My assessment:
- Nice arm talent; He’s got prerequisite arm strength to hit all corners of the field & can make every throw.
His release has a load & uncorking motion that allows for him to get good velocity on the ball. I would imagine due to his size he probably doesn’t have the biggest of hands, but it doesn’t affect his ability to get rid of the ball quickly. He’s a 3 quarters delivery thrower (in Madden terminology that would be Slinger 3) & has enough arm strength to get it where it needs to go on the Deep ball without always having his feet set, which is a good thing. He’s not a multi-platform thrower, meaning his arm slot is pretty much in the same spot on every throw, which tells me he’s a rhythm thrower.
- Anticipatory thrower; He doesn’t have to wait until his WR is open, he throws to a spot where the route is supposed to go. Small detail, but a huge part of modern QBing, a lot of QB’s either don’t have the ability or lack the confidence in their reads to throw to a spot where the WR may not even be open yet or even covered. This is one of JBrowns biggest flaws to his game, he cannot read coverages on a P5 level enough to where he can be trusted to make advanced level reads against Defenses. He doesn’t let go of the ball unless it’s exactly how it was drawn up in practice & this is what keeps him from being able to transfer his big arm ability into actually being an effective QB. He doesn’t throw to spots, he throws to Jersey’s/numbers, which is a DB’s wet dream because it gives you recovery time & allows for you to adjust your read of the route & the QB’s eyes to bait him into throwing you a pick. I saw a ton of anticipation throws from HufflePuff & most were very nicely skilled darts that directly a result of reading the CB’s leverage, meaning he saw the Corner leaning in one direction & immediately threw the ball with enough velocity that by the time he would reshuffle his feet to attempt to make a play on it the ball is already in the WR’s hands.
- Ball placement; He can adjust his gauge meter for where to throw the Ball depending on how he reads the Defender. So that means if the Safety’s are playing 2 High & opened towards to center Coverage shell he’s not going to throw a deep post route to the inside shoulder (like Emory did against Clemson or like TVD did against NC ST); he throws it to where the WR has the chance to make the catch.
- Footwork; He keeps a wide base while setting his feet, this allows for him to gain leverage to generate torque in his upper body to get full power on his release. He did show some ability to throw under duress off his back-foot; this is a crucial trait QB’s in today’s game need because rarely will you ever have a perfect pocket every game all game & there will be times in which Defenses send overload Blitzes that will force the QB to make throws without setting your feet & essentially just heaving it from your torso, he has the ability to do it. It’s not his best throw, but he can make it.
He also made some nice throws on the run rolling to his right with a teardropper to the corner of the end zone. I also saw a pocket climb & shift while rolling to his left throwing the ball opposite of his body motion & still laced a strike to corner of the end zone once again. He’s got a live arm, he doesn’t hesitate to pull the trigger & will absolutely let it go if he sees it... Sometimes he’ll let it go even if it’s not there lol
As far as his feet are concerned, he usually tends to throw with his heel up, not flat footed & rarely on the front of his metatarsals, meaning he doesn’t bounce & throwing on his tippy toes like some guys do. He’s mostly on the back of his calcaneus by the time he lets the ball go. Think of it like a Baseball swing, some guys on their follow through have their feet up pointed back & some guys have them pointed down towards the ground. In Baseball it’s apart of the timing mechanism of a swing while measuring the distance & guessing the break on the pitch, in football it’s more just an aspect from the rhythm of the total release. He’s not a hop-skip to get set type of thrower, meaning he doesn’t do that little jump to get his feet his set before he release it, his is more of a slide-step then rotate. What does any of this mean? Not much to the naked eye of the average fan, but for me as a CB it’s a tell on how much time I have before the ball is in the air out of the QB’s hands & headed towards the WR, which gives me insight on how I need to adjust in counting the WR’s steps, reading his break in his route & timing it with how I’m going to defend the pass based on whichever route I’m covering. The good thing about Poffy is that his arm is strong & he throws a good fastball, so there’s not gonna be much time to diagnose based off his delivery how much time you have to get to the ball, once it’s in the air, it’s going where it’s going. So as a Corner the way you play against a kid like this is beating him before the top of the route & not after. You pick him off by jumping early, you can’t wait against him, unless you have perfect positioning against the WR, you’re not gonna get to it on time because he’s a bullet thrower.
- Mobility; This kid is pretty **** fast in the open field (by QB standards), but more importantly, he runs with purpose. He doesn’t just run because it’s a Read option or breakdown scramble, he runs knowing exactly where he’s trying to go & has enough speed/shiftiness to pick up big chunk yard runs against an unsuspecting Defense. He’s no Lamar or Michael Vick, but the kid bust open a big run going tempo against a reeling Defense that’s not reading the mesh. This is a big plus for this Offense because Mario ha always preferred running QB’s who can help add an extra wrinkle to the run game. Given his quickness, he has good escapability in the pocket. It remains to be seen if he’s a natural right side roller or left side, but what will be an upgrade from TVD is that he will climb the pocket under pressure from the edge & if there’s any lanes that open up he’s outta there. Quick feet keep from getting Blitz-sacked on pressured 3rd downs. Even if it’s a dump off or a throw away you live with that over just standing in the pocket & getting curled over because you refuse to move your feet (like TVD did a whole bunch last season).
This kid plays with a sense of urgency, in some context you could call it panic lol. But he’s not out there like he’s got all day & mentally scrolling down his IG page, he plays like if he doesn’t make something happen he’s gonna get beat up. Smaller QB’s tend to play like that because their internal clock alarm is always going off, which IMO is a good thing. If you’re a small QB I don’t want you back there reading a Novel, play like those big ugly DL’s & LB’s are trying to kill you, because they are.
The downside of some of his ability is his accuracy can be affected by his mechanics. Part of the challenge for Dawson will be to determine how much of his bad games where as a result of Jared Ambrose’s play calling & how much of it is because of Poff getting too erratic at times. The reason why i make note of it is because Ambrose is a KC Keeler Delaware guy who worked with both the Flacco brothers & both had similar accuracy issues in during their college years. Completion % sometimes can be a bit misleading if you don’t know the system & style of play calls from which the QB is operating under. Ambrose is a high volume pass OC, but it’s not really the **** Air Raid stuff most of you would assume it is, it’s a lot of reads that quite frankly I think are kinda dumb, but it’s really to set up plays for the Deep ball. He does a lot of meandering down the field from hash to hash just to bait the Defense into certain coverages that he prefers he calls the deep strike against. I like OC’s who can utilize the Deep ball regardless of the look they’re being presented, but Ambrose is a guy that really only looks for a specific coverage before he calls it in. That sounds like a good idea, except for the fact that when you design your entire Offense around Verticality it’s a bit stupid to take the crux of your play calling off the table just because you’re not getting a look that you wanted. It would be like Michigan deciding not to run the ball until they see 2-high Cover 4, like if your bread & butter is running the ball, don’t wait till you get what you want, just run the **** thing lol. I digress.
But point being, Dawson is going to have figure out whether he has to reign in on Poff’s gunslinger mentality, or if he’ll actually need to lean into more in order to maximize his accuracy. As an OC you can manufacture a 63-66% passer out of kid with the right arm talent with a little smoke & mirrors in your play calling. What will be critical is what Poff does when the play design doesn’t offer the easy options; how will he handle making improvised reads on the spot when the Defense takes away his first 2 progressions? Will he run? Will he checkdown? Will he force it in traffic? Or will he just throw it away & live to fight another down? All options are available on nearly every pass play, what makes some QB’s great is understanding situational awareness & decision making to get to the bigger picture, which is always First down or Touchdown.
The turnovers are always something to monitor; High volume passers tend to have more picks than normal, but considering what we just went through last year there has to be extra precaution taken in the QB room in melding into the minds of our QB’s that turning the ball over is an unforgivable sin. It should be the most important talking point that is programmed into their heads on daily basis to the point of Manichurian candidate style hypnotism; MUST. NOT. THROW. PICKS... Should be the triggering mantra.
Ultimately, this kid has some good tools to work with, good arm, mobility & self-confidence; He also has some red flags with his mechanics & his accuracy issues. The mechanics can be tinkered with, although it’s not necessary in order for him to be successful, it doesn’t hinder him to such a degree that’s it detrimental to his play. The accuracy can also be coached up, it’s just a matter of philosophically figuring out where the problem is coming from & providing a remedy to it. Is it mental, physical, or just simply a byproduct of mediocre play calling? Those are questions that will be answered by the staff’s eval of him in practices.
I personally think he’s far better than every QB we currently have on the roster. Is he good enough to lead us to a 10-win season with him being the main catalyst of the Offense? No. The adage of “we’re a QB away..” doesn’t ring true in this instance, he doesn’t appear to be that QB as of yet. But is he terrible & can cost us games like TVD did last year? I would say no as of now, but who knows how that turns out.
The biggest question will be for Mario & Dawson; What is our Offensive identity? Are we a run-game focal point team, or are we going to Air it out? Most would probably say “balance”, but balance IMO isn’t what people think it is. Meaning being 50/50 run-pass is counterproductive on its face because playing to ratios completely leaves out the unfactored in variables that can happen from game to game. I think Counterpunch is a more apt description than balance, meaning what’s your counterpunch when the Defense takes away one aspect of your Offense. The answer to this primary question about Offensive identity will be the tale of this kid’s success or failure at Miami.
I don’t have a problem with the take. Obviously, he’s not Cam Ward, but at this juncture this is the best we can do & he IMO is a far better pure passer of the ball than JBrown, Emory or Judd. If we plan on bringing in another Portal QB (which I doubt happens), we’ll see how the competition shakes out in Spring & Fall, but if we’re unable to land anyone else I’m good with Poff being the lead guy this year.
He’ll be playing behind the best line he’s ever played in his career, so maybe that helps with his accuracy & boosts his ability even more, we’ll have to see how that plays out. But the acquisition of another WR out the Portal would do wonders to help surround this kid with as many weapons as possible. I don’t think he’s a elevating factor that can carry this team on his own, but he’s good enough that he can be added to the rest of the pieces to make for a viable enough Offense that can keep us in games & give a chance.
I don’t see the lofty Baker Mayfield comp; he reminds me of Nick Mullens who Dawson coached at Southern Miss. very similar play style & arm talent.
