by Vincent Verhei

"Jameis Winston is part of arguably the most frustrating groups of quarterbacks. His talent is undeniable; he's not a Beathard or a Peterman or something, where everything is terrible. He's also not an Alex Smith-type, a steady, unspectacular game manager. Winston's highs are so high; he can do fantastic things ... but his lows are among the lowest in the league. And at this point, I don't know there's much you can do to fix that."

That's part of what FO writer Bryan Knowles had to say about Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Jameis Winston in Audibles at the Line this weekend. It came on a day when Winston's lows were very low, and worse, all too common. He finished the day with four interceptions and five sacks against Cincinnati, and might well have had more if he had not been benched late in the third quarter for Ryan Fitzpatrick. But even on one of the worst days of his career, we still saw the highs Winston is capable of reaching -- he had four completions of 20 yards or more, including a 60-yard touchdown to DeSean Jackson.

This was not just a one-game anomaly. Winston has now thrown 54 interceptions in 1,692 pass attempts in his career. That's an interception rate of 3.19 percent, the worst such rate of any quarterback with at least a thousand pass attempts in the NFL since he was drafted first overall in 2015. However, he has also completed 1,035 passes for 12,817 yards. That works out to 12.4 yards per completion, and that's the second-best of any passer in that same timeframe -- and since Carson Palmer, the only player ahead of Winston, has now retired, it's fair to say that Winston is the reigning mad bomber of the NFL.

This season, at least, that dichotomy has shown up clearly in Winston's advanced stats too. At Football Outsiders, the first step in all of our analysis is to define each play as a success or a failure. As a reminder, a play is considered a success if it gains 45 percent of needed yards on first down; 60 percent of needed yards on second down; or a first-down conversion on third or fourth down. With this methodology, we can separate Winston's successes from his failures, and compare those results to the successes and failures of the league's other quarterbacks. This will help us answer the question of whether Winston's highs and lows are really as extreme as they appear on the surface.

Winston has a success rate of 49.7 percent on 163 pass plays this season. That might sound low, but it's actually 11th-best of the 35 quarterbacks with at least 100 pass plays. (There are a LOT of checkdowns and dumpoffs in the NFL in 2018.) On his 81 successes, he has a DVOA of 157.3%; on his 82 failures, he has a DVOA of -206.7%. That's a difference of 364.1%. That's not the highest gap between success and failure, this season, but it's close.

Largest Gap in DVOA on Successful and Failed Pass Plays, 2018 Player Plays Suc% DVOA DVOA,

Successes DVOA,

Failures Gap 14-R.Fitzpatrick 153 51.6% 36.0% 207.3% -176.0% 383.3% 10-J.Garoppolo 106 46.2% -21.2% 157.8% -213.3% 371.0% 3-J.Winston 163 49.7% -14.9% 157.3% -206.7% 364.1% 3-R.Wilson 201 43.3% 10.3% 201.4% -158.8% 360.3% 3-C.Beathard 189 42.9% -25.3% 164.5% -192.5% 357.0% 4-D.Watson 288 45.1% 8.4% 191.5% -162.8% 354.4% 16-J.Goff 275 51.6% 30.4% 194.1% -156.2% 350.3% 17-J.Allen 163 31.9% -63.7% 165.8% -179.8% 345.6% 17-R.Tannehill 141 41.1% -20.3% 165.1% -178.5% 343.5% 14-S.Darnold 269 39.8% -20.0% 180.4% -162.0% 342.4% 4-C.Keenum 315 43.8% -8.7% 175.2% -161.1% 336.3% 15-P.Mahomes 300 53.0% 46.2% 193.4% -140.7% 334.2% 11-C.Wentz 248 49.6% 7.1% 167.9% -165.5% 333.4% 8-M.Mariota 173 46.2% -25.8% 148.5% -183.5% 332.0% 3-J.Rosen 188 40.4% -29.8% 162.5% -168.1% 330.6% 6-B.Mayfield 246 39.0% -27.9% 161.6% -164.9% 326.5% 14-A.Dalton 312 48.1% 3.8% 164.1% -162.0% 326.1% 9-M.Stafford 270 50.0% 7.8% 166.3% -158.6% 324.9% 17-P.Rivers 229 52.8% 41.5% 188.9% -135.1% 324.0% 10-E.Manning 350 42.0% -11.9% 164.0% -158.8% 322.8% 2-M.Ryan 287 53.0% 27.7% 166.6% -155.1% 321.7% 10-M.Trubisky 260 47.7% 2.5% 162.9% -156.5% 319.4% 12-T.Brady 262 50.8% 6.8% 158.6% -158.3% 316.9% 12-A.Rodgers 306 43.5% 10.2% 175.3% -139.7% 315.0% 12-A.Luck 358 48.9% 2.4% 155.3% -157.4% 312.7% 4-D.Prescott 231 38.5% -18.6% 157.6% -151.7% 309.3% 4-D.Carr 277 53.4% 9.8% 145.8% -160.7% 306.4% 7-B.Roethlisberger 311 47.9% 10.7% 158.8% -145.1% 303.9% 8-B.Osweiler 123 43.9% 6.4% 168.2% -135.0% 303.2% 1-C.Newton 247 50.2% 10.6% 150.6% -152.2% 302.8% 5-B.Bortles 310 44.5% -10.8% 147.3% -146.2% 293.5% 11-A.Smith 245 44.9% -5.8% 144.0% -149.2% 293.2% 5-J.Flacco 359 45.1% 4.7% 159.8% -131.2% 291.0% 8-K.Cousins 369 48.5% 6.0% 142.7% -143.1% 285.7% 9-D.Brees 257 57.2% 36.1% 137.2% -126.7% 263.9% Minimum 100 pass plays

As it turns out, Winston's DVOA on successes isn't very high at all; it's actually in the bottom ten in this group. That's largely because he has thrown only six touchdowns, a rate of 4.1 percent of his pass attempts that would be the lowest of his career. However, Winston's failures have been devastating, with a worse DVOA than anyone except Jimmy Garoppolo. This is mostly due to his 10 interceptions, tied for the most in the league with Sam Darnold and Case Keenum, even though Winston has only started three games. Garoppolo's problem was sacks -- he took 13 of them in less than three games. There are seven quarterbacks with at least seven starts this year who have taken fewer sacks than that.

Thanks to all those sacks, Garoppolo is one of the two players with a larger gap between success and failure than Winston. The one player with a higher gap than either of them is -- of all people -- Fitzpatrick, Winston's backup/replacement. Fitzpatrick currently leads the league with 15.8 yards per completion, and his touchdown rate of 9.0 percent is just a few decimals behind that of Patrick Mahomes'. As a result, he has a 207.3% DVOA on successful plays, the highest in the league. Meanwhile, his -176.0% DVOA on failures is in the bottom ten; his interception rate of 3.5 percent is better than Winston's, but still significantly higher than average.

The remarkable thing about the Winston/Fitzpatrick pairing is that in recent history, they have been the same player. Remember when we said Winston had the worst interception rate but second-best yards per completion in the last four seasons? Well, Fitzpatrick has the second-worst interception rate, but the third-best yards per completion. Both players are in the bottom five in completion rate too. By accident or by design, the Buccaneers have armed themselves with the NFL's two most prominent low-percentage, turnover-prone, explosive quarterbacks. Fitzpatrick will start for Tampa Bay against Carolina this weekend, but despite his torrid start to the season during Winston's suspension, the results for the Buccaneers will likely be similar no matter who's taking snaps.

At the other end of the spectrum, we have Drew Brees. As usual, Brees has been one of the league's best quarterbacks this year, trailing only Mahomes and Philip Rivers in overall DVOA, but he has been doing it with jabs, not haymakers. Brees' success rate of 57.2 percent is best in the league by a substantial margin; the gap between Brees and second-place Derek Carr (!!!) is as big as the gap between Carr and 11th-place Winston. Brees' -126.7% DVOA on failures is also the best in the league, because he has only one interception, nine sacks, and two fumbles this year. However, Brees' 137.2% DVOA on successes is the worst in the league. Brees is only averaging 10.6 yards per completion, which would be his lowest such figure since 2010. None of his top four receivers is averaging even 12.0 yards per catch. Brees sits at the bottom of one column and the top of the other, so obviously he has the smallest gap between highs and lows in the NFL.

The splits of players like Winston, Fitzpatrick, and Brees are not typical. The correlation between DVOA on successes and DVOA on failures is just -0.024. Just because your highs are high doesn't guarantee that your lows will be low; at the same time, a lack of punching power has nothing to do with an ability to avoid catastrophe.

A few other big-picture notes on this data:

After Fitzpatrick, Garoppolo, and Wilson, other players with large gaps between ceiling and floor include Russell Wilson, C.J. Beathard, Deshaun Watson, and Jared Goff. Fitzpatrick is the only one of those players over 30, which suggests young quarterbacks might be more prone to erratic performance.

As noted, Brees has the smallest gap between his highs and lows. He's followed in that category by Kirk Cousins, Joe Flacco, Alex Smith, and Blake Bortles. Flacco and Smith have been two of the NFL's most conservative passers for years now, so their presence here makes sense. Cousins' name is more of a surprise, but he's averaging just 10.5 yards per completion in his first year in Minnesota. Bortles has thrown for just 10 touchdowns, which is limiting his DVOA on successes.

Passing distance definitely plays a part in all this. Fitzpatrick and Winston are the only players in the league whose average pass has traveled more than 11 yards beyond the line of scrimmage (nobody else is even at double digits), and we would expect deep throwers to have more boom-and-bust results. Carr's average pass has traveled a league-low 6.3 yards downfield; Brees, Bortles, and Cousins are also in the bottom five. Each of those players is on the low end of gap between success and failure. On the other hand, Beathard is second behind Carr in lowest pass distance, and the margin between his highs and lows has been huge. He's the exception, though. The correlation between passing distance and DVOA on failed plays is -0.324 (as passing distance goes up, DVOA on failed plays tends to go down). DVOA on successful plays has an even stronger correlation with pass distance at 0.599. And the correlation between pass distance and the gap between highs and lows is 0.631.

Speaking of correlations: the correlation between DVOA on failures and overall DVOA (0.561) is stronger than the correlation between DVOA on successes and overall DVOA (0.355). This suggests that a high DVOA (and theoretically a better football team) has more to do with limiting the damage of bad plays than it does with maximizing the impact of big plays. However, the correlation between success rate and DVOA is an overwhelming 0.839. No matter the extremes, as long as you get a lot of good plays and few bad plays, you'll be fine (duh).

Quarterbacks Rk Player Team CP/AT Yds TD INT Sacks Total

DYAR Pass

DYAR Rush

DYAR Opp 1. Deshaun Watson HOU 16/20 239 5 0 0 172 166 7 MIA In the first 40 minutes of this game, Watson only threw for three first downs. (Two of those were touchdowns, but still.) Then the Dolphins scored a touchdown that left Houston clinging to a precarious 21-17 lead. From that point to the end of the game, here is the result of every Watson dropback: 73-yard touchdown to Will Fuller; 49-yard touchdown to DeAndre Hopkins; 19-yard completion to Hopkins; 38-yard DPI on a throw to Fuller; 2-yard touchdown to Hopkins; 4-yard gain to Hopkins for a third-down conversion. Houston might want to consider mixing up its play calling though. Watson only threw two passes on first down all night. One of those was on first-and-20. 2. Patrick Mahomes KC 24/34 303 4 1 2 163 175 -12 DEN Mahomes would have been the top quarterback this week if he had skipped the fourth quarter. His last pass of the third was a 23-yard touchdown to Kareem Hunt, but in the fourth he went 4-of-7 for 39 yards with an interception and two sacks. His hot streak came on the last two drives of the first half (not counting a kneeldown) and the first two drives of the second. He threw touchdowns on all four of those drives, going 15-of-18 for 213 yards in the process. 3. Russell Wilson SEA 14/17 248 3 0 2 132 129 3 DET Every pass Wilson threw on third down resulted in a completed pass for a conversion, as he went 6-of-6 for 117 yards and a touchdown. (He was also sacked once on third down, and his one pass on fourth down was incomplete at the goal line.) He threw 11 passes that traveled at least 7 yards downfield and every one was completed for a first down, for a total of 238 yards. Meanwhile, each of Wilson's three incompletions were thrown to receivers within 1 yard of the line of scrimmage. Weird. 4. Cam Newton CAR 21/29 219 2 0 0 126 115 11 BAL Throwing to the middle of the Baltimore defense, Newton went 4-of-5 for 57 yards. Each of those completions produced a first down, including a 6-yard touchdown to Christian McCaffrey. 5. Derek Carr OAK 21/28 244 3 0 0 122 115 7 IND Carr's first pass of the second quarter was incomplete. He then completed 17 passes in a row, a stretch that lasted into the fourth quarter and produced 208 yards and 11 first downs, including three touchdowns. 6. Tom Brady NE 29/44 324 0 0 2 106 102 4 BUF 7. Ben Roethlisberger PIT 24/36 257 2 1 1 97 93 4 CLE Roethlisberger threw six passes that traveled 12 to 18 yards downfield. Each was completed for a first down, for a total of 101 yards. 8. Ryan Fitzpatrick TB 11/15 194 2 0 1 96 95 2 CIN On throws that traveled at least 12 yards downfield, Fitzpatrick went 6-of-8 for 166 yards. Each of those completions resulted in a first down, including two touchdowns. 9. Mitchell Trubisky CHI 16/29 220 2 0 2 95 73 22 NYJ Trubisky and the Bears were good at making plays at their own end of the field, but struggled beyond that. Outside the Chicago 40, Trubisky went 8-of-16 for 59 yards with four first downs and two sacks. 10. Matthew Stafford DET 27/40 310 2 1 3 93 89 4 SEA Detroit was playing with a deficit for most of this game, and Seattle's soft zones left plenty of space for Lions running backs to make plays. Throwing to his backs, Stafford went 8-of-10 for 98 yards and six first downs. 11. Carson Wentz PHI 21/30 286 3 1 4 90 71 19 JAX It was feast or famine for Wentz in scoring range. Inside the Jacksonville 40, he went 5-of-7 for 92 yards and three touchdowns -- but he also gave up two sacks, a fumble, and an interception. 12. Andrew Luck IND 22/31 239 3 0 0 78 78 0 OAK Luck was nearly perfect in the fourth quarter, going 6-of-7 for 95 yards. All six of those completions resulted in first downs, incuding a touchdown. Rk Player Team CP/AT Yds TD INT Sacks Total

DYAR Pass

DYAR Rush

DYAR Opp 13. Andy Dalton CIN 21/33 280 2 0 2 67 66 0 TB Dalton didn't do much to help when the Bengals were pinned deep. Inside his own 25, he went 3-of-7 for 25 yards with one sack and no first downs. Those completions included a 9-yard gain on second-and-21 and a 7-yard gain on second-and-15. 14. Aaron Rodgers GB 18/30 286 1 0 3 64 64 0 LAR Deep-ball passing: 5-of-6 for 173 yards and a touchdown. 15. Jared Goff LAR 19/35 295 3 0 5 63 77 -13 GB Goff had his struggles in the middle of the field, but was very good in scoring range. Inside the Green Bay 40, he went 6-of-7 for 103 yards with three touchdowns and one sack. 16. Alex Smith WAS 20/32 178 1 0 0 62 59 4 NYG Smith and Washington did a fine job of avoiding negative plays. Only two of his passes came with more than 10 yards to go for a first down; his average yards to go was just 7.7, second-lowest this week behind Aaron Rodgers' 7.6. With 6 yards or less to go for a first down, Smith went 8-of-14 for 92 yards and seven of his 11 first downs. 17. Sam Darnold NYJ 14/29 153 1 0 1 37 30 7 CHI Third-down passing: 3-of-10 for 37 yards and only two conversions. 18. Kirk Cousins MIN 31/40 359 2 1 4 33 41 -8 NO The Vikings didn't get the win, but their wide receivers dominated the Saints' defensive backs. Throwing to his wideouts, Cousins went 21-of-25 for 266 yards with three touchdowns and one interception. And these weren't failed completions either -- 15 went for first downs, including two scores. And three other throws resulted in DPIs for 30 total yards. 19. Blake Bortles JAX 24/41 288 1 0 4 15 5 10 PHI Red zone passing: 2-of-8 for 14 yards and just one touchdown. Keep in mind that Jacksonville lost this game by six points. 20. Baker Mayfield CLE 22/36 180 2 1 2 10 6 4 PIT Seven of Mayfield's ten first downs came with 6 yards or less to go for a first down. Any more than that, he went 16-of-28 for 107 yards with an interception and a sack. 21. Josh Rosen ARI 24/40 252 2 1 3 -2 -8 6 SF The Cardinals had a lot of success on screens. On throws to receivers behind the line of scrimmage, Rosen went 8-of-9 for 66 yards and five first downs. 22. C.J. Beathard SF 14/28 190 1 0 4 -4 8 -13 ARI In Arizona territory, Beathard went 3-of-9 for 22 yards with two first downs and two sacks. Rk Player Team CP/AT Yds TD INT Sacks Total

DYAR Pass

DYAR Rush

DYAR Opp 23. Drew Brees NO 19/23 120 1 1 0 -8 -8 0 MIN Brees only threw two passes that traveled 10 or more yards beyond the line of scrimmage. One was complete for a 20-yard gain; the other was intercepted. It's not just that Brees threw for only 120 yards, but 78 of those yards came after the catch. That's 65 percent of Brees' production that came after the pass was completed, most of any starter this week. He only had 42 air yards on completions. There were four different quarterbacks this week who gained more air yards than that on just one play. 24. Brock Osweiler MIA 21/37 241 1 1 2 -33 -33 0 HOU Inside Houston territory, Osweiler went 3-of-10 for 24 yards with one sack and no first downs. 25. Derek Anderson BUF 22/39 290 0 1 3 -42 -42 0 NE 26. Case Keenum DEN 23/34 266 2 1 5 -53 -56 3 KC Here's an amazing four-play stretch in the fourth quarter: sack-fumble, interception, sack, 2-yard loss on third-and-2. On third downs, he had one 24-yard touchdown pass; one incompletion; one completion for a loss of 2; three sacks; and two fumbles. (He also had a 4-yard touchdown pass on fourth down.) 27. Eli Manning NYG 30/46 316 1 2 7 -56 -56 0 WAS Manning's first pass of the third quarter was a 16-yard gain on third-and-4. From that point to the start of the fourth quarter, he went 2-of-6 for -1 yard (not a typo) with an interception and three sacks. 28. Joe Flacco BAL 22/39 192 1 2 2 -77 -85 7 CAR On passes that traveled at least 15 yards downfield, Flacco went 0-for-9 with two interceptions. 29. Jameis Winston TB 18/35 276 1 4 5 -158 -162 4 CIN In keeping with the theme of our essay, Winston had a lot of good plays in this game. He finished with 15 successful plays; only Ben Roethlisberger and Patrick Mahomes had more in the first three quarters this week. He had 14 first downs; only Jared Goff and Kirk Cousins had more through three quarters. If you take out everyone's sacks and interceptions, Winston was seventh in DYAR through three quarters. On the other hand, if you look only at sacks and interceptions, he wasn't just the worst quarterback of the week, he had nearly twice as much negative DYAR as anyone else.

Five Best Running Backs by DYAR (Total) Rk Player Team Runs Rush

Yds Rush

TD Rec Rec

Yds Rec

TD Total

DYAR Rush

DYAR Rec

DYAR Opp 1. Kenyan Drake MIA 12 58 1 2/2 37 1 65 37 28 HOU Drake would have made the top five running backs this week without them, but it's opponent adjustments that really shoot him ahead of everyone else. He averaged 4.83 yards per carry, best of any player with at least 10 carries in a game against Houston this year. He was stuffed twice, but half of his carries gained 5 yards or more, and he had a 12-yard touchdown and two other first downs. His two catches were a 9-yard gain on first-and-10 and a 28-yard touchdown. 2. Latavius Murray MIN 13 56 1 5/6 39 0 46 38 8 NO Murray ran for three first downs against New Orleans and also had a 12-yard gain on first-and-20 while getting stuffed twice. All his pass targets came on first-and-10, and he gained first downs on two of them. 3. James Conner PIT 24 146 2 5/6 66 0 42 9 32 CLE Conner had six runs of 10 yards or more and one shorter first down, while being stuffed four times. Each of his catches gained at least 12 yards, and four produced first downs. 4. Todd Gurley LAR 25 114 0 6/7 81 1 38 -2 40 GB Gurley had three runs of 10 yards or more and five first downs, but he was stuffed six times, and converted only one of his six carries with 3 yards or less to go for a first down. Four of his catches produced first downs, including a 30-yard touchdown and a gain of 32. 5. Tarik Cohen CHI 5 40 0 1/3 70 1 36 14 23 NYJ Each of Cohen's carries gained at least 3 yards and two produced first downs, including a gain of 21. His 70-yard touchdown reception included 65 yards after the catch.

Five Best Running Backs by DYAR (Rushing) Rk Player Team Runs Rush

Yds Rush

TD Rec Rec

Yds Rec

TD Total

DYAR Rush

DYAR Rec

DYAR Opp 1. Latavius Murray MIN 13 56 1 5/6 39 0 46 38 8 NO 2. Kenyan Drake MIA 12 58 1 2/2 37 1 65 37 28 HOU 3. Marlon Mack IND 25 132 2 2/4 17 0 34 34 0 OAK Mack only had one run longer than 9 yard, but that run was a 49-yarder. He ran for eight first downs while being stuffed just twice. 4. Lamar Miller HOU 18 133 1 0/2 0 0 24 34 -10 MIA Miller had runs of 15, 19, and 58 yards, and one shorter first down. He was stuffed three times. 5. Frank Gore MIA 12 53 0 1/2 5 0 17 29 -12 HOU Again, opponent adjustments are a big part of Gore's ranking, more than doubling his rushing DYAR. He only had two first downs, his longest run gained only 9 yards, and he was stuffed three times, but nine of his carries gained 4 yards or more.

Worst Running Back by DYAR (Total) Rk Player Team Runs Rush

Yds Rush

TD Rec Rec

Yds Rec

TD Total

DYAR Rush

DYAR Rec

DYAR Opp 1. Carlos Hyde JAX 6 11 0 0/2 0 0 -28 -15 -13 PHI Hyde failed to run for a first down against Philadelphia, even on second-and-3 and third-and-1. His longest carry gained just 7 yards, and he was stuffed twice. His incomplete targets came on second-and-6 and third-and-2.

Worst Running Back by DYAR (Rushing) Rk Player Team Runs Rush

Yds Rush

TD Rec Rec

Yds Rec

TD Total

DYAR Rush

DYAR Rec

DYAR Opp 1. LeSean McCoy BUF 12 13 0 6/8 82 0 -11 -36 24 NE McCoy's first run was a 12-yard gain on first-and-10. His next 11 runs produced a total of 1 (one) yard and no first downs. He was stuffed five times, including four runs that lost 3 yards or more.

Five Best Wide Receivers and Tight Ends by DYAR Rk Player Team Rec Att Yds Avg TD Total

DYAR Opp 1. Marvin Jones DET 7 10 117 16.7 2 74 SEA Only one of Jones' catches failed to pick up a first down; that was a 5-yard gain on second-and-10. He had touchdowns of 19 and 39 yards, and also gained 56 yards on a DPI. 2. Sammy Watkins KC 8 9 107 13.4 2 71 DEN Six of Watkins' catches produced first downs, including touchdowns of 10 and 13 yards. He also had a 17-yard DPI. 3. D.J. Moore CAR 5 6 90 18.0 0 66 BAL Moore's totals include 36 DYAR rushing, 31 DYAR rushing for his two carries for 39 yards. Four of his catches gained at least 13 yards and a first down. 4. Tyler Boyd CIN 9 10 138 15.3 1 55 TB Boyd's totals include 61 DYAR receiving, -6 DYAR rushing for his one carry for a 2-yard loss. Boyd's first six targets each resulted in a first down, totaling 112 yards. His next target was an incompletion, and his last three targets failed to pick up a first down, though two were still successful plays. 5. Dave Moore SEA 4 4 97 24.2 1 54 DET It was a big week for receivers names "D.Moore." Moore's four targets for Seattle: 10-yard gain on third-and-7; 15-yard touchdown; 27-yard gain on third-and-7; 45-yard gain on first-and-10.