 operating systemthat is tailored to meliorate quarterback and coaching controlling.
Maddox explained, "The hips are where all motion originates from. The idea is that if you are a quarterback and you are scanning the field, you have to have the ability to rotate that front hip. If you put a camera on that front hip, that camera has to be pointed to the route space that y'all are throwing to. If your back foot is ready upwardly properly, then your front hip is prepare properly."
"You lot have to kind of over-correct those right eye dominant quarterbacks and make sure they empathise well-nigh that hip position and setting that vertical hallway," he added.
If you lot have watched Mayfield enough, you know his consistent miss is high and backside. More than often on correct side throws than the left side, simply nonetheless, that is his issue. These throws were front and centre this year but certainly non isolated to merely 2021.
At that place are several that stand out this year and you can see how Mayfield is fighting his mechanics due to the poor lower body set. The second interception in the Green Bay game was a cracking example of this. Watch how he is fighting the lower torso here and never gets the lead foot and hip working in the direction he needs to throw.
Expect where the hallway is allowing Mayfield to throw and where he is actually attempting to throw it.
Against the Lions, there were a few examples of the issues once again. The first interception on the twenty-four hour period was as evident equally it tin get. Sentinel every bit Mayfield works dorsum to his correct, but the feet and hips never sync to the eyes upon throwing.
Here'due south the visual at delivery to show you the problems truly stem from the miscommunication happening between what the head is telling Mayfield to practice and what his lower body is allowing. Look specifically at the front end human foot direction.
Information technology'southward easy to arraign these bug on 2021's injuries alone and move on, but these issues have been effectually for Mayfield throughout his career. While the injuries don't help, the lack of consistency in mechanics is what leads to those turnover-worthy throws that toll your team games.
In the 2020 season-opener in Baltimore, Mayfield had Odell Beckham Jr. upwardly the hash on a bender road and the hallway issues popped upwards again. Watch him fight the lower half and get out this ball outside the window to the right side.
Again, look how his lower body hangs the upper body out to dry out here.
Tracking back to 2019, Mayfield had 2 like shooting fish in a barrel examples of this effect. Against the Titans in the opener where he leaves a brawl outside his right side target once again due to the poor lower half. You can come across how it often happens when he scans left side to the correct side and the feet just don't piece of work quickly enough with the eyes.
Front foot down the middle of the field for a ball that ends upwardly exterior on the numbers. No manner tin accuracy consistently happen with this flaw.
One last example of a right-side issue in 2019 here every bit Mayfield is working off play activeness against the Seahawks. Picket the feet again every bit this is near an identical look to the 2021 throw against the Packers.
There is very piffling chance for this brawl to be accurate on an in-breaking or vertical route. Unless you lot observe a way to overcome with arm talent and Mayfield lacks that ability.
Another focal point for Mayfield is the issues he volition have in what is chosen sequencing. This is a popular sports term for many uncoiling motions - remember swing sports like tennis, golf, or baseball. It besides translates to those throwing motions like pitching or quarterback play where you lot generate power and accuracy through a repeatable uncoiling motion.
Adjustment the sequence of a quarterback's body is a major coaching indicate for quarterback Guru Tom House and 3DQB, co-ordinate to Hicks' research.
"Yous throw like a batter in baseball. In baseball, the outset motion that initiates is that lower body and that front foot. What good hitters do is called dissociation. In dissociation, it allows your body to carry efficient power through your body," House notes.
"Keep your hands on the ball and don't move your hands until yous feel that forward pes strike the ground. It creates a coil consequence that builds up spiral spring tension in the core that can release as you carve up your hands."
That is why Aaron Rodgers looks so effortless throwing the ball downwardly the field. Information technology is all virtually his sequencing. Everything is compact, it works in a fluid process from starting time to finish.
There are times where you will feel Mayfield struggling to bring his back one-half through in his sequencing. When he does get that hallway set, he will get into a like trouble that Wentz ran into where the timing is slightly off and the arm doesn't stay at proper pace with the front hip.
Sentry Mayfield on a couple of throw examples. Watch how hard he is fighting to get the back half defenseless upward with the forepart portion of the throwing motion and it causes him to take inaccurate outcomes.
Over again, from 2020, as you lot can run into the back one-half never gets through, elbow trailing the hip and it leads to a sailed throw. Consistency is the business concern.
At that place are examples of Mayfield figuring this out. When he does get the lower trunk to grab up with his eyes, he tin rip it with accuracy. Watch the quick shift in his base going from left to right hither. Watch how active it is instead of the passive approach when he lets the ball drift. When he gets it all correct, you tin see a path to a repeatable formula. But, over again, how willing is he to put in the work to consistently discover that formula.
The failure to practice so consistently is what haunts him. As nosotros know, you tin can have 25 quality throws in an NFL game, but if 5 go sideways and plow into turnovers, then that volition be how you lot are judged. The challenge is how frequently yous tin can get the mechanics right. Information technology takes insane muscle memory and for a quarterback like Mayfield, who has immense arm strength but not immense arm talent, he has to be buttoned up on the mechanics.
Some quarterbacks are gifted plenty to have natural arm strength through a "flick of the wrist" merely that isn't Mayfield. He has to generate it through his core and it takes every fiber of his body. When he does generate the torque necessary he can really drive it, but again, the mechanics take to be buttoned up. He can't miss on the hallway or the sequencing or his range of outcomes is probable to be poor.
And then, again, the question for Mayfield is how often can he get those mechanics right. He has to be insane about them. Brees was wired this way. Manning every bit well. Those who didn't have insane arm talent but fabricated up for information technology with those repeatable mechanics (plus some other variables nosotros volition get to).
Hicks fabricated a great point in his article about quarterbacks who have the arm talent to make those poor platform throws with accurateness. Those who can get away with things Mayfield simply cannot.
He spoke with QB Double-decker Steve Calhoun of Armed and Dangerous QB. Calhoun is a elevation quarterback trainer who is an instructor with the Manning Passing Academy and has helped railroad train multiple NFL quarterbacks (most notably Jordan Honey).
"Move and reset, not move and throw off of one human foot." said Calhoun. "There'south merely ane Pat Mahomes, and only i Aaron Rodgers."
That'south the biggest thing with off-platform throws. Can quarterbacks with great arm talent do them? Absolutely. The trouble, though, is the body loses so much strength and accurateness when not properly synced up.
Players like Mahomes, Allen, and Rodgers can make absurd throws without existence properly synced, but fifty-fifty they would agree that information technology is amend to reset and throw than to throw off of one foot.
"I go into great discussions with my quarterbacks who want to practice more off-platform." said Calhoun. "I say 'let'due south go spotter some NFL moving picture and go a pct where they actually threw off-platform or off of one human foot.' It's maybe but seven or viii times a game where quarterbacks truly throw off-platform."
Off-platform throws are great for highlights but they are non a consistent manner to play quarterback in the NFL. A more productive and efficient way to approach the game is to slide, reset, and deliver an accurate throw with a proper base.
The final sentence there is Mayfield's path in the NFL as it comes to mechanics, merely he has to commit to them and spend time with someone who volition help him observe that repeatable approach.
As nosotros tin all recollect, Mayfield had a poor tendency to bail clean pockets in 2019 and when 2020 arrived yous could sense his urgency to fight that poor habit. Mayfield worked to overhaul his pre-snapfootwork in 2020, merely with the desire to hang in the pocket a betoken of accent, Mayfield formed a new habit that wasn't helping the offense.
When he reaches the top of his drop, y'all will see Mayfield drifting to 1 side or the other where his eyes are working through progressions. While information technology seems harmless, information technology is a propensity that puts pressure level in Mayfield's lap that he creates and you can see his offensive lineman frustrated with not knowing where he volition be on any given drop.
The game in New England, which was rough all effectually, provided several examples. Watch here as Mayfield pushes left where his eyes are carrying him at the meridian of his drop and how he has to overcorrect the steps and causes him to be belatedly and pressure created.
Over again, the eyes are working left side, Mayfield drifts left and never climbs the pocket, the high side rush is waiting on him equally he drifts.
Much like the hallway and sequencing issues nosotros just spoke about, Mayfield has to clean upwards how he works within the pocket. He tin can't drift himself into pressure or sacks. He has to striking the designated driblet point and work those pocket processes with clean footwork. If you drift, you put your passing windows at risk and make life tougher on your tackles than it already is.
As with the physical part of the game nosotros just covered for Mayfield, the mental side took a serious hit in 2021. This is where the biggest single season regression happened. These accept been well-documented throughout the flavour on the OBR Twitch Chalk Talk sessions, but there are quick examples that show you Mayfield left likewise many plays on the field. Plays where his processing is ho-hum and he either creates a negative play or passes upward the correct choice for a weaker one.
Mayfield's first interception against the Packers in Week 16 is a articulate example. Stefanski wanted to attack the single-high Packers defense force with a popular Yankee Concept that puts a vertical and horizontal brunt on the defense. Stefanski was wise and mixed in some shotgun run play-activity with information technology.
Mayfield has to decipher the function of that single-high safe. If he gets nosey and bites on the deep over road from Rashard Higgins, he can take the post shot. If he squats over the pinnacle, then the over becomes the route to throw. Here is the decision-making point.
Darnell Roughshod, the Packers free prophylactic, has turned on the postal service quite clearly hither. The backside cornerback clearly is tied up with Donovan Peoples-Jones which leaves Higgins wide open. The ball is thrown over the top.
Here is a wait at the play from both views.
Nosotros saw this is clear bear witness in the Week 17 game in Pittsburgh where Mayfield missed the open up drag route from his backside tight end in order to throw a tight window comeback on the sideline.
He also passed up ii open up options on a tertiary and ii when at the top of his driblet merely to accept a sack. More than signs that late in the season Mayfield was declining to see the coverage clearly.
He didn't work well off his first read to his second read in 2021 equally well. Not that he has ever been as efficient as we would hope in this surface area, it was obvious he started to forcefulness throws. On this squirrel road from Jarvis Landry against the Ravens, the cornerback is sitting on the route's exterior breaking class, and Mayfield never comes off the road. He leaves it inside and it is intercepted, but watch how open the middle of the field dig road is if he simply comes off that kickoff read.
Nosotros all recollect the missed flat read here in Week 4 where Mayfield rolls out right side off the play-action simulated on tertiary and 2. Demetric Felton, in flat motion, is wide open up in the apartment the whole time Mayfield rolls out but he never processes him in front of his face and takes an eventual sack.
It's not just the downfield processing I am worried well-nigh, simply likewise the immediate answers he misses as well.
Mayfield is just unable to work through things quick enough with pressure in his lap to know what his quick answers are either. Watch these two examples. First from the Cardinals' visit to Cleveland on a 4th and brusk where Mayfield never processes his backside flat route as a replacement to the Cardinals' right side pressure.
Another example is this inside pressure level situation where Mayfield could drop it off to his running dorsum releasing out the backfield but he panics himself into a sack instead of throwing a laissez passer with touch to an open receiver in front of his face. This is how limited athleticism quarterbacks brand plays above expectation. Play with immense apprehension. Non an like shooting fish in a barrel play, just one he needs to brand to show himself a long-term reply.
I also have concerns virtually Mayfield learning from previous mistakes. Watch these two schemes from 2019 when the Browns visited New England and so again in 2021. Yous tin can tell Belichick and the Patriots defense knows if they show Mayfield a man-to-human coverage look that he will forget all near the placement of the corner on routes breaking outside from the No. two receiver. These two look familiar?
Information technology is no secret that Mayfield will have to win from the pocket for long-term success. If he is to practice that for the foreseeable future so he has to clean up these processing errors and show he tin decipher defenses at a college level. He just has to become to a improve level here. I actually can't emphasize enough how of import information technology is for Mayfield to improve in this category if he ever is to become that upper echelon quarterback many hoped he would.
Post-obit the promise we started to see here in 2020, there were major steps back in 2021. The Browns are stuck figuring out whether this tin can really be fixed - at to the lowest degree with some consistency.
The path frontwards truly starts with the Browns committing to Mayfield. There were positive signs in the linguistic communication general manager Andrew Berry used when discussing the quarterback earlier this calendar week.
"I remember it is like shooting fish in a barrel to forget this bespeak of year that what we take seen with Bakery over the past several years, obviously he had his about productive season in this crime under Kevin every bit early as last yr. We take been with Bakery for a long period of time at this signal. We know his work ethic, we know his drive and we have seen him as a talented passer in this league. We are looking forward to him getting salubrious and continuing to make improvements. Nosotros expect him to bounce back next twelvemonth."
There is a path to success for Mayfield at the NFL level. He displayed much of that path through his play in 2020 from the mid-point on. He's given usa a recent glimpse. The league has been attacking Mayfield's weaknesses since his arrival as a rookie. He must suit.
For the best foot forward, Mayfield must clean up his mechanics and tendencies prior to the ball leaving his hand. He controls that outcome. He has to own the mistakes made and then far in his career and commit to a procedure for improvement.
He has to make those schemed throws he missed also often in 2021. He has to trust his eyes and cease the double clutching on answers sitting right in front of his face up.
The Browns have every right to worry about the physical side of Mayfield'south game, but in that location needs to exist a consideration if the physical side this year did more than damage to the mental side and whether he tin get back that confidence that appears to be waning. By the end of the twelvemonth he was a trounce of his previous self.
Tom Firm talked nigh this exact issue.
"(Losing confidence) is something that is not unusual. It happens in baseball, information technology happens in golf. It breaks your center when you watch it going on because you can only practice so much until they attain out. It usually takes a hamlet to help these kids navigate the waters that they are in now."
In the past, Mayfield has declined the notion of needing a private quarterback double-decker or to rework his mechanics. Is Mayfield willing to accomplish out at present given the problems we see? Is he willing to chase the help he needs this off-flavor to give him the hard truth nigh who he is as a quarterback? If he'due south willing to swallow some of that ego and pride, he can resurface as a quality quarterback, just the brawl is in his courtroom.
If the Browns can get Mayfield back on rail with an improved ready of laissez passer catchers then the offense volition trend back toward the dominant versions we saw not too long ago. If you get a repeat of 2021's results and then it does not bode well for anyone's hereafter.
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