Thornton had a good game yesterday, but he still is lacking in the fundamentals. I think yesterday was a damning indictment on Troy Brown. Thornton is still struggling with the basics that should have been coached to him.
In this play, Thornton is wide open running down the center of the field. Jones throws a ball to hit him in stride. But Thornton slowed up and turned around. He slowed down too much and had to make a circus catch which made him fall to the ground and not get any yards after the catch. If he just kept running, and even if he had to turn around to catch the ball, it would have been likely a TD rather than just a big gain.
In this play, he doesn't have awareness of the sidelines and gets lucky that the review could not definitively determine when he got possession. He is running parallel with the sidelines. Yes, the ball is slightly overthrown, but still catchable. But when he catches the ball, he turn his body towards the sidelines and has no awareness to even try to drag that back foot. He should have not turn his body at all and tried to recover and run down the sidelines. Or at the very least tried to drag the back foot.
Then there was the pass in the back of the end zone where he steps out of bounds. Yes, wasn't the best pass, but he needed to have awareness of where the back of the end zone was and looked to step out of bounds even before he struggled to catch the ball.
One other thing is he seems to make some easy catches look tough. Last week on the one he dropped, he dove for the ball while he could have easily tried to catch it in stride. Both the videos here he seems to lose control on each catch. Neither were easy catches (the second was because of his own doing), but good and great receivers are more in control of their bodies. That isn't coachable, but hopefully can be corrected with him doing offseason strength and conditioning.
Again, yesterday was a good day for Thornton, but it could have been a great day. All the talk about coaching letting Mac Jones down, I think Thornton has been let down by coaching just as much. Someone should be working with this guy to learn how to work the sidelines. Same with teaching him when he has a free release like that not to slow down and turn around.
I don't mean to trash the guy in arguably the best game of his young career, but I think the guy has far more potential if he is coached better and he gets stronger and has more control of his body.