"Cam Newton Isn't Accurate." Is That Really True? A Quick Look At Why Shula Is To Blame, And The Offense

[Saca312]

Cam Newton. 2015 NFL MVP turned to 2016 afterthought.

The NFL hates him. The media hates him. It's been that way since Auburn, and there appears to be no end to the mayhem. Everyone is out with their storylines of typical Cam hate, while he keeps on proving everyone wrong. 

One of the most typical cases against Cam is that he's a running quarterback who is very inaccurate. They claim he can't make any of those passes, and forcing him to throw against the defense will prove to be his downfall. 

He proved everyone wrong in 2015. As the moniker went, "Contain Cam and Double Olsen," it seemed that plan would never work, as the Panthers went on a 14-0 stretch, finishing off with an eventual 15-1 record. Teams made Cam Newton pass, and he completely annihilated them.

However, his 2016 season resurfaced those arguments. Arguably his worst year as an NFL player, Cam Newton was beaten and battered behind practice squad players for his o-line, and his accuracy took a dip. The naysayers point to that year as the true view of what Cam Newton really is as a quarterback.

The common argument everyone uses against Cam is his historically average to low QB rating. Cam Newton's QB rating has never been top notch, and that's an undeniable fact. What no one accounts for is the surrounding talent around him, and how that affects that rating. When his receivers can barely catch half the time and get little separation, that's going to be a factor.

Heck, even Kelvin Benjamin's highlight reels shows this problem.

As amazing as this catch was, this still proves the point Cam Newton doesn't have much to work with. A very tight window to throw into that Kelvin Benjamin somehow snagged. Kelvin Benjamin usually wins with his size, not separation, but even that was limited last year. When that happens, he's about as useless as far as helping Newton as the rest of the WR corps. 

The Panthers WR corps barely got much separation, and that's a problem if you're not Kelvin's size. Even Funchess had issues with this. This made life a lot harder for Cam Newton, and thus made him look like an "inaccurate QB." Not only that, but Shula is plenty to blame for making Cam's life miserable too.

Matt Harmon went over this problem in greater detail in an article he posted a while ago. 

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No starting quarterback threw into tight windows more than Cam Newton in 2016, as 24.9 percent of his pass attempts went to a receiver who had less than one yard of separation.

As seen here, Cam Newton threw 24.9 percent of his pass attempts into right windows, which have been defined as when receivers have less than one yard of separation. That's not a good stat for any QB, and not something anyone would want to be the top in the league with.

His wide-receivers actually helped to HURT Cam Newton rather than help. An unexpected twist Gettleman didn't expect, and Shula just poured fire on. The flames of chaos are what resulted with the team built.

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In recent years we've seen the Carolina front office almost overcorrect in an attempt to rectify this issue by drafting behemoth receivers like Kelvin Benjamin and Devin Funchess. The trouble with that approach is that they only serve to extrapolate the high-degree of difficulty for their quarterback. Benjamin checked in with the lowest average separation on his targets (1.8 yards) and Funchess, who barely got on the field anyway, came in with the fourth lowest (2.0) among receivers who saw 20 or more targets. Again, some of that comes back to the scheme Carolina runs and Benjamin has shown some prowess winning at the catch point.

Yep. Kelvin Benjamin came dead last in getting separation, with Funchess not far behind in 4th place. While Kelvin Benjamin has his massive size to help compensate, it's still not the most ideal situation at all. And with Funchess being inconsistent as ever, he didn't help matters at all.

Cam Newton's situation was absolutely terrible.

However, Shula deserves a ton of blame for Cam Newton's short-comings as well. After all, he's the one that forced Cam Newton to be in the situation he was in.

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The Panthers offensive design requires Newton to hit high-degree of difficulty passes both deep and outside the numbers. Even his 20.3 tight window percentage on passes that traveled fewer than 10 yards in the air trailed only the Rams' quarterbacks. Additionally, Newton has had issues with bouts of inaccuracy, although as Eric Stoner of Big Cat Country asserts, there's a big difference between being an inaccurate passer (which Newton is not) and not being consistently accurate.

Effectively, Cam Newton was forced to hit the hard and difficult passes most of the time. Scheme forced him into a situation where his accuracy would take a toll. Shula made Cam Newton throw in plenty of uncomfortable situations, whether airing it out deep or away from the numbers, which caused his accuracy to dip. 

Harmon emphasizes that Cam Newton is an accurate passer, but he isn't going to hit every tight-window difficult throw Shula seems to enjoy torturing Newton with. 

A lot of people argue that Cam Newton is the one forcing himself to throw deep on every play rather than hit the short pass, but Harmon presents it in another way. Rather than Newton requiring himself to be a deep passer. 

In fact, this problem was evident all throughout 2015. Believe it or not, this problem of being forced to throw downfield existed. No one cared because it worked, but Cam Newton truly was in a very tough situations no QB in the league has had to go through. Cam Newton deserved MVP for more ways than one that season, but if difficulty of passes were an option, Cam Newton would be passing that by far. 

And he has Shula to thank for making his life difficult.

Cian Fahey goes over it in greater detail in an article posted last year.

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In 16 games [in 2015], Newton threw for 3,837 yards, 35 touchdowns, and 10 interceptions, while rushing 132 times for 636 yards and 10 touchdowns. He completed just 59.8 percent of his passes, but he wasn't an inaccurate passer. Newton's low completion percentage can be attributed to the quality of his receivers and the system in which he plays. While most of the NFL has become fascinated with efficiency, the Panthers have focused on finding big plays.

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As the above chart shows, the Panthers have been extremely aggressive in pushing the ball downfield this year. Newton didn't have a single throw that landed further than 50 yards away from the line of scrimmage, but he did have 15 that landed 40 or more yards from where the ball was originally snapped. With Greg Olsen, Ted Ginn, Jerricho Cotchery, and Devin Funchess as his primary targets, the Panthers weren't built to be a short-passing offense. They couldn't rely on their receivers to run precise routes or consistently catch the ball to incrementally move down the field. Instead of trying to force them into an offense that would make the quarterback's job easier, they put the onus on Newton to complete downfield throws.

As if Newton's job could get any harder. 2015 was a complete miracle of a season given the fact Newton was pitted in a horrible situation, but 2016 showed what happens when Shula kept up with his silly shenanigans.

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Furthermore, he had to do it while throwing to players with limited catch radii and without a great offensive line to give him time and space. The Panthers were so concerned about their offensive line that they regularly used seven-man pass protections to tip the coverage numbers further in favor of the defense.

Do you not realize how hard it is to even throw when your wideouts can barely get a yard of separation. Just imagine having to do that with defenders roaming the backfield as you have 7 out of 11 offensive personnel working on just keeping Cam Newton standing. 

The odds were against Newton the whole time. Yet he consistently delivered time after time.

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On this play against the Indianapolis Colts in overtime, Newton throws what should have been a walk-off touchdown to Ted Ginn. He does everything perfectly, but Ginn watches the ball bounce off of his hands. It's something that happened with great regularity for Newton this season. This drop cost him a momentous play because it would have led directly to a victory, but it didn't take away from how impressive Newton's actions were. His pass protection broke down immediately, allowing a defender to run clean through the middle of the pocket. Interior pressure rattles most quarterbacks, but Newton shows poise to hold the ball just long enough so he can release it cleanly downfield.

While releasing the ball with that defender in his face, Newton throws a perfect pass to Ginn. The velocity stands out, but so does the placement, as the pass could not have arrived in a better way for his receiver to simply run through the ball and into the end zone. Ginn's drop was completely a result of his own poor hands and concentration.

For most quarterbacks, this play would easily have been one of their best for the whole season. For Newton, it's just one that he was expected to make on a regular basis. Newton completed just 60 percent of his passes, but his accuracy rate was 77.1 percent. And a 77.1 percent accuracy rate while throwing the ball downfield under pressure isn't logical.

I just want to emphasize this. 77.1% accuracy throwing downfield under pressure. You have 7 men focused on keeping you upright, with the rest having less than one yard of separation going deep. 

Yet Cam Newton had a 77.1% accurate rate in 2015. And people say he's an "inaccurate QB." He was the offense, and sustained that high level of play for a whole NFL season. No easy feat however you look at it.

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The Panthers are a team that is reliant on using their areas of great strength to elevate their areas of weakness. It's much tougher for teams that are built like that to be consistent over a full season because a handful of players have to play extremely well every single week or they have no chance of winning. It's not rational to expect any player to consistently play to that level for more than a couple of weeks at a time. Along with Luke Kuechly, Kawann Short, Thomas Davis, and Josh Norman, Newton has managed to sustain that level of play for the whole season.

Newton stands out more than his teammates on the defensive side of the ball though. He is the only superstar-level player the offense boasts. He was tasked with the toughest assignments of anyone on the roster because of this. He was immediately able to elevate his teammates from the start of the season. That wasn't surprising, but it was surprising that he was able to sustain that ability. It was shocking when he began to elevate his own play further over the second half of the season.

We can compare his efficiency numbers to the other quarterbacks in the league. The quarterbacks who thrive from completely clean pockets. The quarterbacks who have ball-winning receivers who erase the need for accuracy. The quarterbacks who throw to dynamic, creative runners who can create yards after the catch on screens and other simple throws [Ahem. Matt Ryan]. Or we can be realistic. We can actually assess how rare a talent the Panthers passer is. We can actually acknowledge how high his performance level has been each week. We can appreciate how important he has been to his team's 15 victories this season without feeling compelled to diminish it by pointing to Luke Kuechly and Josh Norman.

However, it was expected this "put everything on Cam's shoulder" wouldn't work for much longer. 2016 showed that what happens when Cam Newton is literally the offense, and when it's futile to even expect the Panthers desecrated o-line to make an impact.

So, how should the Panthers fix this problem? Matt Harmon offers a solution below:

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Still, the Panthers would be wise to alter their approach with Newton in the same way the Steelers once did with Ben Roethlisberger, as Around the NFL's Chris Wesseling suggests. This also suggests that the Panthers need to explore acquiring another receiver who can quickly separate in their routes to provide Newton an easier target for easier completions, rather than constantly asking him to rifle passes into the tight windows provided by his current mammoth wideouts.

Simply put, the Panthers front office rectified this issue by adding two play-makers in Christian McCaffrey and Curtis Samuel who both can gain separation. Now teams have to respect the fact these two are present on the field, and easy targets for Cam Newton to get the quick passes to. Not only that, but I also believe free agency helped a bit in finding another quality WR in Russell Shepard who could surprise people. Don't disregard his ability as a receiver, as he's can get separation really well.

Another argument made against this is that Cam Newton isn't accurate if he doesn't throw 20+ yards down the field. They say he's terrible at the short and intermediate passes. Well, this statistic should make you rethink that real quick:

A 72.37% accuracy rate. In the 11-15 yard range. The two players above him are Brady and Rivers, both QBs well respected for their superb abilities. Cam Newton is among them.

And let me remind you, that's WITH the type of receivers Cam Newton has, and the low amount of separation they're able to garner. 

So, Is Cam Newton Really Inaccurate?

Answer is simply no. He has had no one on his WR corps who could gain separation, and Shula didn't help at all. He was able to prevail against the odds in 2015, but that luck wouldn't last long into 2016. 

Gettleman has figured out this was a real issue, and made moves in free agency and the draft to better equip Newton with weapons. Armed with guys who can separate and make plays, Cam Newton has a lot more new shiny toys he's never had before in his career. 

Fact of the matter is, Cam Newton is accurate. He just needs the right tools around him to finally breakout, and 2017 may just be his lucky year.

 

 

 

[Saca312]

For all you Shula defenders, this finally convince you he's the reason Cam Newton may never reach his full potential?

[ThPantherFan]

Fire shula!

[beastson]

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The Panthers are a team that is reliant on using their areas of great strength to elevate their areas of weakness. It's much tougher for teams that are built like that to be consistent over a full season because a handful of players have to play extremely well every single week or they have no chance of winning

This has been pointed out by posters since Shula took over. The margin of error.

[Khaki Lackey]

Holy wall of bad syntax, batman.


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[outlaw4]

I wouldn't consider myself a Shula defender by any means. There are things that he does that frustrates me. That said, he doesn't have the ultimate say in what players we are going to bring in. Gettleman wanted big guys with a large catch radius and a lot of people here bought into that. I'm not going to say that concept was a complete bust but we went too heavy in that direction. Ginn ended up being the most "reliable" option last season because he had the speed to get separation and for all the times I hated us chasing after the big play, that was keeping us in more games than we had business being in the first place.

At least we are bringing in speed for a much nice balance, so Shula should have far less excuses. Of course, what would help immensely is if our line can just stay reasonably together for the season because just about every offensive system out there is going to fall apart if the foundation crumbles.  

[RoosterCockburn]

Making one big giant excuse for Cam. He makes the final play call. He makes the reads and decided where to go with the football. 

2015 was a year the defense made the offense look better than it was. It's time to move on.

[TheSpecialJuan]

Very interesting

[punkpanther]

Stopped reading at "the NFL hates him" time to give it up with that poo already .


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[Malt Liquor]

So with Benjamin and Funchess not being able to get separation I wonder if there jobs is on the line now?

[SCPantherFan90]

Great post! It's easy to see Cam pass the eye test when you watch the games, so it's always nice to see statistics back up his performance and debunk these silly myths. Man, I can't wait for this season!

[joeyxfresco]

34 minutes ago, Malt Liquor said:

So with Benjamin and Funchess not being able to get separation I wonder if there jobs is on the line now?

I think that's why Prohel "resigned" 

 

As much as I hate to say it, don't think he was getting the most of his receivers. I know he had god rep around here but something obviously wasn't working 

[JPPT1974]

Yeah as do not blame him all by a bad 2016. His W.R.'s need to give him support. 

[DaveThePanther2008]

Amazing how so many still want to blame Cam for dropped passes, throwing to partially open receivers.

Cam has made some bad throws no doubt but to say he is inaccurate, is well, inaccurate.