Matt Ryan: The Reports of His Demise Were Greatly Exaggerated

Thanks to the nflFastR project and NFL NextGen Stats for the timely sources of data.

For those of you new to this, I will publish key QB stats each week judging how well the Colts passing game performed. Yes, O-Line, receivers, and play-calling impact these numbers but they are primarily QB measures. I will probably modify the charts throughout the season. Commentary will be brief but feel free to let me know in the comments that stats aren’t everything. (click charts for larger view)

I don’t know why people are complaining about Jeff Saturday as head coach. I mean, he’s never lost a game and he was smart enough to put Matt Ryan back under center. For those of you rooting for the Colts to tank, it looks like that isn’t the plan.

HOW WELL?

Sure, the Raiders are probably the worst defense in the league, but Matty Ice killed it, and that is what good QBs do against bad defenses. He had the 6th-best EPA per dropback and the 7th-best passing success rate (before MNF).

His net yards per dropback was crazy good, but a handful of big plays can skew that. Success Rate doesn’t have that bias, though and that shows that even outside of those explosive plays, he was still really good.

On the week, Ryan was easily a top 10 QB. On the season, the Colts passing is most definitely not top 10.

HOW FAR?

There’s not many incompletions in there. His high ypa was steady for most of the game.

Passing depth was shorter than league average, but as long as you are completing at a 75% clip, that works.

TO WHO?

I like the passing distribution. More of this, please.

HOW ACCURATE?

Ryan has had a rough 2022, but one thing he has been consistently good at is accuracy and this week is no exception. As long as he is hitting receivers, this offense has a chance.

HOW FAST?

Quick, quick passes. That is how you beat pressure when your O-line is shaky. Ryan had the 3rd-shortest time to throw this week and was rewarded with 8 fewer sacks than Sam Ehlinger took last week.

TO WHERE?

Remember last week, when this was almost all red? Ryan had a lot of success on passes less than 20 yards.

DASHBOARD

Comparisons are out of the 26 teams that have played through Sunday night.

I’ve already highlighted the important stuff, but here’s the week 10 narrative:

Ryan got rid of the ball very quickly on short attempts (24th ttt, 23rd adot), which helped him avoid sacks (22nd sk%). He was highly accurate on those passes, helping receivers gain yac (10th cpoe, 10th yacoe). This led to a very good 7.9 yards per attempt (11th).

His low sack rate and his 1 ridiculously good scramble elevated his net yards per dropback to the 6th-highest of any QB.

He didn’t turn the ball over and he passed for a lot of first downs (tied 21st to%, 10th 1st%). His TD rate was a little low (14th), because these numbers exclude designed QB runs, so his sneak TD isn’t included. Adding that in would boost his TD rate up to 7th place.

As mentioned earlier, his epa efficiency ranks 6th on the week and his success rate is 7th best.