PFF (or otherwise known as Pro Football Focus) is a football company that has turned into a total joke. Everything that they do is worthless. Before the 2018 NFL Draft, they proclaimed Baker Mayfield as their golden goose. He was their can’t miss guy. Mayfield was their highest graded quarterback ever. They put their entire reputation on the line when it came to Mayfield. PFF doesn’t actually know how to scout.
A sea turtle could do their job. They look at the numbers and whatever the numbers say, that’s the result. Obviously, that’s not how scouting works. Especially in a conference like the Big 12 that plays zero defense. I tried to tell you that Mayfield was a 3rd or 4th round talent. PFF tried to tell you that Mayfield was a generational prospect. Better than quarterbacks like Deshaun Watson, Carson Wentz, etc. We obviously know now what has transpired.
After months of refusing to talk about their golden goose, PFF finally acknowledged that Baker Mayfield stinks. Well, I should say sort of. PFF Mike (the same guy that called JJ Arcega-Whiteside a first round talent) wrote an article called “What happened to Baker Mayfield“. I want to break this down paragraph by paragraph.
Offensive Line:
No real quarrels here for the offensive line portion. The Browns offensive line isn’t great but they do have some solid pieces. Joel Bitonio can play. So can JC Tretter. Cleveland has some tackle issues. PFF has Cleveland rated as the 18th rated pass blocking offensive line which seems about right. It’s not a great offensive line but I’ve seen way worse. Mayfield also isn’t athletic enough to overcome it which was not mentioned.
Wide Receivers:
Then PFF Mike talks about the receivers. Is Mayfield force feeding the ball to Odell Beckham and Jarvis Landry? You bet. He also has Odell and Jarvis to work with. He also has Nick Chubb and more recently Kareem Hunt in the backfield. There is no mention of them. Chubb is the NFL leading rusher and is averaging 5.2 yards per carry. ZERO mention of Chubb in the article. Chubb just might be the best running back in the NFL and there aren’t more than 2 that are better. How many quarterbacks would die for these weapons? How many quarterbacks would commit murder to have Nick Chubb in the backfield? If the offensive line is so bad, why is Nick Chubb averaging 5.2 yards per carry? Chemistry? Nope. Odell is miserable because he’s in Cleveland and they aren’t winning. Jarvis is a front runner too. Mayfield runs his mouth and can’t back any of it up. There isn’t a chemistry issue. There’s a leadership issue and Mayfield isn’t one of them.
The Scheme
I’ll be the first to admit, I’m not a huge tape guy. I don’t study the after the games (although I’ll be doing that more in the future. Stay tuned for that update). I watch football with these two eyes and 99 percent of the time, I’m right. This might be the most embarrassing portion of PFF Mike’s article. This is so elementary and pathetic. If someone wrote this on my site, I’d fire them. Mike’s premise is that the RPO has been schemed well because Mayfield’s numbers are good. The play action game has not been schemed well because Mayfield’s numbers aren’t good.
That’s crazy town. That’s so nuts that Loony Tunes would turn that down. That’s not how you evaluate scheme, you dumb fuck. Show me a video example. Could be something like
“Odell Beckham is creating 1.2 yards of seperation on play action passes. That’s below the league average. Teams seem prepared for play action passes as you can see here the corner and safety seem to know what’s coming”.
Again, I made that up. That’s how you evaluate scheme. Say something like “Mayfield’s first read is open blank percent of the time in play action”. Mike should be ashamed of himself for this. Instead, he basically said, Mayfield does well in RPO so Kitchens did something right. He’s bad on play action so that’s Kitchens fault. A 5 year old could do that and why nobody takes PFF seriously.
Baker Mayfield
Now we’re getting somewhere. Great job, Mike. Mayfield has been the least accurate quarterback in the NFL not named Dwayne Haskins when you remove screens. That’s pretty much what I see. He’s completing 60.1 percent of his throws altogether with phenomenal weapons. All you have to do is watch the games to realize Mayfield isn’t accurate.
At the end of the day, PFF tried to acknowledge that they were wrong. They didn’t do it very well, but the first step in recovering is acknowledging that there is a problem. PFF certainly took that first step. Baker Mayfield is exactly who I thought he was. He’s a slightly more talented version of Case Keenum. He looks a hell of a lot closer to Gardner Minshew than he does to a first overall draft pick. Mayfield never belonged in the first round, to begin with. Next time at least give Nick Chubb more respect.
