Stats the way uh-huh, uh-huh, I like it - Week 3

All stats were curated from here.

In general, the more pressure you can get on a QB, the greater the chances of a good outcome for the defense, whether that is a sack, an interception or an incompletion. Through the first three weeks of the season, Teddy Bridgewater has been under a great deal of pressure from opposing defenses. He has been pressured on 31.5 percent of his dropbacks which is sixth highest among starting quarterbacks. The means that he has been pressured on 34 of his 108 dropbacks (97 throws, 7 sacks, 6 scrambles).

Despite the pressure he has been under, he has been very accurate with his throws (as he has been for most of his career). Pressure rate is the orange line and the right axis. On-Target percentage is the blue bars and the left axis.

In terms of accuracy (on-target percentage), he is currently fourth among starters, behind Justin Herbert, Taylor Heinicke and Sam Darnold. The least accurate starters so for this season are Lamar Jackson and Jalen Hurts, interestingly, both are also near the top of the list in terms of lowest pressure rate.

Dak Prescott and Tom Brady are the two who have the lowest pressure rates so far, but Hurts is currently fourth lowest and Jackson is sixth lowest. For those who prefer tables over graphs, the data is in a table below.

For those concerned about whether or not Bridgewater can maintain this level of accuracy under pressure, in 2020 he was only pressured on 19.8 percent of his throws and 80.5 percent of his throws were on-target. So last season he was pressured less AND was less accurate than he has been so far this season. For what it’s worth, he was one of the most accurate starting quarterbacks in the NFL in 2020.

A big concern for me moving forward is the play of the offensive line. While both of our tackles have been solid, our interior offensive line has been poor. In 2020 the Broncos offensive line allowed pressure on 27.4 percent of dropbacks. So far this year the OL has been doing worse than that at 31.5 percent. Theoretically the OL should stabilize as defenses seem to have the upper hand so far this season.

In 2020 the Vikings allowed a league-worst 30.2 percent pressure rate. Right now there are five teams allowing more pressure than that with the Jets allowing a crazy high 38.5 percent.

With the injuries to Dalton Risner and Graham Glasgow, I am expecting a dropoff in interior OL play in the near term. If we end up with Netane Muti and Quinn Meinerz starting at guard, we might see better run blocking, but I guarantee you that we will see worse pass protection. So it is good that we currently have a starting quarterback who has shown that he can still make accurate throws while under duress. Our next two opponents were fourth and first at getting pressure on opposing QBs last season.

So far this season the Ravens are 25th at pressuring the opposing QB (19.5 percent) while the Steelers are tenth (28.8 percent).