The Falcons ended a two-game losing streak against a fairly hot Texans team in Week 5. With the pressure on quarterback Desmond Ridder, the second-year quarterback came through with his best game of the season.
Ridder passed for a career-high 329 yards in Sunday’s 21-19 win over Houston and led a clutch drive to set up the game-winning field goal.
Ridder was efficient, hitting on 28 of 37 pass attempts and pushing the ball downfield with more confidence than we’ve seen in previous weeks. Check out Ridder’s Week 5 passing chart below.
The most encouraging thing about Ridder’s chart is the variety of his completions. Through the first four weeks of the season, most of Ridder’s completions were at or near the line of scrimmage.
In Week 5, he spread the ball around and completed seven passes of 15 yards or more downfield. Ridder didn’t have a great start, and the offense struggled for four straight drives following Atlanta’s opening touchdown, but he finished strong.
While the Falcons QB still has plenty of room for improvement, there isn’t much to criticize when Ridder plays the way he did on Sunday.