Did an all-22 review for Williams and Daniels, waiting on the Nix game to become available. So far look pretty much like my college scouting report, though Williams worse than expected and Daniels slightly better, maybe.
Pre-Draft Concerns were Williams height, his lack of processing ability, his fear of being hit in the pocket, his Mahomes lite playmaking translating to the NFL and his really bad deep ball. Positives, has a great arm, has some really nice throws. Upside of Trevor Lawrence mid-tier second contract QB and with bust potential on the downside. I wagered on arm talent making him a 2nd contract QB but a 15-20 mid level NFL QB.
Pre-Draft Concerns for Daniels: Age, Arm strength, won't throw tight windows or over the middle, first read and runs a lot. Bad Deep ball and weirdly bad on short throws. Positives, elite runner and that almost always translates to NFL, FYI second to Daniels in EPA per scramble last year was Drake Maye, that will translate for him as well. Daniels, I suspected would be the best rookie QB But once teams figured out his throwing limitations, they'd take away his running and he'll not get a 2nd contract. 1 year wonder?
For the most part my review of game 1 lines up with those college tape analysis pretty well. I was surprised at Williams erratic accuracy on non-deep balls, still terrible with the deep ball in game 1 but had some really bad other throws, but also had a few perfectly placed balls, and had 2 drops that hurt him. Multiple batted balls so height or height plus arm slot could be an issue. Williams just seems to have trouble past first read, always worried about pressure. He needs to calm down and go thru reads but not sure he has the mind for it, seems incredibly slow getting off first read, makes some bad decisions. He was way off target on several mid throws, was kind of shocking as this was his strength, he did those in college, wonder if its 1 game jitters or a recurring problem. I think he'll get better at this.
The Commanders line stinks, they have OK WR's at best and not sure OC is any good. Daniels is playing with much less than Williams. However, a common note I made over and over: had open guy or multiple open guys and did not throw it for some reason, looked to run instead. 1 scramble I counted 4 possible throws he could have made. He made a real good throw on a slant in the red zone, probably his best pass. Deep ball still was bad like in college, not even close most of the time. First throw to flat was behind RB and became a lateral almost fumble, had 1 other bad short throw to flat, continues odd trends in college of missing easy short throw too often. He faced a ton of pressure but made bad reads many times, his feet make up for some of those. I'd like to see him on a good team, Washington stinks. The runs are elite, as expected, played like a rookie but at his age and draft position he should process better, see open guys and make easy throws, all things he struggled with.
Interesting to see how they are 10 weeks down the road. I think they are realizing NFL defenses are a bit different than what they faced in college. See if they can adjust as the game hopefully slows down for them. Best way to improve is playing, we will see if it pays off in a couple months or if the negatives in college are too much to overcome. There are flashes there but way too many negatives to feel confident about them today.
