Could Marcus Mariota be a fit for the Washington Commanders?

Could Mariota provide Washington with a bridge option at quarterback?

As we continue to look at quarterback options for the Washington Commanders this offseason, many of you have asked me about Marcus Mariota, who is set to become a free agent this offseason. He spent the last two years as the back up quarterback for the Raiders after losing his starting job with the Titans to Ryan Tannehill. I wrote about Mariota last offseason when Washington was linked to him in a possible trade scenario before signing Ryan Fitzpatrick. This is simply a republishing of that post, as Mariota only threw two passes this season behind Derek Carr, spending more time as a gadget player running the ball.

So if you read the post last year or simply don’t care for Mariota, that’s fine. I wanted to be honest about that up front. But I was still getting a fair few requests about him and as he’s hardly thrown a pass in an actual game since 2020, it didn’t make any sense to put together an entire new post on him. So here’s the analysis from last year, for anyone who missed it or wants a refresher on Mariota.

While Mariota has struggled to put everything together consistently, he does offer plenty of attractive tools and traits. Perhaps his best trait is his accuracy and ball placement. In short to intermediate areas of the field, Mariota has excellent accuracy and can often be incredibly precise with his ball placement.

Here we see two examples of Mariota’s precision placement. The first play of the clip comes from his 2019 season with the Titans. He works from an empty backfield set and reads his receiver to his left running an over route across the middle. The Falcons play man coverage and the defender sticks tight to the receiver. Mariota feels pressure off his right side, stepping up to avoid the pressure but quickly feeling a defensive tackle working off a block inside. Before he gets hit, Mariota just manages to get the ball out to his receiver, putting the ball in a perfect spot where only his receiver could reach it and still continue to make yards after the catch. Unfortunately, the receiver dropped the pass.

The second play was from his one game with the Raiders in 2020. The snap is slightly wayward, but he manages to adjust to it and secure it before extending it to his running back on an RPO (run-pass option). Mariota spots the defense stepping up to defend the run, including the box safety, so he pulls the ball out and sets to throw. As he does this, the safety in the box begins to sink back into the throwing lane. Mariota doesn’t panic, instead moving the safety with his eyes and body position before throwing behind him. It’s excellent manipulation and shows great anticipation of the path of the receiver to throw him open on the opposite side of the safety. On top of all that, the placement on the throw is great and hits the receiver in stride.

The accuracy is there consistently and he shows the ability to move defenders with his eyes well. As we saw on both plays, he’s also able to remain poised under pressure and anticipate throws before the receiver breaks open.

The first play of this clip sees Titans’ receiver Corey Davis run a curl route outside the numbers. Mariota checks the deep safety to his left to see if he rotates or holds his position. The safety holds his position so Mariota works to his right. He looks to the seam route from his tight end, but it’s bracketed by the linebacker underneath and the safety over the top. That takes Mariota to the curl route outside, which he now knows is one-on-one.

The Bills send a blitzing linebacker from the right side of the line which the running back attempts to cut, but doesn’t pick up the block fully. With the cut defender rolling into him, Mariota quickly delivers his throw on time, before Davis has made his cut. That allows the ball to arrive as Davis works out of his break, maximizing the separation from the cornerback and allowing Davis extra space to make a move and avoid the tackle. 

On the second play, the Titans call for a couple of long-developing double-moves. The slot receiver to the right runs a stick-nod, faking a stick route before breaking back up the field. The outside receiver, meanwhile, runs what some teams call a “squirrel” route. It’s an out-and-up, but with a twist at the end as the receiver breaks back outside to the sideline. The slot receiver does beat his defender with his stick-nod, but there’s a safety over the top in position to drive on the route and take it away, so Mariota works outside.

The Bills run a stunt up front, with the defensive end crashing inside against the right tackle and the defensive tackle looping around to the edge. The stunt works and Mariota feels the defensive tackle looping around, but keeps calm and delivers his throw, again before his receiver makes the break. He displays good accuracy again along with the arm to drive that throw to the sideline and complete the pass.

Mariota is an accurate passer that displays good anticipation and poise in the pocket, but he also offers an extra element that Washington could certainly use at quarterback. Athleticism at the quarterback position was once considered a negative because quarterbacks would be perceived as runners that can throw rather than passers that can run. But in the modern NFL, teams are realising that mobility at quarterback can create explosive plays and help cover up issues when plays break down. Mariota’s athleticism can benefit the team in multiple ways. The most obvious is in the run game.

Here are just a handful of read-option plays that Mariota has been involved in. The Titans and the Raiders were able to open up their run schemes by incorporating Mariota with the read-option to either hold defenders on the back side and even up the numbers, or allow Mariota to outrun defenders himself on keeps. While the designs can be different they all work around the same basic principle. A defender is left unblocked to be read by the quarterback. If the defender holds his position, the quarterback hands the ball off to the running back with one less defender needing to be blocked. If the defender crashes down on the run, the quarterback pulls the ball and keeps it himself, running in the opposite direction. 

These plays are all examples of Mariota keeping the ball himself. Both the Titans and the Raiders were smart in designing ways to get blocker out in front for Mariota too, enabling him to maximize his runs while keeping him protected. 

While Mariota is athletic enough to be a threat in the run game, he’s not someone that always looks to run first. He uses his athleticism to help him move around within the pocket, before taking off running as a last resort if he needs it.

On these two plays, Mariota shows nice pocket mobility. The first play shows the Chargers getting pressure off the right side of the line with both defensive end and defensive tackle. Mariota keeps his eyes down the field, reading the progression of the play before calmly side-stepping to his left and finding his checkdown. The second play is similar, with both defensive ends working around the tackles on the edge. Mariota steps up in the pocket and finds his running back as his checkdown over the middle.

But when plays do break down, Mariota has the athleticism to scramble and work off-script to make a positive from a negative. 

On the first play of this clip, the Raiders run a variation of four verticals designed to beat Cover-3, a coverage the Chargers were known to run regularly at the time. The three receivers to the left run three verticals while the tight end isolated to the right runs an out route. That out route is designed to grab the cornerback playing the deep third on that side of the field and hold him shallow while the deep over route from the slot on the other side of the field works into the vacated space behind him. Cover-3 teams see this concept a lot as it has become increasingly popular in the NFL. Defenses typically respond by teaching the linebacker away from the trips side of the formation to look for that deep over route and sink back to match it, which is precisely what happens here. 

Mariota works his read, looking to the deep over route before coming back down to the running back underneath on an option route. The back is tightly covered and pressure begins to arrive, so Mariota scrambles out to his left. That buys his receivers time to work off-script and find a way to get open. The outside receiver to the left spots Mariota scrambling and breaks off his route, working back to the ball to make himself available. Mariota hits him with an accurate pass on the run for a first down.

On the second play, Mariota looks to hit the over route again, but this time the Colts have a safety in position to rob the route. Mariota reads the safety rotation, with one safety dropping deeper and the other stepping up into the hole and knows his over route will be accounted for. He feels pressure coming off his right side, so he steps up and rolls out to his right, scrambling for a first down.

Again, it’s important to remember that while Mariota is an athletic quarterback, he’s a quarterback first and foremost. Most athletic quarterbacks get branded as “one-read quarterbacks” or “scrambling quarterbacks”, but Mariota shows he’s able to work through his progressions and find the correct receiver.

On this first play, Mariota works from another empty set. To his right he has a double stick concept, with the two inside receivers both running stick routes while the outside receiver vacates space with a clearing route down the sideline. To the left side Mariota has what some teams call a “race” concept, with the inside receiver spotting up underneath and the outside receiver looping around him. Mariota initially works to his right off the snap, but feels both stick routes are covered. He quickly shifts his feet and resets back to his left. He spots the slot receiver hookng up and holding a defender underneath, with the outside receiver breaking free behind him. Mariota takes a quick hitch to step up and avoid some pressure off the edge before finding his receiver over the middle. 

On the second play, the Titans run what’s known as a “spot” or “arrow” concept. The tight end runs a corner route with the running back working to the flat to complete the corner-flat concept, but the outside receiver spots up in between them. Typically, the read for the quarterback will be the spot route to the flat, with the corner an alert against particular looks. The Falcons play Cover-3, as they were known to do regularly at the time, and Mariota spots the flat defender sitting deep while the outside corner sinks back to match the corner route from the tight end. He quickly understands that the back will have plenty of space to work with in the flat and gets the ball out as soon as possible to allow the back the opportunity to pick up yards after the catch.

The third play is a Jon Gruden favorite, Spider 3 Y Banana. The play is designed to look like a run to the left with the fullback leading the way for the running back. Instead, the fullback fakes his block and works out to the flat while the running back replaces him on the block. The primary read for the quarterback is always the fullback in the flat, but the Colts do a good job covering it. Mariota doesn’t force the ball to the flat or try a difficult corner route from the tight end with a defender sinking back underneath it. Instead, he calmly moves on to the tight end from the back side of the formation and finds him wide open over the middle for the touchdown.

Mariota can clearly read through multiple progressions and does well with his footwork to get himself aligned with each read. He’s clearly not a one-read and run quarterback and is far more intelligent than that. At times, he displayed excellent football IQ.

The first play of this clip is worth looking at in detail. Right at the start of the clip, Mariota looks to his right and makes a hand signal to his receivers by tapping his hip. This appears to be an audible to get his receivers to change to a new route combination, with the slot receiver running a bubble screen and the outside receiver running a fade. Mariotathen brings the receiver to his left in motion before snapping the ball. After the snap, Mariota sells a pump fake to the bubble screen before quickly resetting and firing to the fade. He shows off his ball placement yet again as he finds his receiver in the end zone with a perfect fade ball for a touchdown. 

The second play appears much more simple, but still involves smart play from Mariota. The Raiders isolate a receiver to the left of the formation and have him run a go route down the sideline. The defender over that receiver is effectively one-on-one unless the deep safety can get over the top and help out. However, the deep safety is in the middle of the field and slightly cheating to the three-receiver side of the field. After the snap, Mariota ensures the safety can’t impact the play by holding him with his eyes. Mariota looks to his right to keep the safety in the middle of the field before quickly resetting to his left and firing down the field. He delivers a beautiful throw that drops over the shoulder of the receiver, hitting him in stride for a touchdown. The safety was about five yards short of making a play, which was all thanks to Mariota holding him in the middle of the field with his eyes.

Mariota isn’t a flawless quarterback, or he wouldn’t have been cut by the Titans and only signed as a back up with the Raiders. He has issues with consistency at times and while he has a lot of tools you look for in a quarterback, he doesn’t always put them together well enough. However, with the number of positive traits he does have while still being young enough to improve at 28, Mariota does have some upside for a team looking for a quarterback this offseason. Scott Turner could adjust his system to suit Mariota’s ability to work precise passes over the middle, using plenty of disguised formations and empty sets to generate favorable matchups and mix in some of the quarterback run schemes from when he coached Cam Newton in Carolina.

He’s unlikely to be Washington’s first option at quarterback this offseason, but if the Commanders swing and miss on a big target like Russell Wilson, Mariota could be a solid fallback option as a relatively cheap free agent with some upside that can be a bridge until Washington can find it’s franchise quarterback.