Tag: 2024 nfl previews

Kyler Murray’s Cardinals will be better than you think in 2024. Or at least more fun

Unless you’re a Cardinals die-hard, in which case they may meet expectations.

The Arizona Cardinals had so much to do in 2024.

2023 was a disaster in almost every way that counts. The team went 4-13, but that wasn’t enough to lock down a top three pick that could be auctioned off to the highest bidder in a quarterback-heavy draft. Kyler Murray’s recovery from a torn ACL left Joshua Dobbs and Clayton Tune to start games at quarterback. Only one team in the NFL gave up more points.

On top of that, the deal they’d made with the Houston Texans in last year’s draft failed to pay expected dividends. The Texans’ rise to AFC South champions meant they got last year’s third overall pick (and 2023’s defensive rookie of the year) Will Anderson Jr. for the price of the 12th and 27th picks in the 2023 and 2024 drafts, respectively — a solid deal that wasn’t quite the windfall Arizona had hoped.

Fortunately, there were still plenty of assets at general manager Monti Ossenfort’s disposal to dig his team out of the NFC West’s basement. The Cardinals’ $56 million of cap space was a top seven mark in the league heading into the offseason. And while the fourth overall pick wouldn’t get them in position for a top three quarterback, they didn’t need one with Kyler Murray under contract thanks to a massive extension. Arizona was cleared to add the best players available when it came to boosting their roster, either on the open market or in the draft.

That’s pretty much what they did.

Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports

Arizona’s offense should immediately improve even without adding established veteran talent

First, don’t let pre-draft smoke screens tell you differently. Even in a stacked class of wide receiver talent, Marvin Harrison Jr. was the clear top wideout.

Even better, he fit an immediate need for the Cardinals. Arizona’s most targeted wide receiver in 2023 was Marquise Brown, who is now a Kansas City Chief. Number two on the list was Rondale Moore, who was traded to the Atlanta Falcons.

Need met opportunity in a massive way to give the Cardinals, and Murray, a viable WR1. The rookie will not only lift the offense but save a ton of cap space going forward. In a league where $35 million just became the annual going rate for an elite receiver, Harrison Jr. will cost just under $35.4 million… for the next four years.

That’s vital for a team with a quarterback whose salary cap hits the next five seasons vacillate between $43 and $53 million. But Murray won’t just be relying on a first-year stud to lift his offense.

Arziona’s overall target leader last year was Trey McBride, who was served a platter of unappetizing quarterbacks most of 2023 and turned it into a feast:

His average target distance was six yards downfield but his average catch sprang for more than 10 yards per reception owing to sneaky impressive run after catch skills. Pro Football Reference credited him with 10 broken tackles last season after recording zero as a rookie in 2022.

The other arrow in Murray’s quiver will be Michael Wilson, whose 9.7 yards per target ranked second among all rookies to only Green Bay Packer Dontayvion Wicks. Consistency was right about where you’d expect from the 13th wideout selected last spring, but he seemed to find a connection with his veteran QB late in the year. After zero catches on seven targets his first two games with Murray in the lineup, Wilson had 12 targets, 10 catches, 130 yards and a touchdown in the final two.

That’s an extremely fun young lineup of targets, albeit a thin one. There’s also help coming to the backfield. James Conner was quietly great last season, running for more than 1,000 yards in only 13 games. His 1.02 rush yards over expected (RYOE) per attempt were fourth best in the NFL last season, per Next Gen Stats.

Conner is also 29 years old, has more than 1,100 NFL carries under his belt and offered little in the receiving game, though 13 of his 27 catches came after Murray’s return in the last four weeks of the year. Fortunately, the Cardinals have more help en route. Trey Benson was arguably the top rookie running back in this year’s draft class and was the second one off the board when Arizona took him in the third round.

Benson’s size and aggressive running gives Murray a thunder/thunder combination to tenderize defenses and set up his passing game before taking his own scrambling ability into consideration. Benson also has 4.3-second 40 speed, shifty lateral quickness and the ability to contribute as a receiver. He’s another link in this exciting chain of young playmakers.

Then there’s the guy in the middle of it all, hoping to turn potential into production.

Joe Rondone-Arizona Republic

Kyler Murray was quietly decent to finish a lost 2023

2023 didn’t offer Murray much but the chance to build confidence in his surgically repaired knee. His first five games back failed to paint him as a quarterback worthy of a $230 million contract. Though Arizona went 2-3 in that span, he threw only four touchdowns against four interceptions. He added three more scores on the ground, but his 31 rushing yards per game were still below his career average of 39.

In terms of overall efficiency, he was somewhere between Desmond Ridder and Bailey Zappe:

via rbsdm.com and the author.

Things changed over the final three weeks of the season. The schedule got easier, for one, but Murray still had to face a Chicago Bears defense that was playing like a top three unit to finish the year, a talented-but-spiraling Philadelphia Eagles and a Seattle Seahawks team still in the playoff hunt.

Murray threw six touchdowns against a single interception in that span. His passer rating rose from 78.4 to 108.3. His deep game was still a mess — he completed only three of 12 passes that traveled at least 15 yards downfield — but he found a way to maximize a roster with a few nice young prospects and a whole bunch of replacement level players.

Here’s where he ranked among starting quarterbacks over those final three weeks of 2023.

via rbsdm.com and the author

That’s a small sample size and those aren’t world beater numbers, but they’re above average for a quarterback playing with one of the league’s least recognizable supporting casts. Now Murray gets to add an elite young wideout to the mix who can crush defenders at every level. He can pair Harrison Jr. with McBride’s reliable short-range game and Wilson’s budding deep/intermediate range savagery. He’s also got two new(ish) tackles in Jonah Williams and Paris Johnson to keep his edges intact and create the space he needs to rise to his contract.

There’s potential here! Modest potential, sure, but the 2024 Cardinals could be extremely fun to watch. Which is great, because that focus on young playmakers has left the defense in a tight spot. Signing Justin Jones and Bilal Nichols should help boost a deficient defensive front, but this remains a team for which no player who started double-digit games had more than 3.5 sacks.

There will be immediate pressure on rookies Darius Robinson and Max Melton to step into starting roles and perform. This is, without question, asking a lot even before we get to the competition in the AFC West, where every non-Cardinals team finished above .500 last winter.

That suggests 2024 may be a year of modest improvement in Arizona rather than a stunning turnaround. But given the relative weakness of the rest of the NFC, there’s a chance that some young contributors could push the Cardinals into a Wild Card spot ahead of schedule.

And if they don’t, they should be fun as hell to watch along the way.

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The Ravens have several holes to fill and no one is worried because (gestures broadly)

No one’s too worried… until the playoffs, at least.

If any other team had the offseason the Baltimore Ravens did, the air surrounding their facility would be thick with concern.

Baltimore fell short of its Super Bowl dream, losing to the world champion Kansas City Chiefs while scoring just 10 points at home in the AFC title game. 60 percent of the team’s starting offensive line departed in the offseason. So did Geno Stone, who finished second in the NFL in interceptions last fall, and All-Pro linebacker Patrick Queen.

The team’s biggest veteran acquisition this spring? A 30-year-old Derrick Henry, coming off his least efficient season as a pro.

That’s what the Ravens will have to overcome all before playing in the league’s toughest division. But it’s tough to be too worried about Baltimore’s immediate future because… it’s the Ravens. Their history suggests none of this will matter.

Until the playoffs.

The Ravens are a neural network set up to overcome loss by building new pathways

Let’s start with the losses. Baltimore’s extensive draft success and ability to plug in undervalued veterans has been key to the 66 regular season wins its racked up the last six years. Losing John Simpson, Kevin Zeitler and Morgan Moses hurts; they made up the bulk of the league’s top-rated pass blocking unit last fall.

But only Zeitler was a high value acquisition at the time. The 34-year-old was a steady veteran who outplayed his $22.5 million contract en route to his first Pro Bowl honors in his final season with the team. Simpson had been released by the Las Vegas Raiders. Moses was a cap casualty in Washington, spent a year with the New York Jets and signed an inexpensive three-year, $15 million deal with Baltimore in 2022 before being traded this offseason.

In their place step Andrew Voorhees, Ben Cleveland and some combination of rookie Roger Rosengarten and Daniel Faalele. None is especially high profile (though Cleveland and Rosengarten were recent-ish Day 2 draft picks) and each will probably be perfectly fine when it comes to buying the time Lamar Jackson needs in his quest for a third MVP award.

There’s a similar bent to the defensive reinforcements, even if the guys who left have more name recognition. Baltimore’s hope is placing newcomers to the starting lineup next to tent pole stars will create a cohesive unit or, at the very least, enough coverage to gloss over any mistakes these newcomers make.

Losing Queen isn’t ideal, but Roquan Smith remains in the middle of the field to make life easier for Trenton Simpson, who has the athleticism and recognition to thrive as an off-ball linebacker in his second year. Stone was a Ravens’ developmental success story after working his way from seventh-round pick to starter. He’ll cede his spot to deposed New Orleans Saints safety Marcus Williams, who gets to lean on All-Pro Kyle Hamilton at corner. First round pick Nate Wiggins’ lean frame could create a steep learning curve for 2024, but Marlon Humphrey’s versatility means new defensive coordinator Zach Orr won’t solely have to rely on a 170-pound rookie when it comes to stopping opponents’ top targets.

Baltimore, at its best, is a support network. A brain of neural pathways where the quickest-firing lobes help lift developing connections and find ways to see the field in new and innovative ways. It’s why this team has ranked in the top three when it comes to points allowed five of the last six years and why only an injury to Jackson could break a streak of winning campaigns.

The problem is, that success runs thin once January arrives.

The Ravens have to reverse the suction of  their own postseason failure to be more than “pretty good.”

That 66-33 record the last six years gives way to a 2-5 record once the playoffs begin. Baltimore has twice finished the regular season with the AFC’s top record but only made it to the conference championship game once in that span. Because we have to start there, let’s begin with the face of the franchise, Lamar Jackson.

Here’s where Jackson ranks among all quarterbacks to play at least 2,000 regular season snaps since 2018:

via rbsdm.com and the author

His 0.159 expected points added (EPA) per play ranks sixth behind luminaries like Patrick Mahomes, Aaron Rodgers, Josh Allen and Tom Brady. He’s 58-19 as a starter in that span.

Here’s where he ranks when you limit the scope to 120 playoff snaps:

via rbsdm.com and the author

Jackson’s EPA/play drops from 0.171 to -0.021, better than only late stage Drew Brees among quarterbacks to frequently make the postseason. He’s 2-5 in that stretch. His passer rating drops from 98.0 to 75.7. His rushing yards per game actually rise from 61.1 to 86.8, but it doesn’t seem to make life easier for his offense. The Ravens have been limited to 17 points or fewer in all five of those playoff defeats.

This does not have to define Jackson. His performance was significantly better in 2023 even without Mark Andrews available (in a Divisional Round win over the Houston Texans) or able to play at full speed (in the loss to the Chiefs). Jackson’s three touchdowns (two rushing, one passing to Andrews replacement Isaiah Likely) was the jet fuel that helped Baltimore race past the Texans in the second half of that game. He was worse against Kansas City, but still arguably one Zay Flowers goal line fumble away from taking that game to overtime.

That’s given the Ravens the confidence to run his offense back with the lineup of skill players relatively unchanged. Odell Beckham Jr. is out and Henry is in as the veteran eager to chase a ring with one of the AFC’s most consistent teams. But Jackson’s receiving wish list is once again Andrews and Flowers, with Likely, Rashod Bateman and Nelson Agholor holding down supporting roles. Deonte Hardy and rookie fourth rounder Devontez Walker should provide spurts of playmaking, though relying on either on a regular basis will be tricky.

But hey, while we’re talking about reliability, we’ve got to land on Derrick Henry. Henry has been a workhorse unlike any other in an NFL where old school RB1s are no longer valued. He’s only missed more than a single game in a season once in his eight years — and more than 2,000 regular season carries — as a pro. That kind of consistency would be enormous for a running back rotation that has been perennially devastated by injuries; JK Dobbins, Keaton Mitchell and Gus Edwards all had their seasons ended prematurely in the last two years.

The former All-Pro’s availability may be his best ability at this point. His age 29 season saw career lows in both yards per carry (4.2) and yards after contact per carry (2.1). He had just 28 catches in 17 games, diminishing his already iffy production as a receiver out of the backfield.

On the other hand, he’s still pretty good! Next Gen Stats pegged him for 0.31 rushing yards over expected (RYOE) per carry last season, which was a top 20 mark in the NFL. He took more handoffs than anyone in the league for the fourth time in the last five years. If he can show up and lure linebackers and safeties closer to the line of scrimmage, he’ll create space for Andrews and Flowers to thrive and for Jackson to elevate his deep game even more.

What does this all mean? That the Ravens have plenty of questions to answer but head coach John Harbaugh has proven he’s got the teacher’s edition of the workbook waiting at his desk. Baltimore was hamstrung by the salary cap and forced to watch key contributors leave this offseason. But the team held on to its franchise players and has all the connective tissue needed to stay in place.

The question now is whether this proficiency can finally lead to playoff success.

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If Sean Payton can guide *this* Broncos team to a winning record, he’s a wizard

Who better to maximize a gameplan of short passes than the guy who elevated late-stage Drew Brees?

The Denver Broncos have reverted back to their Simpsons form. They are, once again, the franchise Homer would have to settle for after helping Hank Scorpio take over the eastern seaboard.

There’s been a multitude of reasons why Denver has failed to make the postseason since winning Super Bowl 50 in Peyton Manning’s NFL finale. Foremost among them is a quarterback position that’s been unable to develop homegrown talent or, more recently, turn proven veterans into anything productive.

Manning worked out as well as he could have, even if his lone Super Bowl as a Bronco came in a vastly diminished state. The veterans who followed were an eclectic mix of low and high expectations whose play never crested above “average.” Case Keenum, Teddy Bridgewater, Joe Flacco and most notably Russell Wilson were unable to lead the team to a single winning record the last seven seasons. They were necessities because draft picks Payton Lynch and Drew Lock failed to pan out.

Denver heads into the 2024 season with its highest drafted quarterback since Jay Cutler in 2006. The team will have a six-year veteran showing that rookie the ropes. But depending on either Bo Nix or Jarrett Stidham to do anything more than maybe punch their way above the AFC West basement looks like a fool’s errand.

The 2024 Broncos aren’t supposed to be good

If you need any indication on how NFL teams view next year’s quarterback draft class, consider Denver. The Broncos knew 2024 was going to be a challenge. Russell Wilson was gone, but $85 million of his salary remained on the team’s books — $53 million this fall and $32 million the next. 20 percent of the team’s spending room in 2024 is dedicated to a guy who’ll be playing quarterback in some capacity for the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Even with some great homegrown talent on rookie deals, this was going to be a difficult year. But Jerry Jeudy was traded to the Cleveland Browns. Justin Simmons was cut. Tough decisions were made in service of that scarce cap space, leaving Denver with a few young building blocks (Pat Surtain, Quinn Meinerz … maybe Baron Browning?) but mostly a roster in dire need of improvement.

Despite what could be a top five draft pick for 2025 and the chance to take 2024’s first defensive prospect (or a host of offensive talent) with the 12th overall pick, the Broncos opted to take this spring’s sixth drafted passer rather than cast their lot for next spring.

Nix’s college resume is undeniably impressive. His transfer from Auburn to Oregon pushed him from good to great. He threw 45 touchdown passes in 14 2023 games against just three interceptions en route to a third place finish in Heisman Trophy voting.

However, that says more about the Oregon offense than Nix’s capabilities as a game-changer. The Ducks were closer in spirit to the San Francisco 49ers than the Kansas City Chiefs in terms of their passing game. The Pac-12 runners-up leaned heavily on the yards-after-catch machines in their lineup. Nix may have averaged a superb 9.6 yards per attempt — fifth best in the FBS — but his average pass traveled just 6.9 yards downfield, sixth-lowest in the FBS. 67 percent of his throws came nine yards beyond the line of scrimmage or fewer.

This didn’t mean he couldn’t make those big throws. He had a 26:2 touchdown:interception ratio on the 33 percent of his tosses that went 10 yards or further. But what the Washington Huskies did to Nix in the Pac-12 title game is what opposing defenses will do throughout his rookie campaign.

The Huskies, healthier in the secondary than they were in October when Nix burned them for 337 yards and a pair of touchdowns (in a loss), flooded the short range and trusted their deep safeties to erase Oregon’s big throws. It worked; Nix threw three touchdown passes but his 239 yards and 61.9 percent completion rate were both season lows. Washington won the game and went on to the College Football Playoff.

If head coach Sean Payton isn’t willing to throw him into that fire, he can turn to Stidham — the same guy he used to snuff out the dying embers of the Russ Wilson era in Colorado. The former Tom Brady backup has never been more than a replacement level quarterback, but he’s always been willing to take shots downfield. His 9.0 air yards per pass rank ninth out of 63 quarterbacks to play at least 150 snaps since 2022.

He’s not particularly good at these throws, however. Per SIS, he’s completed only 25 of 52 attempts to travel at least 10 yards downfield. There are some caveats there. He was tossed into games for teams with nothing to lose. Before taking Wilson’s spot he was the guy to usher Derek Carr out of Las Vegas. He also lost three of those four games, creating the backdrop to take risks downfield even against crowded secondaries.

If there’s one guy who can maximize Nix’s short-range strength, it’s Payton

Early signs suggest Nix will get his chance to shine (or get thrown under the bus, either/or). That makes a ton of sense given Payton’s ability to maximize the waning years of Drew Brees’ career but not Wilson’s. Wilson’s throw distance dipped in Denver, especially when Payton replaced Nathaniel Hackett (it dropped from 8.7 to 7.1 yards between 2022 and 2023). But while this helped his efficiency he failed to thrive within the program. He too often backslid in play action situations and forced bad throws on the run.

Nix is a blank canvas who won’t feel corralled by a passing attack where his checkdown options earn highlighted status in his play book. Brees had the league’s lowest target distance in 2019 (6.4 yards) and second lowest in 2020 (6.1) and New Orleans went 25-7 those two years. In the future Hall of Famer’s final season, he played through injury to himself (aforementioned broken ribs) and his wideout corps (Michael Thomas missed nine games, leaving a 33-year-old Emmanuel Sanders as the only non-tailback to have more than 40 catches). The Saints still won 12 games and found a way to overcome the Chicago Bears and first-ever Nickelodeon Valuable Player award winner Mitchell Trubisky in the playoffs.

It would make for a stupidly debatable 2024 if Nix can do a late-stage Brees (or New Orleans-era Teddy Bridgewater) imitation and use his accuracy and ability to mitigate risk and plant the foundation of a Broncos revival. It’s also unlikely, but not impossible. Denver’s schedule is littered with winnable games and the pecking order behind the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC West is a big ol’ mess.

Getting that done with a rookie quarterback (who may not have Courtland Sutton in the lineup) and rebuilding defense will be difficult. Payton has earned the benefit of the doubt when it comes to maximizing his returns from steady, accurate, and occasionally unexciting quarterbacks. But he’s burning that goodwill at an excessive rate. Failure in 2024 won’t mark up his resume too heavily, but it will have the Broncos feeling a bit of buyer’s remorse for the head coach for whom they’re paying an alleged $18 million each year.

Dropping Justin Herbert into Jim Harbaugh’s game plan will accelerate the Chargers’ rebuild

Just maybe not in 2024.

Justin Herbert has been trapped in purgatory.

It’s been more than three years since the Los Angeles Chargers’ hopeless training staff thrust him head-first into a rookie of the year campaign by puncturing Tyrod Taylor’s lung. That season, a draft pick who looked like more potential than production was a revelation. Herbert threw for nearly 290 yards per game. His 98.3 passer rating was nearly 10 points higher than Joe Burrow, the quarterback selected five spots ahead of him atop the 2020 NFL Draft.

This set up Herbert as the league’s next great young franchise quarterback. But Los Angeles has been unable to move forward from there. Three seasons with human broken Magic 8-Ball Brandon Staley at head coach and a never-quite-trustworthy offensive line curtailed Herbert’s downfield game, leaving him to easily slide under a high bar of expectations in both 2022 and 2023.

That led to Staley’s ouster this winter. In his place is a head coach who has repeatedly proven capable of driving his quarterbacks to new heights.

Jim Harbaugh guided Michigan to its first NCAA title since 1997 last winter. Along the way, he made JJ McCarthy one of the FBS’s most efficient quarterbacks. Before that, he pushed Colin Kaepernick from Alex Smith’s understudy to Super Bowl quarterback. Go even further and you’ll find him molding Josh Johnson into a 15-year pro football veteran despite cutting his teeth at non-scholarship FCS program San Diego.

That’s how a throwback, establish-the-run coach is so vital for a 26-year-old passer who went from ranking fifth in the NFL in expected points added (EPA) per dropback in 2021:

via rbsdm.com and the author

to 16th over the last two seasons:

via rbsdm.com and the author.

How will Harbaugh get this done? Let’s look at his past to determine Los Angeles’ future. And let’s start with the obvious. Harbaugh is going to establish the run, no matter which direction the winds of offensive trends may be blowing.

Jim Harbaugh’s offenses are exactly as run-heavy as you thought

Since 2007, he’s been the head coach of either an NFL or Power 5 college football program. In those 17 years, he’s passed the ball more than he’s run it exactly twice — and one of those was the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, so it barely counts.

Harbaugh’s teams won a lot, so that skews the results toward a clock-killing offense. But in great times or merely moderately good ones, his playbook leaned heavily on grinding runs to create opportunities for the pass.

It’s not like he was planning around bad quarterbacks in the process. Andrew Luck quarterbacked two of those Stanford seasons (2009 and 2010). JJ McCarthy was a 2024 first round draft pick. Jake Rudock, John O’Korn and Wilton Speight… well, OK, they weren’t all winners. But for the most part, Harbaugh’s offenses maintained a similar run-heavy ethos regardless of who was slinging the ball.

Now he gets Herbert, who could badly use some support in the midst of significant roster turnover. The Chargers offense will look very different in 2024 even before Harbaugh’s influence.

Keenan Allen is a Chicago Bear, Mike Williams is a New York Jet and Austin Ekeler is a Washington Commander. Los Angeles’ top three wideouts could be Josh Palmer, Quentin Johnston and Ladd McConkey, flanked by JK Dobbins at tailback and Hayden Hurst at tight end. Even if all those guys exceed expectations, that’s a pretty big shift from the lineup Herbert played with the first four years of his pro career.

Creating the foundation of a run-heavy offense won’t be easy either. Joe Alt is an impressive specimen who can pair with Rashawn Slater to give LA one of the best tackle combinations in the league. Things aren’t as stable on the interior, where Zion Johnson has failed to live up to his first round pedigree, Jamaree Salyer has played roughly up to his sixth round status in two seasons and Bradley Bozeman is stable but not special.

Then you get to the running back rotation, which is relying on a lot of best case scenarios. Dobbins has only 100 carries since 2020 and is coming off a torn Achilles. Gus Edwards is 29 years old and coming off his least efficient season as a pro. Kimani Vidal was a thoroughbred at Troy but is also a Day 3 rookie draft pick facing a steep jump in competition. This may not be the stable needed to create the third-and-short situations that have made life easier for so many Harbaugh offenses.

You know what? That’s fine.

The Chargers don’t have to compete in 2024 to feel good about their choices

Los Angeles walked through salary cap hell in gasoline boots this offseason, losing recognizable stars in the process. The offense will have to rebuild, but the most important pieces — sans a proven wideout — are there. Quarterback and both tackle positions are extremely solid.

The defense managed to keep both Joey Bosa and Khalil Mack around, which would be more encouraging if that unit weren’t below average in most regards last season. There aren’t any major additions on that side of the ball — the Chargers’ defensive rookies all came in the third round or later — which suggests LA will have to counterpunch its way through slugfests in order to exceed expectations in 2024.

That’s unlikely, but it doesn’t mean this team is cooked. 2024 is about setting up chess pieces and proving the Harbaugh we last saw guiding the 49ers to prominence is still there. Losing stinks, but it also helps stock the cupboard for a coach who has proven himself as an upper class talent developer no matter where he’s been.

Herbert’s stats will once again paint him as an average quarterback rather than a franchise savior. But, if all goes well, anyone watching the games will be able to see this team’s potential shine through the muck.

The Bengals are hoping the center will hold, at least for one more Super Bowl run

Cincinnati is holding steady, but losing Brian Callahan could throw the Bengals’ world off its axis.

A few things changed for the Cincinnati Bengals this offseason. Tyler Boyd is now a Tennessee Titan. The defensive line swapped D.J. Reader for Sheldon Rankins and the offensive line replaced Jonah Williams with Trent Brown.

But, for the most part, this Bengals team looks a lot like the one that failed to make the playoffs last winter. That’s by design.

Cincinnati stayed afloat in the NFL’s toughest division, rallying to a 9-8 record despite a 1-3 start. More importantly, the Bengals did this after losing Joe Burrow nine-plus games into the season, turning Jake Browning — zero snaps in four NFL seasons before 2023 — into an above average quarterback in the process.

Seriously. In seven-plus games, Browning’s expected points added (EPA) per dropback were roughly the same as 2023 MVP Lamar Jackson:

via rbsdm.com and the author.

Besides pointing out the flaws in EPA, that number points to the Bengals’ strength — and what could be their biggest weakness in 2024. One of head coach Zac Taylor’s attributes is his ability to trust his playmakers and assistant coaches to create winning strategies. But when he lost his biggest playmaker last season, offensive coordinator Brian Callahan threw Browning into the void and found a way for the career backup to thrive.

That meant a diet of motion and spread fields to maximize yards after catch from an arsenal capable of excelling through misdirection. Browning’s average throw distance (6.3 yards downfield) was slightly lower than Burrow’s (6.5), though a calf injury left him to linger in a slow start even longer than usual last year. The backup’s short-range accuracy was a boon, completing 73 percent of throws between zero and nine yards downfield but that wasn’t the key to his game (Burrow clocked in at 78 percent). Where he excellent was the intermediate range.

On throws between 10 and 19 yards downfield, Browning’s 67 percent completion rate put him alongside Jackson, Jalen Hurts and Tua Tagovailoa at the top of the rankings. Burrow, on the other hand, completed less than half his throws in that same range.

So what does that tell us? That Callahan had a plan to create space and allow whomever was behind center to thrive with a few modest tweaks. And that his departure could be the void Cincinnati can’t fill in 2024.

Callahan will coach the Tennessee Titans this fall, hoping to bring his Fix-It Felix skills to Will Levis’ blown-out skyscraper. Promoted to fill his place is quarterbacks coach Dan Pitcher, who began his Bengals career back when Marvin Lewis was head coach and has been the guy taking care of Joe Burrow since he was drafted in 2020.

That fits with the team’s “once we’re healthy, we’re fine” mentality. Cincy was in the midst of a 4-1 stretch with wins over the San Francisco 49ers and Buffalo Bills before Burrow’s injury. The offense scored at least 24 points in four of those five games. This looked like the team that made it to Super Bowl 56 once again.

We know Pitcher’s job won’t be under scrutiny if the season begins slowly, because that’s sorta Cincinnati’s thing. The Bengals are 6-6 in the first four weeks of the season the last three years and 25-13 afterward. We also know a healthy Burrow will significantly lessen the challenge on his plate. Over the last three seasons, he’s been at least a top five quarterback with an argument to be made about top three status:

via rbsdm.com and the author.

While some concerns emerged last season — 2023 was the first year in his career where the majority of his passing yards came from runs after the catch rather than distance where his balls were caught, for instance — many of those can be hand waved away by the calf strain that limited him early. The question is whether he can turn the clock back to 2021, where his completed air yards per attempt — a measure of both accuracy and the difficulty of a QB’s throws — peaked (4.5 yards downfield, third-best in the NFL and owing in part to a career-best 42 percent success rate on deep throws). Without Boyd as a veteran short-range target, 2024 could force him to return to those deeper targets, especially if Mike Gesicki’s seam-stretching routes take over the top spot at tight end.

Cincinnati gets the benefit of the doubt here. It’s the same on the other side of the ball, where defensive coordinator Lou Anarumo perpetually finds ways to coax the best from his players when they need it most. The Bengals have plenty of good players, but are light on defensive studs. The only defender to make the Pro Bowl in the last four years is Trey Hendrickson who, in fairness, has been invited each of the last three seasons.

That group ranks 17th in overall defensive efficiency in that stretch. It has only once finished ranked higher than 17th when it comes to points allowed. But flip the timeline over to the playoffs and Anarumo’s unit jumps to sixth out of the 28 teams to have seen at least one postseason game the last four years.

via rbsdm.com and the author.

That’s a handful of words to say, yep, Cincinnati’s defense will likely be fine with Rankins instead of Reader and Vonn Bell approaching his twilight era. And, really, the point of this whole article is to say the Bengals in general were smart to run things back based on everything we know about this team under Taylor, Burrow and Anarumo.

The question is whether Callahan’s departure will leave a sizeable dent on the offense. Being able to build plays around Burrow, Ja’Marr Chase and contract-year Tee Higgins gives Pitcher the chance to play his first season as an NFL coordinator on easy mode. Unfortunately, that’s about the only thing that will come easy in the AFC North this fall.

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The Panthers will be better in 2024 because, well…

The Panthers are trying to pump Bryce Young up 49ers style.

There’s no place to go but up for the Carolina Panthers. 2024, however, will be the start of a slow uphill trudge rather than a leap forward.

The Panthers were unwatchable last fall as the hope and luster of a high prolife rebuild disintegrated under the harsh glare of incompetence. Bryce Young fizzled while CJ Stroud, the quarterback selected directly after him in the 2023 NFL Draft, shined. No team in the league gained fewer yards. Carolina’s two wins came in games where it scored a combined 24 points.

Frank Reich, the respected head coach who’d been drummed out of Indianapolis for being too good in a tanking year (thus necessitating the hiring of Jeff Saturday), lasted 11 games on the sideline. Brian Burns, once the rumored target of trade talks that would have sent the Panthers two first round picks in 2022, backslid slightly in a lost season and was eventually dealt for second- and fifth-round selections. Frankie Luvu, who developed into a trustworthy, versatile do-whatever linebacker, joined the Washington Commanders in free agency.

In the middle of all this, team owner David Tepper presided over a low-rent Game of Thrones between his coaching staff and executive team. He winged a drink at fans after a road loss. He proved every stereotype about the social skills of Carnegie Mellon graduates right with a weird, hello-fellow-human interaction with a restaurant worker whose sign had the nerve to playfully criticize Tepper’s decision making.

Despite sinking to the bottom of the standings and rising to the top of the NFL’s clown shoe rankings, there wasn’t even a high value first round pick on which to fall back. The Chicago Bears, still profiting from the deal that put Young in Carolina blue, used the first overall pick to draft Caleb Williams, the best-received quarterback prospect since Trevor Lawrence.

This is all a tremendous amount of haze that makes it difficult to see a silver lining. It’s there, I promise.

It all begins with Young, whose fortunes behind center will dictate whether we see the Panthers back in the postseason for the first time since 2017 or if the team is sunk in another arduous rebuild. Admittedly, there wasn’t much to like about his 2023.

Questions about his size manifested in throws downfield and over the middle. His 11 completed deep balls (out of 46!) tied for 25th-most in the NFL. That wouldn’t seem so bad until you realize the guys tied with him include Kirk Cousins (eight starts in 2023) and Tyrod Taylor (five). That’s one fewer deep ball than Zach Wilson who is, notably, Zach Wilson.

From Week 6 onward, Young only had 18 completions that came between the tackles and traveled at least 10 yards downfield. Defenses knew they could shut down his offense over the middle and forced Carolina’s passing game to operate horizontally rather than vertically. The Panthers’ 4.7 net yards per attempt was worst in the NFL, as was Young’s 21.5 percent bad throw rate (by a wide margin).

His -0.139 adjusted expected points added (EPA) per dropback was second-worst among starters to only Wilson. For every 22 passing plays the Panthers called, he made his team roughly a field goal worse than an average quarterback.

via rbsdm.com and the author.

None of this screams “FRANCHISE QUARTERBACK” or even “USEFUL QUARTERBACK” but there were mitigating factors at play. Young’s top target, by a wide margin, was a 33-year-old Adam Thielen. The star running back acquired to take heat from his shoulders, Miles Sanders, averaged just 3.3 yards per carry. The offensive line in front of him ranked 25th among all NFL units at midseason (per The 33rd Team) and only got worse from there.

These Panthers have placed a priority on boosting Young with a rising tide. That starts with the run game between the tackles. Robert Hunt was a vital piece of the Miami Dolphins’ top ranked rushing crew. Damien Lewis was a four-year starter clearing a path for the Seattle Seahawks’ good and occasionally great ground attack. They both came to Charlotte this offseason via free agent deals that carried more than $70 million in guaranteed money.

That wouldn’t be enough if Miles Sanders (-54 rushing yards over expected in 2023) continued to stink. So the Panthers did some wheeling and dealing to make Texas stud Jonathon Brooks the first tailback selected at this year’s draft.

Was the second round too high for a running back in a deep class with few sure thing standouts? Possibly! But Brooks is an inexpensive platoon addition who can mitigate what’s becoming a desperate situation for the Carolina offense. His availability paved the way to give less glorious but badly needed veterans like Lewis and Hunt money instead of paying big for a runner for the second straight offseason.

They’ll also help keep Young upright. The Athletic’s Ben Baldwin pegs the Panthers’ blocking as a top five pass protection machine for the upcoming season.

On top of that, there are run-after-catch wizards who can prop Young up the way the San Francisco 49ers have used their playmakers to turn Jimmy Garoppolo and Brock Purdy into efficiency machines. Trading for Diontae Johnson, coming off his most effective season as a pro (8.2 yards per target, a 52.9 percent success rate when targeted) cost only uneven veteran cornerback Donte Jackson and a swap of late round picks.

Dealing into the first round allowed the team to land Xavier Legette, whose Deebo Samuel comparisons boil right down to the same alma mater. Ja’Tavion Sanders was ranked as high as second among 2024’s rookie tight end crop and the Panthers were able to snag him in the fourth round. Pair them with a couple of young lottery tickets like Jonathan Mingo and Terrace Marshall Jr. and the vision for this team begins to round into focus.

Young’s average pass distance will likely decrease in 2024. His average completion distance will likely increase once the yards-after-catch savants in his lineup turn up. The improvements may be modest, but they’ll be vital. Especially because the defense may be staring at a step backward.

via rbsdm.com and the author.

The Panthers’ defense was a problem last year. It ranked fourth in total yards allowed but only three teams in the NFL gave up more points. No one forced fewer turnovers than Carolina’s 11. The team’s 17.2 percent pressure rate ranked 30th among all defenses. Its 27 sacks were dead last.

That team won’t return two of its best players now that Burns and Luvu are gone. The only defensive player the team drafted in the first 150 picks was third round linebacker Trevin Wallace. The marquee free agent signings on that side of the ball were Jordan Fuller, Josey Jewell, DJ Wonnum and a 31-year-old Jadeveon Clowney.

Even if that group punches above its weight class, there’s going to be a learning curve for a team replacing seven starters from last year’s opening week. The small miracles of 2023 — ranking sixth in yards allowed per play or 15th in third down percentage — may evaporate.

That leaves the burden of improvement on an offense that’s undeniably in better shape than it was last season. It puts a massive weight on the shoulders of a quarterback who cost the Panthers two No. 1 overall picks, and more, to select. But there’s reason to believe things will get better in 2024. Even if better doesn’t necessarily mean good.