One of the reasons why Aidan O’Connell was an intriguing prospect coming out of Purdue was his ability to throw the ball deep. Without a lot of mobility in the pocket, O’Connell has learned to throw a beautiful deep ball.
But before Week 15, the Raiders had taken that away from him a bit. Most of the offense was designed to be quick hitters and to allow the receivers to make plays after the catch. O’Connell would routinely have games where he would only attempt two or three passes beyond 15 air yards all game.
In Week 15, the Raiders let O’Connell air it out and he had the best game of his young NFL career. According to Pro Football Focus, O’Connell was the NFL’s highest-graded quarterback on deep passes in Week 15. :
A decent enough night’s work for Aidan O’Connell. He had the highest PFF grade on deep passes for the week at 96.7, narrowly beating Matthew Stafford.
The Raiders are likely out of the playoffs for the 2023-2024 season, but they still have three games left to evaluate O’Connell and the rest of the roster. The hope is that the Raiders will let him air it out, especially to speedster Tre Tucker.
If O’Connell can continue to be this effective throwing the ball down the field, then maybe the Raiders really do have something worth holding onto at quarterback.
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