I’m certain you’ve all seen this grouping of pictures collectively:
Sure, these are all Russell Wilson, and sure, these are all from this yr. To say that the Broncos expertise for each Wilson and Denver has been unhealthy is an understatement; the Broncos are lifeless final in factors per sport and Wilson’s composite anticipated factors added (EPA/play) is within the area of Mitchell Trubisky and Cooper Rush—who’re each backup QBs. Towards the Chargers on Monday night time, viewers have been subjected to the Russell Wilson undertaking in Denver.
Yeah, not an excellent search for Wilson this yr.
I feel it’s truthful to look at the construction of the Broncos offense and the way Wilson really suits right here. Earlier this season, I wrote about how the Broncos offense might look with Hackett and Wilson in live performance, however up to now, it’s largely nonetheless been the Russell Wilson offense within the passing sport. The purpose was to make him extra environment friendly towards Cowl Two and different two-high shells, however that merely hasn’t been the case by way of the primary third of the season.
By the primary six video games, he has an EPA of -0.175, which is an alarming quantity for those who take a look at his traits. Groups performed extra snaps with two-high shells towards Wilson within the again half of the 2020 season, because the “Let Russ Cook dinner” marketing campaign flew too near the solar. Since groups started transferring to two-high shells towards Wilson, he’s averaged a detrimental EPA/try, with this yr being his worst yr. Professional Soccer Focus’ Seth Galina wrote that these coverages work as a result of they pressure Wilson to work in areas the place he wasn’t comfy—the center of the sector.
Nevertheless, the Broncos knew this coming in, and but Wilson appears nearly like a shell of himself, even on the best of ideas. Wilson has at all times held onto the ball for a very long time—his 2.97 and a couple of.8 time to throw have been within the high third of all passers in each 2020 and 2021, respectively. This yr, his time to throw is at 2.86 seconds, which is correct in between these numbers. Nevertheless, his sack proportion is close to the highest of the league. What makes this worse is that his strain proportion by way of six video games is the bottom for the reason that “Let Russ Cook dinner” motion started. He’s not the identical QB that he was in his prime, but he’s persevering with to carry on to the ball like he can escape this stuff and he can’t.
This play is a damning instance of the confusion and general insecurity Wilson has on this offense. It is a fundamental three man stick route, but Wilson panics on the first semblance of strain, making the pocket worse and throwing an incompletion. If it’s this unhealthy that he’s not studying out your complete idea, this experiment is likely to be over earlier than any cooking occurs.
Wilson has proven the dearth of belief in persistently standing within the pocket and making these throws, and it’s largely as a result of that’s how he’s at all times performed. His sport was by no means going to age the way in which others did at this age, however now it appears like he’s misplaced confidence within the easy facets of enjoying QB. His effectivity is down and he’s out of the pocket much less, the place the standard Wilson magic occurs probably the most.
The Broncos might tweak some facets of their offense to assist Wilson out, maybe. The very first thing could be to up the RPO utilization. If the Broncos are going to see as a lot two excessive shells as they do, they’ll leverage their success operating out of shotgun into utilizing extra RPOs, to get defenses to deliver a security down. Towards the Chargers, their EPA/try on runs out of the gun was -0.05, whereas underneath heart it was -0.21. If they’ll use extra RPOs to present Wilson simpler targets to the flats and (possibly) over the center, it will assist make that offense run smoother.
Finally, none of this issues except Wilson is assured. proper now, he doesn’t look that approach in any respect.