Taylor Heinicke struggles significantly against Vikings
Breaking down the struggles of the Commanders QB after the loss to the Vikings
The positivity surrounding Commanders quarterback Taylor Heinicke came crashing down this week as Washington snapped its winning streak after losing a very winnable game against the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday. The defense played as well as they could have and kept the team in the game throughout, but the offense really struggled to get anything going and Heinicke’s performance was a large part of the reason why.
Heinicke finished the game with 149 passing yards with two touchdowns and an interception while completing just 15 of his 28 passes at a 54% completion rate. His stats weren’t great but even they don’t tell the full story of his performance which involved some poor pocket management, missed opportunities and a few horrific decisions.
A common theme in the game was Heinicke rejecting open options before panicking in the pocket.
On this play, the Commanders run a sail concept with receiver Cam Sims running a deep post, tight end Logan Thomas running the sail route and receiver Curtis Samuel completing the concept with a shallow cross from the other side. As Heinicke drops back to pass, he looks to his right to see how the defense reacts to the sail concept. The Vikings have two deep safeties on top of Sims’ route, so that’s out of the equation. A linebacker attaches to Thomas’ route while the outside corner sinks back underneath it, taking that away too. Heinicke should then progress down to Samuel underneath. He appears to look his way and Samuel is available for the throw, but instead he opts against the throw to Samuel.
Now, perhaps Heinicke saw the outside cornerback peeking back while sinking under Thomas’ route and thought he might quickly adjust to make the play on Samuel. However, there’s still a significant window for that throw to arrive and the corner would have had to completely flip his hips before being able to make a tackle, giving Samuel a chance to make a play after the catch. But instead of just taking the throw available to him, Heinicke starts to panic in the pocket. He looks for a lane to escape despite having plenty of time and a relatively clean pocket to work from. He ends up running into pressure and then missing a throw to Antonio Gibson in the flat.
This theme happened on multiple occasions throughout the game.
Here, the Commanders have Samuel run a whip route, faking a shallow cross before pivoting back outside to the flat. Meanwhile, Terry McLaurin runs a slot fade. It’s a nice combination and the Vikings give McLaurin the respect he deserves by sitting back and protecting against the deeper option. This should be an easy read for Heinicke to just take the throw underneath to Samuel as the coverage sinks back, especially with his right tackle being driven back towards him. But that flash of pressure from the right tackle causes Heinicke to panic. Instead of just getting the ball out quickly to Samuel, Heinicke panics again, drifting backwards before throwing the ball away.
In a one-off scenario, these aren’t horrifically bad plays as at least he managed to throw the ball away and not take a negative play on both occasions. However, when they appear consistently, then it becomes a trend which is concerning. The panicking in the pocket is obviously a problem, but the other issue of not taking the open throw underneath is just as big a problem. That was clear to see on the interception.
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