ORCHARD PARK – The same knock on Josh Allen that created so much polarization about him as a first-round draft prospect last spring has raged on throughout his rookie season with the Buffalo Bills. The kid has accuracy issues.

But is this really true? Does Allen really have problems with his ball placement, or are other factors at play that skew his numbers?

The rudimentary statistics are there for everyone to see. He had a sub-par 56.2 career completion percentage at Wyoming, and now in his first season with Buffalo, he ranks last in the NFL among quarterbacks with a minimum of 200 pass attempts with a 52.2 completion percentage.

However, just as batting average or pitcher wins are no longer viable measurements of true performance in Major League Baseball, completion percentage is trending that way in football.

“There’s a lot of different variables that go into that,” Allen said. “There’s a lot of different variables that go into winning a football game as well. I wouldn’t say that that’s a crucial stat. At the same time, I do want to complete at a high percentage and put the ball in our playmakers’ hands when the time calls for it.”

Bills offensive coordinator Brian Daboll reeled off the variables Allen alluded to that go into compiling a poor completion percentage.

On some plays the quarterback’s best option is to throw the ball out of bounds when no one is open or to avoid a sack. Late in the game, spiking the ball is needed to stop the clock. On other plays, the quarterback might deliver a perfect pass that is dropped by the receiver, and others where the receiver may have run the wrong route. And there are also times when a quarterback needs to squeeze a pass into a tight window, and you tip your cap to the defender who makes a nice play to break it up.

All of these things work against completion percentage, and none of them are really the quarterback’s fault.

“I think every game is such a unique situation,” said Daboll, who admitted he doesn’t pay much attention to completion percentage. “Everybody would like to be 80, 78, 75, 71 percent, but you kind of need to peel it back and figure out the reasons why. At the end of the day the quarterback really needs to be judged on leading his team down to score points and taking care of the football and giving us an opportunity for us to have success. The most important thing is that letter (W or L) at the end of the day.”

No one spent more time researching Allen than general manager Brandon Beane, and he said the completion percentage issue at Wyoming was not as much a red flag as some made it out to be.

“I evaluate based on what are the balls he should have completed,” said Beane. “At Wyoming, how many times did he avoid a sack and throw it away? He could have taken the sack, hurt his team, and there’s no incompletions. Now, if he’s missing guys that he should hit, those are the ones I looked at.”

Said coach Sean McDermott, “It's in there. You have to watch what stats you’re actually analyzing based on the overall performance. At the end of the day you turn the tape on and that's the truest indicator, to me, of the performance.”

NextGenStats is an analytics arm of NFL.com and it has several measuring tools to rate the performance of quarterbacks, and its analysis of completion percentage is worth diving into.

It points out that in 2016, Sam Bradford of the Vikings set the NFL’s all-time completion percentage record at 71.6, and then in 2017, Drew Brees of the Saints broke it at 72.1 percent.

Impressive indeed, but NextGenStats also pointed out that both Bradford and Brees put up such gaudy numbers because they relied heavily on short passes that are more easily completed.

NextGenStats has a metric called Completion Percentage Above Expectation which, as their glossary explains, “allows us to compare all styles of quarterback play, through the same lens, to differentiate between the accuracy of quarterbacks in a conservative or quick-passing system to the accuracy of a gunslinger who takes shots downfield.”

Last year, Brees averaged 6.3 intended air yards per pass attempt, meaning the number of yards his throws traveled in the air. That was the shortest average distance in the league, was 2.2 yards below the league average, and was five yards fewer than league leader DeShaun Watson of Houston, who not surprisingly had a 61.2 completion percentage which ranked 23rd in the league.

Simply put, Brees attempted far easier passes to complete than Watson, and easier passes than every other qualified quarterback in the league. Joe Flacco of Baltimore (6.6 intended yards) and Green Bay’s Aaron Rodgers (7.0) attempted the second- and third-easiest throws in the league, and they completed 66.7 and 66.3 percent of their passes, respectively.

So, how does this pertain to what we’ve seen from Allen this season?

Allen clearly fits into the “gunslinger” category as he leads the NFL with 11.6 yards per intended air yardage, which surpasses Watson’s figure in 2017 and Cam Newton’s league-high 11.0 in 2016. Coincidentally, Allen is fifth in completed air yards at 6.8, whereas Brees last season was at 4.8.

What this shows is that Allen isn’t settling for dump offs, screens and other short passes that are essentially extended handoffs. He’s pushing the ball downfield, which Bills fans should be happy about. And if Beane gives him some help by signing viable players to protect him and catch his passes, his completion percentage should naturally rise.

“I have to do a better job of completing the ball when it’s there,” Allen said. “Obviously, there’s throwaways and different situations that you’re in that maybe can decrease that and (completion percentage) can lie, but I’m not really focused on that. I’m focused on winning football games, moving the chains on third down, and like I said, putting the ball in the end zone.”

Which is right where Daboll wants Allen to be.

“The most important thing is to make good decisions, try to do your best to go where you’re supposed to go with the ball,” said Daboll. “It’s not always going to be perfect, but big plays historically within drives and offenses usually lead to points if you can get a few of them, or at least one of them in a drive.”

MAIORANA@Gannett.com

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