When you get your first opportunity to host a Sunday Night Football game in over a decade, you want to make the most of it. If the chants ringing out through the stadium at various points of the broadcast were any indication, I’d say that mission was accomplished.
Bryce Young may not have heard it, or was too humble to acknowledge it, but the millions of people watching the only game on TV did. For this week’s game review, let’s take a look at his performance and how it’s worthy of the chants.
While
Young has had games with 300+ passing yards, it’s the considerable jump in consistency that’s new and is adding some weight behind the MVP buzz. Not only that, but the ‘lows’ aren’t as low and he still puts up well over 200 yards instead of well under.
The raw passing production also comes with several notable more advanced metrics that add more context to just how well Young performed. On 41 attempts, Young completed 8.5% more passes than expected, including the 3rd and 14 strike to Teteiroa McMillan that’s the 18th most improbable completion of the season so far, according to Next Gen Stats. Young still manages to generate an EPA of 0.47 even while pressured at a rate that’s (depending on which site you look on) more than any other quarterback in the NFL.
Now, I do believe that there is some inflation to that statistic. While there is definitely no doubt that the offensive line has left much to be desired while being down several starters and losing Monroe Freeling during the game, some of those pressures are caused by the Panthers leaving defenders intentionally unblocked as the read defender in the Panthers run-pass-option concepts. A huge uptick in those plays caught the Detroit Lions off guard, and isolated their defenders in space and put them in conflict; do they take the bait and crash down on Young? On several occasions an unblocked player was credited with a pressure while Young threw the ball to an open receiver running through a passing lane that the defender just vacated.
But it’s Young’s development and ability as a passer that allows the offense to operate this way. Few quarterbacks in the NFL can handle that much onus being put onto them; to handle an unblocked defender speeding at them and choosing between 3 different routes that his stature likely doesn’t even allow him to fully see. It’s not just adequate, in many aspects it’s elite. According to TruMedia, Young has a 72% precision pass rate in the middle of the field, the highest mark in the league.
When you make an argument for Young as an MVP, or say his Week 4 performance is the quality you’d expect from an MVP candidate, it’s those aspects that should be considered. When things aren’t going as expected (see: injuries to Jalen Coker, Xavier Legette, Ikem Ekwonu, Taylor Moton, Damien Lewis, Monroe Freeling, Brady Christensen, Jonathon Brooks, Trevor Etienne and Chris Brazzell) what can he do to make it work? In other words…. how does Young still provide value? Right now, Young is putting himself in the line of fire and producing at a level that rivals the best quarterbacks in the NFL. Can it continue like this? If it does, don’t be surprised if those chants are heard throughout Charlotte in December.
