A Diamond in the Rough? Taylor Heinicke's Unique Path to NFL Relevance
 |
| Taylor Heinicke suited up for the Washington Football Team in their Wild Card matchup with the Buccaneers. |
Oh, 2021. I thought you'd be different. I thought that all of the oddities and anomalies that so characterized these past twelve months were going to give way to some semblance of sense and order. I'm not going to lie; life has felt like a stretched out Rick Astley song these past few months with the unexpected becoming the expected and the world continually Rick-Rolling us for NO. GOOD. REASON. Fool that I am, I began to hope that perhaps things would start making a little bit more sense. Up would be up, down would be down, and NFL career backup quarterbacks, undrafted ones at that, would fold under the pressure on the sport's biggest stage: primetime playoff football. It's an outcome that you would expect, a conclusion that nobody would be surprised by, and yet, here we are, making sense of a surprisingly competent performance by Taylor Heinicke who was thrust into the limelight as the Washington Football Team's starting quarterback in their Wild Card match-up with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Despite a final score of 31-23 in favor of the Buccaneers, the biggest quarterback story of the night wasn't Tom Brady leading the Bucs to their first playoff win since 2002, it wasn't the fact that Tom Brady has now beaten more teams in NFL history (17) than any other quarterback has playoff wins (Joe Montana at 16), and it even wasn't the fact that Tom Brady no doubt has a rapidly aging and deteriorating painting of himself stowed away in the attic of his home whilst his "mortal", physical body remains ageless, as evidenced by perhaps the most bewildering side-by-side comparison ever posted in game. No, the biggest QB story of tonight's game was undoubtedly Heinicke's performance. In his first playoff appearance (and second career start), Heinicke put up a stat-line of 26-for-44 passing, going for 306 yards with a touchdown and an interception through the air, while also posting six rushes for 46 yards and a score on the ground. Pretty remarkable against one of the NFL's top-10 defenses. Even more remarkable given the fact that Heinicke was essentially out of football in 2019 when he served as the backup quarterback for the St. Louis BattleHawks of the XFL in a season in which he didn't appear in a single game. The last time we saw Heinicke on a professional football field, he was serving in relief of an injured Cam Newton for the Carolina Panthers in 2018, a stretch which saw him start a Week 16 game and go 33-for-53 for 274 yards, a touchdown, three interceptions, and an elbow injury that would prematurely end his season. In an ironic twist of fate, Heinicke would be replaced by Kyle Allen for Week 17 of that season only for Heinicke to ultimately replace Kyle Allen in 2020 for the Washington Football Team for whom Allen had served as the starter for four games before suffering a season ending leg injury earlier this year. Like I said, 2020 has been full of quirks and oddities.
Nevertheless, it was an impressive turn for Taylor Heinicke particularly given that he would play much of the fourth quarter injured (he'd put up almost one hundred yards passing and a touchdown upon returning to the game) and, while he was practicing with the first-team offense for much of this past week, I'm sure many in the Washington organization were hoping veteran stalwart Alex Smith would be able to lace up his cleats for tonight's game. Smith, on the heels of his remarkable comeback from what was a career-threatening, nay, a life threatening injury these past few seasons, led Washington to a 5-1 record once he took over as the starter, but would ultimately be ruled out with lingering calf issues sustained from the team's Week 14 game against the San Francisco 49ers, thus forcing Heinicke to suit up.
While Heinicke's success certainly was surprising given these circumstances, it's important to remember that every NFL player was, at some point, considered to be one of the top players in the country and Heinicke was no exception. Taylor Heinicke entered the league in 2015 as an undrafted rookie out of Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, where he helped the Monarchs transition from the FCS to the FBS in 2013. Over his four years at ODU, Heinicke put up almost 15,000 yards passing, over 1,300 yards rushing, and was responsible for 154 total touchdowns (132 passing, 22 rushing). Of particular note was his freshman year in 2011 when he put up a 25:1 touchdown-to-interception rate and helped lead ODU to a top-10 ranking in the FCS. In his encore season, he passed for over 5,000 yards and forty-four touchdowns. In a September 22nd game against New Hampshire, Heinicke threw for an NCAA record 730 yards and five touchdowns. As a junior and senior, Heinicke put up 63 touchdowns while passing at a 66.7% completion rate. Very impressive to say the least.
Despite these gaudy numbers, Heinicke went undrafted. Why was this so? The fact that Heinicke did the majority of his statistical damage against FCS competition is partly to blame for his undrafted status (though, he was perfectly serviceable in 2014 in his senior season when his schedule consisted of games against NC State, Marshall, and a 9-5 Louisiana Tech team that blew out Illinois in the Heart of Dallas Bowl). Not exactly Murderer's Row, but still, those were legitimate FBS games. The bigger issue at hand is the fact that Heinicke clocks in at 6'0" and 215 pounds, measurements that hardly qualify him as the prototypical NFL quarterback. It's hard to make it in the NFL at quarterback if you can't see over the shoulders of your linemen and it's the NFL's preference for tall QBs that led Logan Thomas, Heinicke's tight-end for Saturday night's game, to be drafted in the fourth round as a quarterback out of Virginia Tech by the Arizona Cardinals. Never mind the fact that Logan Thomas would have trouble hitting water if he fell out of a boat; the NFL loves tall quarterbacks who can throw the ball a mile so we saw guys like Thomas, Zach Mettenberger, Blake Bortles, and Garrett Gilbert all get drafted in place of Heinicke in the 2014 NFL Draft, despite much less productive collegiate careers. That being said, it is Heinicke who will be the subject of headlines going into Sunday's slate of games.
It wasn't an ideal situation for a 7-9 Washington Football Team to be in; indeed, their ability to win and be competitive in games this season seemed to be largely in part due to Alex Smith's leadership and the competitive edge he brought to the field. However, you have to imagine that the powers that be in Washington are thrilled with Heinicke's performance and, given tonight's results (and a growing trend in the league to buy into the value and production of undersized quarterbacks), it's clear that Taylor Heinicke has proven that he belongs in the NFL, perhaps not as a long-term starter, but most definitely on a roster somewhere where he can compete for a back-up spot.
Image courtesy of NFL.com.
Comments
Post a Comment