First off, I fell in love with Josh Allen back in 2016.
So I've been watching the market go through this story arc from hope to hype to hate and now some sort of odd demonstration of cognitive dissonance as the people try and reconcile their hatred for the player with the consistent signaling from the professionals that they still value him very high...and I've been fairly disconnected from it, in part because I have known the player longer than them.
The good stuff is obvious.
He really has a great arm. Top tier. Like, tippy-top. Maybe not the strongest arm I've seen but he's pretty far up there. There are areas of the football field defenders will have to defend more assertively because of his arm, and that can open up some easier stuff. I'm not an arm strength nut; I generally think there's a requisite level of arm strength you need to start in the NFL and, once you have that, incremental arm strength won't necessarily lead to incremental effectiveness. However, it's a basic tool in the tool kit. The more tools you have that can hurt a defense, the better. It counts, and it adds up with the other tools.
He's huge. Why's that good? It's typically harder to intimidate a big guy in the pocket, which sucks for the defense because half the benefit of pressure is what the QB does when you aren't touching him, or when you're not even pressuring him at all. The size makes him harder to bring down, so you'll have extra time to get the ball off in some instances, which can lead to game-changing big plays. He can reasonably be assumed to be able to see over the line and throw the ball into other areas where smaller guys would have to be especially cognizant of passing lanes. There's a good and bad in that, in that the guys that have to pay attention to those passing lanes and slide their feet can at times become savants in part because of their need to pay attention to such fine details.
He's fast. He can scramble and run. He's got natural elusiveness. We're not talking Quinton Flowers elusiveness but it's certainly better than a Mason Rudolph or someone of his ilk. But combine the feet and the elusiveness with his size, a guy that can buy time like he does and make big plays like he does can force a defense to play them differently. Playing him differently means easier stuff opens up.
When you add up the arm strength, the size, and the feet, these things stack in a way that can really put a defense on their heels, and extract yardage that they weren't trying to give. That's important. Defenses give up some things and take away other things. Guys like Josh Allen can take what they weren't trying to give up.
Step back, stop dissecting things into their basic elements, and just watch a play:
2016 Josh Allen TD throw vs San Diego State
Who the hell makes that play, that throw, and wouldn't you rather that guy be on your team rather than on the other team?
Oh and that's hardly an isolated incident. Picking out THE most singly stupefying touchdown throw from among Josh Allen's collection of stupefying touchdown throws is a pretty tough task.
Here is a choice selection of the others from 2016:
2016 Josh Allen TD throw vs Nebraska (note the down, distance, clock, quarter, scoreboard)
2016 Josh Allen TD throw vs UC Davis
2016 Josh Allen TD throw vs UC Davis
2016 Josh Allen TD throw vs Boise State (note the down, distance, clock, quarter, scoreboard)
2016 Josh Allen TD throw vs Utah State
2016 Josh Allen TD throw vs Utah State
2016 Josh Allen TD throw vs UNLV (note the down, distance, clock, quarter, and scoreboard)
2016 Josh Allen TD throw vs San Diego State (note the down, distance, clock, quarter, and scoreboard)
2016 Josh Allen TD throw vs BYU (note the down, distance, clock, quarter, and scoreboard)
This guy's A+ plays are A+ for anyone who has ever played the game. There's no grading on a curve, there.
That's worth something. It's not about just arm strength. I can take or leave arm strength that's never put to good use. It's about play making, and that's a whole lot different from how a guy "looks". Baker Mayfield couldn't possibly look more different from Josh Allen, but he makes damn good plays. Russell Wilson makes damn good plays. Josh Allen does as well.
The legs and size to buy extra time, the vision to see it, the daring to take it, and the arm to get it there, and the accuracy to land it, it takes all those things to make plays. I used to be a huge fan of a kid that was 5'11" and 171 lbs with half the arm strength of a Josh Allen, because he was one of the most prolific lightning strike play makers I'd seen at the position in college.
But that kid had a tragic background, more than a few emotional issues, a learning disability, communication issues, and no experience with a pro style system. Josh Allen has a stable background, no learning issues I know of, good communication skills, and he's executed pro concepts you generally don't see from 90% of the passers that are drafted nowadays. That's in addition to, as I said before, being half a foot taller and 70 pounds harder to bring down.
And I just alluded to something I've been talking about for over a year that people don't realize, which are the intangibles with Josh Allen. This is the entire reason he entered the season as a top 10 pick for a lot of NFL teams. Josh Allen was present at pre-Draft events a year ago (the Senior Bowl or Combine, can't remember which but it honestly doesn't matter) and he met with teams. They got a preview of his intellect, communications skills, and football knowledge a year in advance, and loved what they found out. That's why they still love him despite what many view to be a disappointing year.
I didn't love his 2017, mostly because he didn't seem to take a big step forward in many of things that nagged me about his 2016. He doesn't always manage the pocket as he should. He can lose his cool and start trying to create rather than work within the confines of the play. He still takes some chances that might best be left on the field. The accuracy wasn't what it should have been.
But I understood that it was tough to take a step FORWARD as a player when the rest of the offense so clearly took a step BACKWARD. The running game was not even close to what it was a year ago with Brian Hill rushing for 1,860 yards and 22 TDs. Together, Wyoming's top three running backs combined for 1,004 yards on 3.5 yards per carry.
Allen also lost his top three receiving options from a year ago (Taylor Gentry, Jake Maulhardt, Jacob Hollister, all of whom got shots in the NFL). These were guys that totaled 142 catches for 2,455 yards and 25 TDs a year ago. His top two targets this year were sophomores.
It takes a toll. It's not an excuse to go out there and play bad football from a personal standpoint, but it's tough to take a step forward and be a significantly better football player under those conditions. I think you see this sort of second year correction in lots of college QB careers, and usually the third year they're better than ever.
Allen won't have that third year because he came out early. He came out early because he was a JUCO transfer. He was a JUCO transfer because he came from a town of like 500 people and almost literally nobody from any big colleges ever scouted his high school games.
I probably can't possibly communicate all the positive reasons I like him, nor can I tally up the potential pitfalls he could've fallen into with me that he deftly avoids, which is part of why I continue to view him as such a good prospect. In the end you just feel a certain way and that's how it goes. I see people comparing him to Christian Hackenberg, whom I strongly disliked as a prospect, and while I can appreciate the comparisons on some level, there's the simple fact that I disliked one and like the other. So we'll see.
