Evaluating Sam Howell's performance against the Browns in preseason

Breaking down how QB Sam Howell performed in the Commanders preseason opener.

We finally have some new All-22 to discuss! The Washington Commanders played their preseason opener against the Browns last night and all eyes were on quarterback Sam Howell. He put together a solid performance on paper, completing nine of 12 passes for 77 yards and a touchdown, but box scores never tell the full story and in preseason aren’t really that relevant. What Washington was looking to see from Howell was a good grasp of the offense by showing an understanding of where to go with the football, how he processed things pre and post-snap and how quickly he was making decisions. 

So how did he do? Let’s take a closer look. 

This was Howell’s first pass attempt of the game. The Commanders align in a two by two formation and motion tight end in tight to the formation after starting him out wide. To the right side, the Commanders run their Bow concept, which the Andy Reid coaching tree calls Tampa Bay. On their left, the Commanders have Curtis Samuel spotting up on a quick hitch while Terry McLaurin works down the field on a go route. 

Howell gathers that the defense is in man coverage pre-snap as once the ball is snapped, he works to his left. The Tampa Bay concept is typically a zone-beating concept, so it’s regularly paired with a man-beating concept on the other side. However, as he gets to the top of his drop and looks to Samuel’s route, he spots a linebacker sitting in the hole in the middle of the field and ready to jump the route. So instead of taking that option, he quickly moves on to the Tampa Bay concept. 

What I like most about this play from Howell is his mental processing. He quickly moved off of the man-beating concept when it wasn’t there and came back to his right, but didn’t then slow down. Many quarterbacks could have checked the basic cross from tight end Cole Turner over the middle as that would have been a natural progression as he worked from left to right. However, because he knows it’s man coverage, he knows the linebacker will be much tighter to the tight end than the outside corner will be to Jahan Dotson running the spot route inside. So Instead of reading Turner, Howell instantly works to Dotson and shows off that quick release to hit him before the corner in coverage can do anything about it. 

With a short gain to Dotson, the Commanders then faced third and six on their opening drive, a tough situation for Howell.

This is an interesting call on a concept I’m not overly familiar with, but let’s break down what Howell does well. The Commanders are in a three by one formation with the tight end isolated to the right and all three wide receivers aligned to the left. The two outside receivers both appear to run clearing routes down the sideline, with perhaps Jahan Dotson getting forced a little too wide when he should have been in the seam. Curtis Samuel aligns inside and runs what’s often referred to as a branch route, which is much like a stick route but just a bit longer. On the other side, Cole Turner runs a basic cross. 

After securing the snap, Howell looks to his left. I don’t think he works all the way outside because Terry McLaurin does get a step on his defender and Howell never considers a throw. He perhaps looked at Dotson in the slot, who got forced wider by the slot corner. After a brief look left, he works back to Turner from his right side, but the safety is sitting in a perfect spot to attach to that basic cross and takes it away. At that point, Howell feels pressure coming from the left side and works around it by rolling out to his left. Once he avoids the pressure, he still has no clear option to throw to, so he instead uses his athleticism to take off running and pick up the first down himself. 

The next play may not have stood out during the game as a particularly special play, but I think it’s worth highlighting because it shows a quick process and release by Howell, two traits that will ultimately have a huge hand in making him successful this season if he does manage to have success.

Initially, the Commanders aligned in an empty formation with running back Brian Robinson split outside to the left with tight end Cole Turner. The Browns respond with a zone indicator, having the cornerback outside over the running back while the safety rotated down over the safety. Before the snap, Howell motions Robinson into the backfield, which causes the Browns to change. The cornerback slides inside over the tight end while the safety rotates back deep. 

From this new look, the Browns look like they’re in more of a man defense than zone. The three receivers to the right side all have a defensive back over them, with Samuel in the slot having a safety aligned across from him. That’s obviously a matchup problem for the defense as Washington will happily take Samuel against a safety in coverage all game long. After receiving the snap, Howell immediately looks to Samuel and the safety to confirm his pre-snap suspicions. As he does so, he also spots the linebacker blitzing, which leaves a big gap in the middle of the field. 

Howell shortens his drop to just become a catch, rock and throw rather than taking multiple steps. This enables him to get the ball out to Samuel instantly and allows Samuel time to secure the pass before the safety can close on him. This gives Samuel a chance to make a move and break free of the tackle attempt from the safety. He then is able to burst up the field and pick up a first down before being taken to the ground. 

It might not have looked like a big deal. On paper, it was just a quick throw to Samuel. But there is a lot of mental processing that goes into that type of throw, including diagnosing coverages pre-snap with the help of Bieniemy’s use of personnel groups, formations and motions. He’s then also alert enough to be able to adjust the depth of his drop to help speed up his ability to get the ball out and take advantage of a matchup. Those are very encouraging signs that Howell not only understands the offense, but is able to process all the information that Bieniemy is able to give to him pre-snap in an efficient manner. 

Unfortunately though, there were still some things for Howell to improve on. Of course, we can’t expect him to be perfect and mistakes are bound to happen, but he did make one that ended up costing him a sack. 

On this play, the Commanders line up in the same three by one formation we’ve seen a lot of already, with the tight end isolated to one side of the field. Get used to this look because Bieniemy uses it a lot. The Browns decide to send a disguised blitz here with the nickel cornerback and the linebacker blitzing the left side of the Commanders offensive line while the defensive end on the right side of the line sinks back into coverage. 

What’s important to know about protections schemes here is that the offensive line are most typically responsible for the four defensive lineman and one predetermined linebacker. If the running back is staying in to protect, he is then responsible for the first defender that comes from anywhere else, be it the other linebacker, a cornerback or a safety. If two defenders that rush that the offensive line aren’t accounting for, the running back can pick up one but the quarterback is then responsible for the other by throwing the ball before he gets sacked or scrambling to avoid him. 

In this situation specifically, the offensive line appears to be responsible for the four defensive lineman and the linebacker that does end up rushing. However, the running back is allowed to release into his route as soon as the ball is snapped, indicating he’s not part of the protection. That means that the blitz from the slot corner is Howell’s responsibility, as the offensive line doesn’t have enough bodies to account for him. 

Now, I think Howell understands all of this and recognizes that the slot corner is indeed blitzing and his responsibility. I think he believes that the corner started from so far off that he has plenty of time to simply throw over the blitz, looking to hit Jahan Dotson on his quick in-breaking route. However, he doesn’t anticipate the safety working down immediately to Dotson instead of staying deeper over Samuel. The safety takes away the potential throw to Dotson, at which point Howell has to know the slot corner is closing in on him and he needs to get rid of the ball. This is where the big mistake comes. He has Robinson wide open in the flat as his checkdown and should really just instantly flip there once he realizes the throw to Dotson wasn’t there. Instead, he hesitates and then starts to scramble, which results in the slot corner eventually catching up to him and getting the sack.

I think there are positives from this play. I believe Howell read the blitz and wasn’t worried about it, thinking a big play was available if he threw over it. However, the lesson to learn here is to not get greedy and to just take what the defense gives him. I don’t necessarily mind him looking for that bigger play by throwing over the blitz, especially given it takes a long time for the slot corner to get there. However, as soon as he knows it's not there, he has to be alert to immediately flip his hips to Robinson in the flat and get the ball out as soon as possible. There was definitely enough time for him to do that after he moved on from Dotson, he just failed to do it. 

Later on, Howell got back on track. He had a nice series of plays to wrap up the work for the starting offense. 

The first play of this series I want to look at is actually an incomplete pass. While the result might not have been what the Commanders would have wanted, I think the process was excellent from Howell and ultimately that is the most important thing. On third and three, the Commanders motion Turner in tight to the formation and run a variation of a mesh concept. Once Turner has completed his motion, Howell recognizes a potential big blitz from the Browns. 

The Browns put six defenders on the line of scrimmage and have the remaining five defensive backs all line up across from the five eligible receivers. Howell recognizes it’s actually a Cover-0 blitz from the Browns, which is a blitz designed to guarantee the defense rushes one more defender than the offense can block by playing pure man coverage without any safety help. Cover-0 presents a lot of problems for the offense as the defense is guaranteed to rush one more than the offense can block, but it also presents an opportunity as the defense has no safety help if a defender gets beat in man coverage. 

Howell uses this Cover-0 as an opportunity to attack on third down. He knows that the deep safety is responsible for the running back out of the backfield and that he has a LOT of ground to make up as the running back swings out to the flat. Howell adjusts the protection so that the offensive line blocks down inside to secure the inside and leave Howell responsible for the defensive end to his right. Howell knows he has this defensive end rushing freely at him, so off the snap he starts to sprint out to his right to avoid him, knowing he just has to throw over him to find his running back for a potentially huge gain. 

All of that mental processing is a fantastic sign for Howell in this offense. Bieniemy’s system throws a lot at the quarterback but offers him a lot in return if he’s able to process all that information efficiently. This play is a great example of him processing all that information and finding a potentially huge play. Unfortunately, the defensive end does a terrific job leaping up and tipping the pass, deflecting it away from the running back to save what would have likely been a first down if not a significantly bigger play. 

The Commanders then tested Howell with another key situation, leaving the offense on the field to go for it on fourth down. 

This time, the Commanders run a variation of their shallow cross concept. The two receivers to the left run a post and swing combination while the tight end and receiver to the right execute the shallow cross concept. I think with the situation being fourth down, Howell pretty much ignores the deeper concept to his left and focuses on the shallow cross, looking to hit a quick throw over the middle to move the chains instead of taking a much riskier throw down the field.

However, as the play develops, Howell looks for the shallow cross over the middle, but spots a linebacker in zone coverage ready to drive down on the crossing route and break it up. That means the crossing route is dead and Howell has to move on from it. He initially looks out to the flat but the running back is covered, so Howell starts to scramble and roll out to his right. As he does that, tight end Cole Turner does a great job recognizing Howell is in trouble and working off-script with him. Turner initially was meant to sit down over the ball to create traffic for the shallow cross, but once that doesn’t work, he takes off down the field and mirrors Howell rolling out to the right. He makes himself available and Howell takes full advantage, picking up a nice chunk of yards to convert on fourth down.

It’s a good reminder that Howell has more to his game than just making quick throws from the pocket. He’s a mobile quarterback that can offer plenty to the offense with his legs and ability to go off-script. On the next play though, he didn’t need any of that to top off what was a solid start to the preseason for Howell.

Here we have the touchdown pass to Jahan Dotson, which was the last play we saw from the starting offense. The Commanders align two receivers to the left, Dotson and Dyami Brown, and look to execute a play-action fake to the running back. On the outside, Brown runs a vertical clear out. He’s not really part of the read and is more there to take the top off the defense and vacate space behind him. That space is used excellently by Dotson from the slot. Dotson runs what I believe is known as the Seattle route. It’s a variation of the sail concept where the receiver fakes like they’re running a deep crossing route before breaking sharply back outside. 

The route from Dotson is superb. He takes a few steps vertically before angling himself inside, selling the fake deep over route incredibly well. The defender in coverage bites fully on the fake as he immediately breaks inside, assuming it’s a deep over. With the defender biting so heavily, Dotson suddenly breaks off his route and cuts back outside into the space vacated by Brown. He’s wide open and Howell finds him with a nice ball for a touchdown. 

From Howell’s perspective, the read wasn’t particularly difficult, but the execution of the throw was solid. From the end zone replay angle, you can see that left tackle Charles Leno got driven back towards him by a strong bullrush on the edge. This prevented Howell from fully stepping into the throw cleanly. Overall, his footwork was much better than we saw from this time during the preseason last year, but there’s still a few things to clean up there. Ultimately though, despite not being able to fully step into the throw, he’s able to deliver a decent enough pass that Dotson can make a play on and it results in a touchdown. 

Overall I think it was a very encouraging performance from Howell. It wasn’t perfect by any means and there weren't any spectacular deep shots down the field, but what stood out most was his mental processing. Being able to not only handle the information given to him by the system pre-snap, but also processing it efficiently post-snap and getting the ball out on time more often than not is impressive. While the deep shots down the field are fun and can lead to explosive plays, that type of processing is the glue that will hold the offense together and enable Bieniemy to get into situations where he can call those shots and look for more explosive plays. It’s a good start to the preseason for Howell and hopefully he can continue that momentum going forward.