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Paul Banach |
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If you watched Tyrod Taylor’s 14 games this season in which he accumulated an 8-6 W-L record in the first year as starter, then this may not come as a huge surprise. Still, some validation from one of the NFL’s elite player performance evaluators never hurt anyone.
Pro Football Focus recently published its top NFL quarterbacks for the 2015 season and for the first time in a while, the Buffalo Bills have a signal caller ranked highly on the list. Taylor finished with a PFF grade of 81.7 which is good for tenth-best in the league. Additionally, the article had this to say about T-Mobiles performance:
“A surprising inclusion into the top 10, Taylor made some of the best throws of the year. It was seemingly a weekly event watching him drop a perfect throw in the bucket down the field, but he still has great strides to make in the short (39th-best passing grade) and intermediate game (24th-best passing grade) to take the next step in his development.”
While I sometimes have my questions about PFF grades just like everybody else, that analysis seems pretty spot on. Tyrod has one of the most accurate deep balls in the NFL but can definitely improve on reading the defense and hitting on the short to intermediate throws.
Along with his big arm and running ability, Taylor was also so effective because he barely turned the ball over, setting a franchise record for the fewest interceptions (6) thrown in one season. Averaging about 27 passing attempts per game in Greg Roman’s run-heavy offense, #5 totaled 3,035 passing yards with 20 td’s, 6 INT’s and added 568 yards and 4 scores on the ground.
With all the weapons Buffalo now has on offense in addition to the emergence of Tyrod Taylor and Sammy Watkins, this unit should receive plenty of hype heading into the 2016 season.
For the most part Buffalo Bills General Manager Doug Whaley has been a pretty cool customer. His stoic demeanor and habit of crafting words without tipping his hand has become commonplace around One Bills Drive.
So when Whaley sat alongside Rex Ryan at an end of the year presser and told the media that quarterback Tyrod Taylor had “warranted enough” to continue to see if he’s the guy for the future and mentioned him needing to become more of a leader, it wasn’t a huge surprise. Nevermind the multiple team records T-2 set in his first NFL season as a starter, the Bills missed the playoffs again and there was room for improvement.
While some took it as a very hallow endorsement of Taylor given how well he had just performed compared to the team’s recent history at the position, make no mistake Buffalo’s GM absolutely liked what he saw from #5:
Via BuffaloBills.com:
“I think the biggest strides were made with him being more comfortable in the pocket, command in the huddle and command of the offense in general,” Whaley said of Tyrod.
“So continued maturation with him as a quarterback. We’re excited about that. I know he’s excited about that and we think he’s just scratching the surface.”
Just scratching the surface on his potential under center you say? I know plenty of Bills fans’ would sign up for that today.
And Whaley’s correct in that Tyrod’s ability to scan the field and actually go though his progressions vastly improved late in the year. It’ll be interesting to see what the former sixth-round pick can do with a full offseason to prepare as the starter.