Redefining Arm Strength, Epilogue

Real quick today, I offer an article from Matt Bowen of the National Football Post that analyzes an 85-yard touchdown pass from Arkansas QB Ryan Mallett.

As soon as you read the phrase "85-yard touchdown pass", you probably imagined a deep bomb to a streaking wide receiver who'd gotten behind the defense, right? Nope. This article is actually an excellent example of how arm strength isn't all about distance, but about velocity and zipping the ball to an underneath receiver before the defender can get there. It's a throw that college QB prospects are required to make if they want any respect from scouts, because it's a throw that NFL teams use all the time. This, and not this, is the definition of "beating safeties deep". A strong arm can split apart even a fast, disciplined defense.

Enjoy Bowen's breakdown. Be warned, it's heavy on the X's and O's.)

Hawks and Hasselbeck: Half Seconds

It's believed that Matt Hasselbeck reinvented himself in 2010 as a vertical quarterback. He certainly looked more successful at the deep bomb from my armchair. It was no small task for him to accomplish this transformation, set at his feet by 2010 offensive coordinator Jeremy Bates. But Bates is now gone, leaving us to wonder what value that transformation will have going forward, and how complete it was.

Despite what some say about Darrell Bevell's predilection for the West Coast offense, Seattle's new OC comes from the Reid-Childress branch of the WCO that employs Desean Jackson and Sidney Rice. There's no reason to limit our expectations to a mostly short passing game of the kind Holmgren ran. There will be deep passes in Seattle in 2011, and Hasselbeck will indeed have value to the Seahawks if it can be proven that Bates' West Coast Recovery program has turned him into a deep-ball maestro.

Problem is, no successful quarterback in this league actually has the deep pass for his bread and butter. It is the velocity of the football on all manner of throws - short, intermediate, and long - that keeps the chains moving and the ball slicing past defenders. The Packers' game in particular is based on intermediate zip. Arm strength is not shown by distance; it's shown by velocity.

And by that definition, I'm not sure Hasselbeck has ever thrown a deep pass in his life.

Redefining Arm Strength

I have a female friend, 19 years old and a petite 110 pounds, whom I've seen throw a regulation football 30 yards' distance several times in a row and hit the same general area with good consistency.

According to some people's definition of a "deep ball", that makes my friend a pro quarterback prospect. Never mind that her delivery looks more like a pitcher's combined with the heel grab of a figure skater, and never mind the fact that her throws hang in the air long enough for most turtles to get under it from several feet away. For some, the distance a QB can throw is the only measure of arm strength - and the only point. If he can throw long, the thinking goes, then he can succeed in the NFL.

The major hole in this theory is that most defenses are thinking the same thing. And they've invented the safety position to compensate.