Carson Wentz should bring more verticality to the Commanders' offense
Taylor Heinicke's arm strength often limited Washington's ability to create explosive plays last year. That shouldn't be an issue for Wentz.
One of the biggest frustrations from the Commanders offense last season was the inability to push the ball down the field. Offensive Coordinator Scott Turner runs his version of the “Air Coryell” system, which is a system historically built on a foundation of vertical concepts that require a quarterback capable of driving the ball down the field Taylor Heinicke did his best last season, but simply lacks the arm strength to drive the ball with velocity on deeper throws. That meant the offense lacked the verticality that the system is predicated on.
Carson Wentz is a quarterback with plenty of flaws, but arm strength isn’t one of them. He can make a 50-yard throw look like an effortless flick of the wrist. This will undoubtedly be one of the biggest positives that Washington saw in trading for him. It doesn’t take much watching film to see a stark difference between Wentz and Heinicke in terms of arm strength.
On this play, Washington runs a variation of a sail concept, with the outside receiver running a pivot route, the middle receiver running a deep post and the inside receiver running the sail route. Heinicke drops back and spots he likely has Terry McLaurin working against a safety on the sail route, so opts to pull the trigger. He delivers the throw from about the 45 yard line and the ball arrives at McLaurin at about the 15. Heinicke is also throwing from the far hash to the sideline, which makes the throw even longer. Heinicke delivers the throw as McLaurin reaches the top of the numbers while breaking outside. Unfortunately, the lack of velocity means the ball hangs in the air. McLaurin works all the way to the sideline as he tracks the ball, but just before it arrives, the safety is able to take advantage of the floaty pass by undercutting it and knocking it away from McLaurin.
Let’s compare that to a similar throw from Wentz from last season.
This is an entirely different concept and formation, but the actual throw for the quarterback is pretty similar. In the previous clip, Heinicke delivered his throw from the far hash of about the 45 yard line and the ball arrived at the 15, whereas Wentz delivered his throw from the far hash of about the 15 yard line and the ball arrived at about the 45. On top of that, both quarterbacks made their throw just as the receiver was at the top of the numbers. But while Heinicke’s throw was very floaty, Wentz is able to drive his ball with excellent velocity. He gets the ball to his receiver much quicker, with the ball arriving at the receiver midway between the numbers and the sideline, whereas McLaurin was practically at the sideline by the time the ball arrived. So not only did Wentz deliver a better throw that didn't give a defender a chance to recover, he got the ball there early enough to allow the receiver a chance to pick up some more yards after the catch.
Heinicke’s lack of arm strength showed up in various different ways across the season. One of those ways was when he attempted to put touch on throws to drop them over the shoulder of the receiver. He would try to take some velocity off his throw to add more touch and precision to get the right arc on the ball, but by taking something off, he would often underthrow his target.
Here against the Cowboys, Washington works out of an empty formation with a running back aligned outside running a slant to try and create traffic for McLaurin’s slot fade. The play works perfectly as McLaurin gains a step on the trailing defender and all he needs is a good throw out in front for him to run under for a potentially big gain. Unfortunately, Heinicke attempts to put touch on the throw by taking velocity off it. That causes him to underthrow the pass. McLaurin attempts to come back to the ball and make a catch over the top of the defender, but the ball is too underthrown for him to make the play.
Wentz had a very similar throw this season.
On this play, the Colts also work out of an empty formation with the outside receiver running a slant designed to create traffic for the slot receiver to run his fade route. The play again works as intended with the slot receiver running free from his defender. Wentz attempts to put some touch on the throw to drop it over the receivers shoulder and does so just about perfectly, hitting him in stride. Unfortunately, the receiver drops the pass which ruined what could have been a huge play with only the deep safety left to beat.
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