After Further Review: Why Brandon Marshall is making the Jets' O go
Brandon Marshall is making New York's offense go. His size, power, gliding speed and route running have turned him back into a star and have the Jets eyeing the postseason. A closer look at game tapes shows how he's doing it.
By
Pete Prisco
•
9 min read
The name Don Maynard might not mean much to current NFL watchers, but in New York Jets history it means a lot.
Maynard was the deep-ball threat for Joe Namath, a long strider who is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Why he matters now is because a record he’s held since 1967 -- almost 50 years -- is about to be taken down.
It’s the Jets’ single-season record of 1,434 yards receiving. The significance of that is that it’s about to be broken by Brandon Marshall, a player I wasn’t sure had the ability to roll up those numbers, a player who appeared to be on the decline in 2014, a player who has been traded by three teams and worn out his welcome in most of those places.
Not bad for a guy the Jets acquired essentially for a corned beef on rye -- and not even one of those big, giant ones from a fancy New York deli.
The Jets traded a fifth-round pick -- and exchanged seventh-rounders -- to acquire Marshall from the Bears last spring. It was a trade that I didn’t think would work for one reason:
I didn’t think the 31-year-old Marshall was a No. 1 receiver anymore.
In Chicago, he averaged 11.8 yards per catch in 2014, tying for the second-lowest average of his career, and his lowest since 2010. That’s usually a sign a receiver is slowing down.
Instead, Marshall has shown he’s far from done and is still a dominant No. 1 receiver who warrants extra attention from the defense. Not only that, he’s having one of his best seasons, which should be his sixth Pro Bowl season. He’s also helping the Jets become a playoff contender. An offense that was the worst in the red zone in 2014 is now the third-best in the league because of him.
The Jets have won three straight games with Marshall catching 37 passes for 387 yards and four touchdowns in those games. Quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick has nine touchdown passes and no picks in the three games.
Those numbers made me want to take a deeper dive into the Jets' game tapes to see why it’s all working. Much of it is because of Marshall.
For the season, Marshall has 89 catches for 1,187 yards and 11 touchdowns. That projects to 110 catches, 1,460 yards and 14 touchdowns. The catch total would be a Jets record, breaking the mark of 93 set by Al Toon in 1988. For me, though, the eye-opening number is the yardage total and how he’s set to take down a record that has lasted since I was a kid.
Who saw that coming?
With Marshall playing like a younger version of himself, the Jets passing game has improved greatly. Eric Decker, who didn’t look great last season when cast in the role as the No. 1 receiver, has been much improved as the No.2 option opposite Marshall. He has 66 catches for 875 yards and nine touchdowns. That means the Jets will likely have two 1,000-yard receivers after not having one since 2007.
Fitzpatrick makes it work, even if it isn’t always pretty to watch. The veteran has been dominant the past three weeks. For the season, he has 25 touchdown passes and 11 interceptions, but his shaky play at times nearly caused him to be benched. That seems like lunacy with the way he’s playing now.
Fitzpatrick doesn’t throw the tightest spirals, and he can sometimes look like the guy next door playing the position, especially when that beard was in full force. But he makes up for his physical limitations with his mind. He sees the field. He understands coverage and he’s a smart pre-snap quarterback. That’s important.
We would expect that from a guy who graduated from Harvard and has written computer programs in his spare time.
Fitzpatrick’s ability to decipher defenses shows up in a big way on tape, but it’s Marshall that stands out on it. Without him, the offense wouldn’t work. He makes teams play him with the double, which helps the rest of the offense go.
When he is singled, he beats it often. The best thing I can say about watching Marshall on tape is to pay him the ultimate compliment:
He makes it look easy.
Whether he’s gliding down the field with his long strides or shaking off press coverage with his strong hands, he makes it look simple. Marshall might not have blazing speed, but he sure has a knack for being able to make the big plays deep. He has four catches of 40 yards or more, which ties the best season of his career.
I picked out three plays to highlight how he’s gone about putting up his big numbers, doing so in a lot of different ways.
The first play came in Week 12 against the Dolphins. It was a 20-yard completion that highlights his ability to make things look easy.
Take a look.
- Play: First-and -10 at the Jets’ 38 with 5:34 left in the first quarter
- Offense: Posse (3WR, 1TE, 1RB)
- Defense: Nickel, Cover-3, four-man rush
There are two things I wanted to highlight with this play. One is the route run by Marshall, but also the timing with Fitzpatrick, who trusted his receiver to make the throw before the break.
Matched up in man coverage with Brent Grimes, Marshall ran a stutter-and-go that looked like a deep route.
But instead of going down the field, he broke it off for a deep out.
It was a great route to shake Grimes as you can see, but you can also see that the timing was there with Fitzpatrick, who released the ball well before Marshall made the break. That’s trust.
The second play I wanted to highlight was from Week 13 against the Giants. It was a 25-yard catch-and-run.
- Play: Second-and-10 at the Giants 32 with 5:21 left in the fourth quarter
- Offense: Jet (4 WR, 1RB,), shotgun, offset back
- Defense: Dime, man-to-man, seven-man rush
On this play, it was Marshall’s power that made the catch possible. He was lined up wide left in man coverage against Prince Amukamara.
At the snap, Amukamara did a great job of getting his hands on Marshall, but Marshall did a great grab-and-rip to get Amukamara off. As he went down the field, he broke off his route just as he’s freed himself of the corner.
The timing between Fitzpatrick and Marshall was outstanding again. The ball was on him with no chance for Amukamara to make a play.
Marshall then turned it inside and showed off that big stride to get extra yardage.
The final play I wanted to show here was his game-tying touchdown with 32 seconds left in that same Giants game. This play, as well as others like it, shows why the Jets are third in the league in the red zone.
Marshall is once again lined up in man coverage against Amukamara, who is four inches shorter than the 6-foot-4 Marshall.
That made for an easy throw for Fitzpatrick, who just threw it high enough for Marshall to pluck it out of the air.
His big body made it so Amukamara had no chance. I love the way Marshall went up and plucked the ball out at its highest point.
If the Jets win out, starting Saturday night at Dallas, they have a good chance to be a playoff team. Fitzpatrick has been on fire, and if he can keep it up and get them to the postseason, the Jets will likely reward him with a new deal. Not bad for a guy who was almost benched five weeks ago and who also happens to be playing with a surgically repaired thumb on his non-throwing hand suffered in November.
Make no mistake, it is Marshall that is making the offense go. His size, power, gliding speed and route running have turned him back into a star.
For nearly 50 years, Maynard’s record has stood in the Jets' record book. In three weeks, there’s a good chance it’s coming down.
Not bad for a guy who I mistook for an aging possession receiver at this point in his career.
More observations from watching tape this week
The weekly J.J. Watt review: As part of this column, I watch every snap Houston Texans defensive end J.J. Watt takes each week. Why? Best defensive player in the league.
Not last week.
Watt, who was playing with a broken left hand, had a cast on the injury and it clearly impacted his play. In fact, for much of the game he appeared to be playing one-handed, not even using the hand, clearly favoring it.
Watt made two tackles in the run game, two really nice plays, but for the most part the Patriots neutralized him. They used a variety of ways to do so. They doubled him some. They chipped him with backs. They tried to wham block him with tight ends. They mostly ran away from him, and Tom Brady’s ability to get the ball out quickly helped take away his second-effort pressures, which usually leads to sacks.
Watt was on the ground a lot in this game, more so than any other. To help compensate for his injury, the Texans seemed to move him around a lot more, and he was standing up in the middle of the defense more than usual. He’s done it some in games, but there was more of it. That could be because they didn’t want him involved in as much hand-fighting as he would be lined up closer to the line.
Watt did beat a double by Rob Gronkowski and Michael Williams to drop Brandon Bolden for a 1-yard gain. Later in the game, he came around tackle Sebastian Vollmer to chase down Bolden for a 1-yard loss.
That was about it. There were a lot of plays where you could see Watt favoring that hand, actually keeping it away from his body as he attacked the offensive linemen.
It’s hard to give him a negative grade with the club on his hand, but if you’re on the field you are accountable. By his standards, it wasn’t a good game.
Positive signs in Pittsburgh: The Steelers have to be thrilled with what they are getting from left tackle Alejandro Villanueva. The former Army ranger and receiver on the football team has made a smooth transition to left tackle.
When Kelvin Beachum was lost for the season in Week 6, Villanueva was played into the starting lineup -- even though he had never started an NFL game to that point. He struggled some early, but he’s improved the past month and did some nice things last week against the Cincinnati Bengals. He was solid in pass protection and moved Michael Johnson some in the run game.
At 6-9, 295 pounds, he is a taller tackle, which can present leverage problems. But he’s done a great job of working on his techniques to get lower in the run game. In pass protection, you can see his feet improving and he understands better how to use his hands. When you protect Ben Roethlisberger’s blind side, that’s so important.
This week, his ability to block the Broncos' outside pass rushers will be will be key for the Steelers.
