“Right Around 65 Percent”
June 16th, 2016
A legend weighs in on Jameis
Another NFL legend is waving the flag for America’s Quarterback, Jameis Winston, to make a huge leap in his second season.
Kurt Warner grabbed the flagpole earlier this year. This time it’s LaDainian Tomlinson, the NFL’s fifth all-time leading rusher.
Tomlinson was on NFL Network recently explaining he expects Jameis to improve recognition of his second and third reads this season. That, Tomlinson believes, will lead to Jameis bumping his completion percentage up to “right around 65 percent,” up about seven points from his Pro Bowl rookie campaign.
Of course, Jameis’ maturation in this area will lean heavily on who is running those second and third reads. Will it be a healthy Vincent Jackson (fingers and toes crossed), or will it again be Donteea Dye because Jackson is injured?
Is inexperienced Kenny Bell flying across the middle? Or will tight end Cameron Brate take on a much bigger workload in a more methodical offense?
For a little perspective, if Jameis were to have a 65 percent completion rate, then that would place him among the upper third of NFL starters, based on last season’s stats.
June 16th, 2016 at 12:38 pm
Fair enough. I would imagine it would have been a few points higher up last year if you factor in all the drops.
June 16th, 2016 at 12:48 pm
Every QB stats include drops.
June 16th, 2016 at 12:58 pm
Yet, every QB’s stats don’t include throwing to 3 UFA’s most of the year.
June 16th, 2016 at 1:09 pm
@Joe
I promise you are sleeping on Kenny Bell. That kid is our 3rd best receiver by enough to say it’s not even close
June 16th, 2016 at 1:10 pm
Winston will likely not have high completion percentages throughout his career compared to some NFL QBs because he is aggressive and takes more 15-30 yard shots than most QBs.
It won’t matter one bit if he is a sub-65% career passer as long as he is consistently near the top in yards per completion and TDs.
June 16th, 2016 at 1:25 pm
From the videos posted it looks like Dye has shown some improvement
June 16th, 2016 at 1:35 pm
Mvp
June 16th, 2016 at 1:52 pm
Charles Sims can catch 90 passes a year, if the Bucs can find a way to get him more playing time.. It could be out of the backfield, in the slot or out wide.
June 16th, 2016 at 2:02 pm
Bucs know what their doing on offense don’t you worry about that. Number 5 in the league last year. You just worry about the wins and let the staff worry about what they need to do with the players and playing time for them lol.
June 16th, 2016 at 2:16 pm
Jameis took a relatively high number of hits, but suffered relatively few sacks because he was good at throwing the ball away. Also, he didn’t throw a lot of 5 yard net completions on 3rd and 8 (what the stat geeks are calling failed completions). 65% with few sacks relative to pressure/hits and few “failed completions” puts us in the rarefied air of first round bye land.
June 16th, 2016 at 2:46 pm
Sign ANQUAN BOLDIN!
June 16th, 2016 at 3:39 pm
Lake and Johnny is right
We are lacking in explosive playmakers in open field
Simms is the only player to gain yards after catch
los or 5 yard slants, quick screens, and dump offs are high percentage routes that our receivers lack in skill set. Except Simms i didnt see any receiver consistently break tackles after the catch
stop and go speed
elusive hips
explosive breaks
change of direction
catch in traffic and break arm tackles
(Anquan Boldin is a physical angry beast)
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“I wanted to be drafted by the Tampa Bay Bucs and play in front of poster Kobe Faker” Sterling Shepard
June 16th, 2016 at 6:49 pm
Wish I’d had time to read this one earlier Joe … great article. No doubt Jameis will improve on last year’s 58% completion rate this year (more experienced, will have better receivers, etc, etc).
What’s fascinating is that Jameis only threw 535 times and completed 312 for a tad over 4,000 yds. Had he hit on 65% of those 535 passes, he would’ve completed 348 and passed for over 4,500 yds (if the average per completion holds true).
But I think it’d be even better than that, because some of those additional 36 completions would go for 1st downs … and lead to another series of downs, and more passing attempts. And if his attempts grow as his percentage increases to 65%, his TDs should increase also. Convinced that 65% is perfectly doable with the receiving weapons that he’s got, if folks can stay reasonably healthy of course.