Mile High Report
How well did Bo Nix get protected and how well did he handle pressure as a rookie passer?
Bo Nix dropped back to pass 641 times as a rookie. He threw the ball 567 times, was sacked 24 times and scrambled 50 times. His 50 scrambles were the third most in the NFL behind only Jayden Daniels (73) and Caleb Williams (51). Fellow rookie Drake Maye (45) also scrambled quite a bit considering that he played much less than the other rookie QBs.
Rookie QBs tend to scramble for two reasons, they tend to get blitzed more often than veterans and that can result in them running, they also have less familiarity with their WRs so most of those scrambles end up as runs instead of big play throws like you might see from Josh Allen or Patrick Mahomes.
The second reason is that the may not be as able to diagnose the opposing defense and make the right read in time to get the ball out - so they run with it. Additionally they may be less willing to throw the ball away to avoid a sack. Caleb Williams had a huge problem with this aspect.
I was interested in understanding the Nexus between passing protection, blitzes and QB pressure. QB can create their own pressure by being indecisive or by not knowing how to move in the pocket to buy time. So first let’s look at the ESPN OL pass block rankings from team pass block win rate (were the Broncos were ranked #1).
With a team PBWR of 74% the Broncos were significantly better than the second best OL - Baltimore which was at 70%. The Bronco OL also finished second in run block win rate with only the Texans having a higher value as a team.
So Bo Nix was protected extremely well, which was a testament to the play of the OL and the coaching of Zach Strief. This resulted in in the third lowest sack rate in the league among starting QBs, and the 4th lowest pressure rate in the league at 15.9% according to PFR. Fantasy Pros disagrees and shows that he was pressured on 17.4% of his dropbacks, mainly because they don’t take into account scrambles like PFR does. The only starting QBs who were pressured less than Bo were Tua Tagovailoa (13.6%), Mac Jones (14.1%), and Trevor Lawrence (15.2%). But how often was he (and how often were they) blitzed?
46 Starting QBs (min 100 passing attempts) were blitzed (five or more pass rushers) anywhere from 12.8% (Tyler Huntley) to 33.5% (Andy Dalton). While Dalton was blitzed often, he was not pressured very much. Looking at Blitz % minus Pressure% is informative. A negative value could mean that the OL was terrible and that opposing DC could get pressure with only three or four pass rushers, or it could mean that the QB created their own pressure as we discussed earlier.
Bo Nix was only Blitzed on 25% of his dropbacks...
