The Patriots passing game has been decidedly not good during the 2020 NFL season. New England ranks 28th in both passing DVOA and EPA. It’s one of three teams that has thrown more interceptions than touchdown passes on the season.
Again, not good.
And when a passing game isn’t very good, a lot of the blame falls on the quarterback. That has certainly been the case in New England, where Patriots fans gave up on the Cam Newton experiment weeks ago.
Patriots coaches have not been so eager to move on, ignoring cries from the fanbase to see what the team has in Jarrett Stidham. Bill Belichick has reiterated that Newton is the starter, and seemed to be fed up with the questions following the team’s recent loss to the Rams. When asked how the passing game could improve, he named everything BUT the quarterback position…
Belichick explained the issues go beyond one player. They’re having problems in a lot of areas – pass protection, separation, route running, etc.
— Mark Daniels (@MarkDanielsPJ) December 15, 2020
On Tuesday, offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels had this to say about his quarterback…
Josh McDaniels: "As far as Cam is concerned, I couldn't ask anything more of him."
— Ryan Hannable (@RyanHannable) December 15, 2020
Patriots fans, who have this idealized version of Tom Brady that never missed a throw or made a mistake in the back of their minds, will probably scoff at the notion that Newton has done as well as you can reasonably expect given the state of the offensive depth chart, but I think the loss to the Rams perfectly illustrates what McDaniels is saying there.
The numbers were ugly. Newton completed 56.3% of his passes and failed to throw a touchdown. He did, however, throw an interception that was returned for a score. Pro Football Focus gave him a 59.6 passing grade for the outing.
The film tells a much more encouraging story, though. Newton did just about everything he was asked and it just didn’t matter. To show this, I’m going to go through all of his failed dropbacks — those that produced an EPA less than 0 — and figure out if Newton could have realistically done more to make the play work.
