The numbers show that Washington Redskins quarterback Dwayne Haskins had a tough go of it in his first year in the NFL, but sometimes that needs to be taken with a grain of salt. While he finished the season with as many interceptions as he did touchdowns — 7 and 7 — a newly uncovered stat is showing that the rookie QB might have been a bit more risk-averse than you might think. To some, it’s led them to make the following statement about the Redskins QB:
“Haskins’ numbers do not reflect what he was last season.”
According to Pro Football Focus, Haskins led all rookie QBs in 2019 when it came to turnover-worthy plays, though he ended up with the most interceptions of any rookie. PFF’s Sam Monson concludes that Haskins was simply less fortunate than the other players.
“I think that’s a big reason people are willing to write him off because it’s almost box score scouting,” Monson said, via NBC Sports Washington. “You look at the numbers and it’s, ‘Well, this guy had a 2-to-1 touchdown-to-interception ratio, this guy was 3-to-1, and Haskins was 1-to-1.’ OK, it shouldn’t have been. There was a lot of luck rolled up into those numbers. Interceptions are generally a bad way to measure almost anything.”
Instead of judging things purely by interception numbers, Monson points out that it’s important to acknowledge how careful a QB is with the ball, judging by his willingness to fire downfield and give his teammates a chance to make big plays. While some may call it scared, others could deem it cautious.
“As the year went on he started to loosen up and started to make some of the bigger throws,” Monson said. “Started to push the ball downfield a bit more, started to make some of the higher-end plays that some of these others guys made right at the start but also were making a ton of the bad plays to offset them.”
As Haskins gets more experience in the offense, and more time to show what he can actually do, the numbers will likely skew in the right direction, and we can get a clearer picture of what tendencies he has, both right and wrong. But for now, with such a small sample size, small details like this one need to be mentioned. He may not have blown your socks off in 2019, but he definitely did enough to warrant another chance in 2020.
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