Article: How Can Graham Mertz Take The Next Step In 2024?

According to an article on the front page Mertz was 11th out of 14 QB in attempted passes beyond 20 yards down field. That has to change for the better.


Mertz completed 16 of 39 (41.0%) passes that traveled 20+ yards downfield, recording five touchdowns and zero interceptions on deep balls. While Florida would like Mertz to complete those at a higher percentage, he still outperformed Carson Beck, Devin Leary, Payton Thorne, Will Rodgers, Joe Milton, and was neck-and-neck with several other SEC quarterbacks regarding completion percentage on 20+ air yard passes. The narrative that Mertz is uncapable of throwing the deep ball is false, as he was nowhere near the bottom of the conference in that category. Mertz simply didn’t take nearly enough attempts.

Out of 14 SEC quarterbacks, Mertz ranked 11th in 20+ yard attempts with 39. The only three quarterbacks that trailed him were AJ Swann, Max Johnson, and Will Rodgers, all of which threw 110+ fewer passes than Mertz in 2023.

Mertz has been open and honest with his weaknesses in the past, claiming he tends to hold on to the ball too long, which resulted in a high number of sacks (31) in 2023.

How can Graham Mertz take the next step in 2024? | GatorCountry.com

 

Oline is by far the biggest factor in Mertz’ sec was. Give us a running game and time in a clean pocket and there will be vast improvement all over the offense. If we can’t establish the run and Mertz is getting flush from the pocket consistently, you know what that is going to look like. Every other aspect of the offense is basically proven. Let’s see a decent line.

 

To me, it seems the pocket broke down early and consistently and didn’t allow the opportunity to go downfield as much as we would like.

 

That team looks great... on paper. But The Gators don't play football on paper.

Let's see if we can poke a few holes in the paper.

 

Mertz coming here with mixed reviews did not want to add to the fire by throwing ints. I think he was purposefully cautious due to not wanting to be seen as a bust. I do think with a successful year of low ints and the respect of the team/fans that he will be more apt to take risks. Hopefully the OL will give him time to do so and I really think he has put in the time off season to focus on longer throws. I do suspect he will throw more ints this year taking those risks but also I think there will be more reward.

 

I agree, but would add that part of this is on his QB coach and offensive coordinator. The QB does what he is coached to do at the best of his ability. Bud Davis and Seth Varnadore discuss some of this in their podcast In an offense that has a mix of low-risk and high-risk reads with each QB drop-back, there is plenty of room for Mertz to choose the high-risk/ high-EPA (expected points added) read or the lower-risk/ lower-EPA read. In year of the same offense, and without that recent memory of Wisconsin we should expect higher-risk/higher-EPA reads with or without a vastly improved offensive line..

 

Routes trees and design have been discussed by errbody. Is the design of the offense and predictability of play type allowing DCs to prevent the offense from making more big plays?

 

Check out the video that I linked above. The design of the offense is not the problem, but the execution. Swap Carson Beck or Anthony Richardson for Graham Mertz using the same playbook with the same route trees and it gets executed differently.

 

Watched some yesterday, watching again now. You believe AR would have been a better QB last season? I thought AR was really mediocre as a passer.

At 33: they begin to dissect where the tendencies are personnel are less optimal. Have to believe Napier and staff(analysts?) could make some changes that help.

Wish we would do more with the end around. Looks like defenses don't follow and that side of the field is open. Hope to see more designed swing passes to our RBs and not the sideways drift safety valve.

Will try to continue watching later.

 

I would not say that AR is a bad passer, but given the same playbook as we saw with our own eyes he will execute the same offense differently than a QB like Mertz.

I would agree in general that the offense needs to get some misdirection in a different manner if the QB is not mobile.

The video does a great job of explaining the specifics of the Napier offense. I look forward to more of those videos.