







Bryce Petty and the Jets lost a lopsided game to the Dolphins this past week, and so far we have seen the good throws by the young QB, and plays made (or not made) by his teammates. Let’s look at the bad throws made by Petty in this game.

Petty Crimes:

1)

This is the first pass of the game, and Petty makes a bad throw. The defense comes out in a one deep safety look, and put eight men in the box, with pre-snap movement indicating man coverage. Petty runs play action on this play, and this play is set up to be a three tiered look. In the previous article, we mentioned that Gailey has a penchant for these routes, giving his QB a option at three levels on the same side of the field with a roll out. In this case, the deep option is Brandon Marshall, the intermediate option is Austin Seferian-Jenkins, and the short option is Quincy Enunwa. The play doesn’t go seamlessly because Cameron Wake gets around a chop block from Quincy Enunwa, which causes issues for Petty. The block is supposed to take out two players in the sense that Wake should go down, and the defender on Enunwa would assume the play is away from the receiver and move on. The second aspect works because the defender briefly commits to the run, before realizing that Enunwa was running a route and chasing after him. Unfortunately, by the time Petty reads Enunwa, Wake is near him to disrupt this pass and he throws it at the feet on Enunwa. The Dolphins do an excellent job of defending the play here because Brandon Marshall is well covered (although he seems to be held slightly), and Jenkins is double covered going across the middle. Petty does a great job of finding the open receiver, showing decent progression, but makes a terrible throw. While he does have a defender near him, he has to throw this ball in a fashion that allows Enunwa to make a play on it.

2)

The first interception of Petty in this game. Remember single high safety look with press man coverage, and Petty’s tendencies? Well the Dolphins are baiting this throw from Petty who makes a terrible read. The pre-snap read indicates that this is man coverage, which holds true. Petty has a tendency to go for the outside receiver in such cases because it’s supposed to take the safety out of this play. The Dolphins are counting on this happening to the right side of the formation because the safety is playing the deep route with Marshall while Cameron Wake is playing the underneath route. Notice the position of where the defender on Marshall is lined up, as he is about half a yard to a yard outside of Marshall, indicating that he wants the receiver to have inside position so he can be funneled to the safety on a deep pass. Wake running back into coverage is supposed to provide the underneath coverage, the corner back has the outside coverage, and the safety has the deep coverage. Petty makes a horrible read, and throws the ball as soon as he sees Marshall’s defender fall down (there is a case to be argued that this is offensive pass interference) but does not see Wake at all, who promptly intercepts the pass. This is a prime example of Petty being a rookie and not quite recognizing the changes in the defense at the last minute. The defense starts out with press man coverage across the board, which is probably where Petty made the outside receiver read on a single high safety look, and he reads that it’s man coverage when the defender moves with Enunwa. What Petty doesn’t grasp is that, the defenders on the left side of the formation moved from press coverage, and backed off the line of scrimmage, allowing free release to the receivers. In the Gailey system, this usually means a much better chance at being open, and both those receivers are open. He has to do a better job of recognizing changes at the line of scrimmage, when the defense makes a late move. It’s hard to anticipate Wake dropping back in coverage, but he has to make better reads prior to the snap. This is a bad read from Petty and a terrible throw on top of it as well.

3)

This is a play straight out of the Fitzpatrick play book because Petty doesn’t read any progressions on this pass, he’s dead set on throwing the pass to Powell. The Dolphins come out in a two deep safety look, with press man coverage across the board, which takes away the deep route to Brandon Marshall on the right side of the formation. Petty does a good job of holding the safety in the middle with his eyes, but then throws a bad pass to Powell, who is relatively well covered on this play. Considering the pocket was clean, especially if Petty steps up a bit, he should have scanned the field a bit more, allowing the routes to develop, and spot Robby Anderson on the crossing route open with space ahead of him. This was one of the biggest issues with Fitzpatrick, who consistently refused to go through progressions, and rather relying on the pre-snap read alone to make his decisions. Petty’s intentions are clear on this play, as he wants his play maker in Powell in open space against the line backer, but throws this pass well ahead of Powell. It would have been an acceptable play if the throw was better, but there were better options on the board if Petty were to be more patient. While it’s a different topic, this is the type of pass that has caused the value of speed linebackers to skyrocket lately. The Jets don’t run the play here, but this is a situation where a RB could run a wheel route, and just run by traditional linebackers known for tackling abilities (David Harris) instead of their coverage abilities.

4)

Single high safety, press coverage? Bryce Petty stays true to his roots and goes for the outside receiver deep pass here. In this situation, it’s somewhat understandable because there is only 26 seconds left on the clock in the second quarter so they have to take a shot at the end zone in this look. Notice the position of the defender with Marshall again, he is lined up to his outside shoulder, indicating that he wants Marshall to run inside. However, Brandon Marshall does a very good job of being physical off the line of scrimmage, and establishes outside position on the corner back. The defender has to turn his hip around once Marshall is on the outside, which allows the receiver to break free down the sideline. Bryce Petty realizes the Jets need to take a shot downfield partially because Todd Bowles wasted a timeout to recover from a challenge that didn’t go his way, even though there was ample time to review plays while the referees were challenging. On a side note, this is another example of horrible clock management by Bowles, and shows a lack of preparation. Almost every coach has a play if the call stands, and a play if the call is reversed lined up because the booth review takes copious amounts of time to complete. Instead, Todd Bowles was completely shocked the play was reversed, which cost the team a time out. Getting back to the matter at hand, Bryce Petty does everything right on this play, except he makes a horrible throw. This is probably the worst throw in the game for him (in a vacuum, just for the ball getting from point A to B) because he throws it short and to the inside of Marshall. Brandon Marshall doesn’t make much of an effort to catch the ball, but this is a horrendous throw.

5)

This is a borderline play here, but Petty deserves more blame than Enunwa on this play. The Dolphins are in a two deep safety, with press zone coverage on the outside, and zone coverage in the middle. This is actually a good read by Petty because the Dolphins are playing the underneath coverage on the outside. So any sort of short pass routes would have a defender in the passing lane, and they are hoping the two deep safeties would act as deterrents to any deep passes. Petty makes the correct read pre-snap because he realizes his best options are Charone Peake and Quincy Enunwa. While it looks like Peake is more open for a deep pass, Petty’s first read happens to be Peake on this play. At the moment he looks at Peake, he has a defender near him (a linebacker in the middle) with another player angling to run backwards towards him if needed, which causes Petty to look towards his secondary read in Enunwa. While Enunwa stopped short of the first down marker, he has a fighting chance of achieving the yardage if he catches this ball, but it goes through his hands. However, the biggest fault on this play is with Petty because this pass is behind Enunwa. This is a pass that could be caught, but considering the clean pocket, he has to make this pass. The broadcast mentioned this as well, but Ndamukong Suh makes an impact on this play because he clogs the passing lane with his arms, causing Petty to aim the throw slightly to the left. However, Petty has to learn to slide in the pocket in such cases, and look for other options because a throw behind the receiver doesn’t accomplish the goal of a first down.

6)

Single high safety and press man coverage? Once again, Petty becomes predictable and goes for the deep outside route. There isn’t much to read here, as this play comes right after the blocked punt for the TD by the Dolphins. The defense comes out in a single high safety look, Petty calls an audible at the line, and takes his shot deep. Petty makes the right read because Anderson is open, but makes a horrible throw. Robby Anderson runs a great route, and this is set up to take advantage of his speed. Anderson was clocked at a 4.3 in the 40 yard dash, while corner back Tony Lippett was clocked at 4.5. When Anderson has the hesitation in his route, the purpose is to cause Lippet to pause (to defend a possible slant route) and then just out run him down the sideline. Anderson accomplishes this aspect perfectly, and notice that Petty makes this throw right when Anderson is starting to run again. The receiver has a 2 yard cushion on Lippett going down the field, but Petty under throws this ball slightly, which allows Lippett to get back in this play. For most corners, the best case scenario on this play is to just knock it down, but Lippett famously played receiver in college, and makes a great interception on this pass. While this is a good read, it’s another ball that is slightly under-thrown by Petty. One has to wonder if he adjusted too much from the Colts game, where he seemed to consistently over-throw Anderson on deep passes. Petty has to get in more reps with these receivers because the timing just isn’t there, even with his favorite target Anderson, on some of these passes. This interception isn’t horrible, it’s just a play where you have to tip your cap to a tremendous play by the defender.

7)

Another borderline play between Petty and Enunwa. The defense comes out in a two safety look, and Petty realizes that he has a great match up with Enunwa on a smaller corner back (Bobby McCain) and decides to take advantage. He makes the right decision because Enunwa runs by McCain, who is playing the inside route to prevent the slant since they have safety coverage over the top. Notice the position of the defender, about a yard inside to Enunwa on this play, indicating that the corner back is willing to concede the deep route on this play. Petty makes a good read, and has Enunwa open for a big pass, but throws the ball behind him again. If Petty throws the pass straight at Enunwa, this is most likely a big yardage catch. Unfortunately, Petty’s is eyeing the second safety on this play (the one to the right of the formation) prior to delivering the pass. When the Jets routes on the right side amount to a shallow crossing route, and an out route (especially with a TE), the safety starts moving towards Enunwa, which causes Petty to panic and “pull” the throw a bit to avoid the safety. It’s another story of Petty making a good read and seeing the right guy, but making a bad throw. This play may have been more successful, if the roles of Jenkins and Anderson are reversed because the second safety would definitely pay more attention to the speedy receiver than the slower tight end.

8)

The Dolphins come out in a two safety look, but they show their hands too early with a corner blitz, which puts them in a single high safety look with press man coverage. By now, after three games, you can reasonably guess what type of play Petty is calling for in this audible. He changes the call to deep routes on the outside, and once again Brandon Marshall beats his man (although in this case, he doesn’t gain outside positioning) and has a step on him, but Petty under throws the pass. This is the type of situation where Petty has to take advantage of his arm, and make more of a linear throw, rather than a high arching one, because his receiver has a step and inside leverage on this play. Petty throws this pass short, which allows the defender to come back and make a play on the ball. Once again, Petty is throwing to an open receiver, but misses the throw. The only other thing to notice on this play is Robby Anderson on the left side of the formation. He runs the same exact route he did on the interception, and blows by his defender again. While his stats may not indicate that he’s a dynamic weapon, on the field, he’s constantly causing headaches for defenders. Petty has to do a better job with this throw, and learn to have less arch on throws where his guy the inside position.

9)

Single high safety, press man coverage, and he we go once again with the deep throw to the outside route. Charone Peake is matched up with Xavien Howard on this play, so there isn’t an inherent advantage by targeting Peake on this play. The receiver is running a wheel route, but in most cases it’s only successful if the receiver is faster than the defender, or if there is traffic clogging the path for the defender. Unfortunately, neither of those scenarios are present for this play. Petty seems to panic with the blitz (Dolphins sent seven) and throws up a pass to Peake, when he had better match ups on the other side. While Marshall hasn’t been himself this year, the combination of Marshall/Enunwa to the left side of the formation presents a better chance of being open than Peake one one one running a wheel route. In fact, Quincy Enunwa is running a wheel route on this play, and the Jets are trying to create traffic for the defender by having Marshall run an in route at the same time. The spacing is a bit off, but that route has a much larger chance of success than the one by Peake. This is a terrible pre-snap read by Petty, as well as a terrible throw by Petty.

Conclusion:

Bryce Petty is far from perfect, although he’s doing a better job at making pre-snap reads than advertised. However, Petty has to improve on his predictability because he clearly has a penchant for the deep outside pass on single high safety defenses with press coverage. If there is anyone in the game that will take advantage of a QB being predictable, it’s Bill Belichik, so the next game should be an interesting test for the young QB. There is a good chance that Petty improves with more playing time, because most of his errors seem to be timing issues with his receivers. Petty also needs to realize the changes in dynamics with late movement on the defensive side, such as defensive backs back pedaling from press coverage prior to the snap, and take advantage of them.

Grade: C

Forum Questions:

A) Which one of the passes would you consider to be the worst throw from Petty?

B) How will Petty do against the Pats?

C) What types of routes do you suggest against a single high safety, press coverage look?

Thank you for reading our weekly breakdown of the passing offense. Please check out the good throws by Bryce Petty in our “Petty Nation” article and the plays made/not made by his teammates in our “Petty’s Friends” article. If you have an affinity towards Ryan Fitzpatrick, then check out our “Fitzpatrick” article. This concludes our weekly film review for Week 15.