The NFL will be more fun if Anthony Gordon makes it. Mix some Gardner Minshew with some Ryan Fitzpatrick and add a dash of Jameis Winston and you have Gordon. He’s a reckless decision-maker, but he has a good feel for the position, which is more than you can say for half of the quarterbacks in this class. And while his arm isn’t the strongest, it’s flexible and allows him to make wild throws from ridiculous arm angles. Gordon’s play-making mentality will get him into trouble (often) but when everything’s clicking, he looks like a first-round pick.
If he can just turn the Jameis down from a 10 to a 7, Gordon will find himself starting in the NFL — maybe sooner rather than later. If that happens, we all win.
+ Can change velocity and trajectory on throws when needed. Not the strongest arm but he has arm talent.
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+ Can change arm angles to fit throws into windows
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+ A crafty player who will use eyes to move defenders
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+ Washington State’s offense required him to make full-field reads, which will serve him well at the next level
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– Tries too hard to make plays out of structure. He’ll point receivers to open areas and just blindly trust they’re on the same page.
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– Throws a lot of Jameis-like interceptions
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Playing in the Air Raid inflated Gordon’s accuracy numbers for sure, but on those shorter routes that made up the bulk of his throws, the Washington State star was better than most of this year’s class.
Mike Leach’s system may have inflated some of Gordon’s numbers, but the players around him did not. Gordon was one of the few players in this class who performed better in Total Points than he did in EPA.
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Glossary of advanced stats
PFF
Adjusted Completion Percentage:
“Adjusted completion percentage considers factors outside of the quarterback’s control in terms of completing passes. It accounts for dropped passes, passes thrown away, spiked balls, passes batted at the line of scrimmage and those passes in which a quarterback was hit as he threw.”
Average Depth of Target:
The average distance a quarterback’s throws travel past the line of scrimmage.
Big-time Throw Percentage:
“In its simplest terms, a big-time throw is on the highest end of both difficulty and value … Therefore, the big-time throw is best described as a pass with excellent ball location and timing, generally thrown further down the field and/or into a tighter window.”
Turnover-worthy Throw Percentage:
“For quarterbacks, there are two ways to achieve a turnover-worthy play: throw a pass that has a high percentage chance to be intercepted or do a poor job of taking care of the ball and fumbling.”
SIS
On-target Throw Percentage:
“The number of accurate throws a quarterback makes divided by the total number of pass attempts”
Catchable Throw Percentage:
“The number of catchable throws a quarterback makes divided by the total number of pass attempts”
EPA:
“Expected Points Added; the total change in the offense’s Expected Points that came on passes thrown by the player”
Total Points:
“The total of a player’s EPA responsibility on passes using the Total Points system that distributes credit among all players on the field for a given play. For passers, this includes accounting for offensive line play, sacks, off-target passes, dropped passes, and dropped interceptions.”
IQR:
“Sports Info Solutions’ proprietary quarterback metric builds on the traditional Passer Rating formula by considering the value of a quarterback independent of results outside of his control such as dropped passes, dropped interceptions, throwaways, etc.”