Locked On Patriots - Daily Podcast On The New England Patriots - Locked On Patriots February 27, 2019 - Nick Mullens?

Episode Date: February 27, 2019

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Hey there everybody, welcome on in to a Wednesday installment of the Locked On Patriots podcast. Mark Schofield back in the big chair for today, Wednesday, February 27th. What are we going to do today? We're going to take everything I've been talking about in the past couple of weeks, about quarterbacks and the draft class and Brett Rippin and all of that, and we're just going to throw it out the window. Because what if I told you that there was a quarterback that's currently in the NFL that might be a very good scheme fit for what the New England Patriots do, and because of the depth his team has at the quarterback position, there is a possibility that he could

be available. And better yet, he's currently on a team that the New England Patriots have dealt with in the past. So today we're going to be talking about Nick Mullins, San Francisco 49ers quarterback who kind of caught the football world by surprise last season when Jimmy G went down. He stepped in for Beathard after Beathard got dinged a little bit and had a fantastic, relatively speaking, close to the season. I re-watched his games from last year, yesterday, last night, a little bit this morning as well, and came away pretty impressed with a number of his traits that I think would translate to the Patriots. So we're going to dive into that in a second.

But before we do, a reminder to follow me on Twitter at Mark Schofield. You can check out the work at places like InsideThePylon.com, Pro Football Weekly. The Score, Matt Waldman's rookie scouting portfolio, Big Blue View. Part of the SB Nation family of websites. As I've said before, friends, if there's an outlet cover in the game of football, odds are I'm doing some work for them. Let's talk about Nick Mullins because I want to do this from a strengths analysis and then a little bit later we'll talk about some weaknesses, some things he needs to clean up, and then finally we'll talk about the overall scheme fit and whether he might even be available. Now Mullins, he got his initial start in the NFL, in the National Football League,

on a Thursday night game when he went up against the Oakland Raiders. And if you were to just sort of watch that game and walk away, you might be sort of blown away with where he is as a quarterback. He went 16 of 22 for 262, so 72.7% completions, three touchdowns, no picks, averaging 11.9 yards per attempt, quarterback rated of 151.9, so a nearly perfect game, and that's not a bad way to start. Now, obviously, that was not the only game he played. Then they went through three straight losses. He had some struggles in back-to-back weeks against the Giants and Tampa Bay. Two pass defenses which were not great, but then he rebounded of sorts. They lost at Seattle

early in December. He went 30-48 for 4 for 14, two touchdowns, one pick. They lost 43-16. But then they had back-to-back wins against Denver, who was sort of in the playoff hunt around this time. And then Seattle, who ended up being a playoff team. They lost a tough one to Chicago, and then they lost on the final week of the season to the Rams. In a game in which he went 23-33 for 282, three touchdowns, three picks.

And so he's a fascinating study for a number of reasons. Let's sort of talk about his strengths as a passer. And I want to start with process and speed. Now, there are some deficiencies in this area, which we will get to. But one of the things that he does very well as a quarterback is sort of identifying man versus zone and then knowing where to go with the football or where to look first. And that is, in many cases, job one for a quarterback. And we have talked at length here on this show about how Josh McDaniel structures things for his quarterback to give his quarterback a bit of help

and to sort of allow him to decipher man versus zone. And he uses motion as a big part of that. And Kyle Shanahan does that as well. You will see a lot of pre-snap movement. And if you read his playbook, almost every single pass and concept series has an example of using motion and incorporating motion into a play call. And again, it helps the quarterback. For example, here's a play call from Shanahan's playbook, just to give you a flavor of it. This is F fly to speed right, three scat, H choice ninja. Now, the F fly to speed right, that sends the F receiver in motion

from right to left, sending up a trips left with a tight end to the right. One of the weird things about Shanahan's sort of naming conventions is the right or left always follows the tight end. So even though speed right is the formation, you know, you would think, oh, right, so you're going to have three receivers on the right, or that's where the bulk of the people are going to be. No, that means that you end up with the tight end in line on the right with a running back shaded to the right. This is shotgun formation and trips to the left. So F fly to speed right means that that F receiver starts on the right, comes in motion, and he sets up when the play begins. He's the middle receiver and trips to the left. So F, fly, two speed right, three scat. That's the protection.

H, choice. This is the first name in convention. The running back runs a choice route to the right. And then ninja means that gives you the rest of the pass routes. So you've got the outside receiver in the trips running the China route where he goes upfield, starts out right, then comes underneath. That receiver, F, fly, he comes across. He runs a deep dig route from the middle spot.

And then the inside trips receiver runs that same sort of China route. And then the tight end runs a flag, corner route. And then choice, that gives the H back out of the backfield an option to do one of like five different things. But built into the play is that F fly, that motion. So Shanahan does the same stuff using motion. That's just a super nerdy way to talk about that for a second. Mullins in those sort of, you know, motion moments does a good job of taking the help that he gets from his coach, deciphering it quickly and making a quick throw. For example, a play against Oakland in his first start. It's a third and six play with one 10 left in the first half.

They show cover two. The defense does. They rotate it to a cover one blitz. They have motion pre-snap, so he knows it's man coverage, even though you get the two high safeties and you might be thinking cover two zone. Even though they don't rotate, the motion tells him it's going to be man.

They do blitz. He knows exactly where to go with the football, replaces the blitz with the ball. It's a great play, great read, great throw. And one of those moments that we've seen with Tom Brady, where he gets that pre-snap indicator and knows where to go with the football. But even when he doesn't get that sort of pre-snap indicator, he's pretty good at deciphering right away man versus zone and then know where to go to the football.

For example, his game in Week 17, they opened with a slant-flat concept sort of weak side to the running back and the X receiver. And there's no motion pre-snap, but he knows immediately after the snap that it is man coverage, so he knows right where to go with the football. So that's one of the things I do like with him from a process and speed standpoint, sort of deciphering man versus zone. His ball placement in the short area, intermediate area

as well, is generally on point. I like where he puts the football. I like his accuracy and ball placement in the short areas of the field. That obviously, as we're going to talk about in a bit, fits with what New England does. So that's something I like with him. Also, the quick release. And when the 49ers traded for Jimmy Garoppolo, one of the things that they liked about him, one of Garoppolo's strengths as a quarterback, is that same sort of quick release. And so his ability to sort of get the ball out of his hand quickly, mechanically speaking,

is a good thing. He's got good lower body footwork as well. We will talk about one of the aspects to his throw in motion and his mechanics that does irk me a bit. As we talked about with that first play, I love the way that he sort of attacks the blitz. He's very good at replacing the blitz with the ball. You know, his film is sort of littered with moments like that where he sees a blitz, whether it's from a linebacker or something like that, or even on the outside where he sees it and sort of replaces it with the ball.

For example, against Seattle in Week 15, there's a play early in the second quarter, a third and seven deep in their own territory or on their own five where they have a three-receiver look to the right. The corner over the middle receiver blitzes they run the ohio concept so it's an out route from the outside i mean excuse me a vertical route from the outside receiver that slot receiver who's against the blitz he runs that out route now the safety has to work down from a too high look to cover that out he deciphers that immediately goes right to that out route for the first down with a beautifully placed throw. This is a left hash mark to right sideline throw, so he checks

that sort of arm strength in the short area, blocks nicely, but also checks that, you know, attack in the blitz type of situation. Does that as well, which is something I really like with him. He's very good at sort of replacing the blitz with the ball. Another thing he's very good at, timing and rhythm throws. And this is one example, but those timing and rhythm out routes, whether it's that Ohio concept, which they run a lot, Y-sail with the tight end runs that deep out and the outside receiver runs the vertical route to clear that out. Very good timing and rhythm based passer. And that's something we talk about a lot when it comes to the New England Patriots and finally and this is the thing that might have had me most excited about him as a passer his ability to manipulate underneath defenders with his eyes and yes we all know the easy examples

moving that free safety on the vertical route moving them to one and then throwing the other but I like his ability to work against underneath defenders, particularly when he can get that underneath defender out of position. A great example of this comes to us from that first game against Oakland. There are a number of examples. I'll just highlight this one here on this show. There's a second and 12 play early in the third quarter. They are empty, so you've got three receivers to one side, two to the other. What you want to do here is move that linebacker, if you can, away from the three receiver side. That Mike linebacker is going to open his hips to that three receiver side.

That's the numbers game that the defense has to play. But here, he uses his eyes. He moves him away from the three receiver side to the two receiver side, he uses his eyes. He moves him away from the three-receiver side to the two-receiver side, gets him to take a couple of steps away from that inside number three receiver, and then throws that slant route to him. I've talked about it with Brady. I've talked about it with other quarterbacks. But as a quarterback, anytime you can get a defender to do what he's not supposed to do with your eyes, anytime you can get a defender to ignore what he's not supposed to do with your eyes. Anytime you can get a defender to ignore what he's been taught,

and in that split second, ignore his linebacker's coach, his defensive coordinator yelling at him since the start of training camp, open to number three. If you can get him to ignore that advice, you've done your job as a quarterback. Mullins does it there. His film is just replete with examples of him particularly moving underneath defenders with his eyes. So I love him sort of from a manipulation standpoint. Up next, we're going to talk about the things I'd like to

see him clean up a bit. Some areas I think he could get better at. That's ahead on this Wednesday installment of Locked on Patriots. Mark Schofield back with you now on this Wednesday installment of Locked On Patriots. Mark Schofield back with you now on this Wednesday installment of the Locked On Patriots podcast. And I'm going to put together a piece. I don't know where I'm going to put it yet on Nick Mullins. So hopefully by the time you're listening to this or shortly thereafter, you will have a piece on him, whether it's an ITP or Matt Waldman site or somewhere else on Nick Mullins, whether just a basic scouting report or a more Patriots-specific one.

I'll tweet that out as well so you can check that out. Also, just so you know, what else is coming up the rest of this week? Thursday's show is a Take Thursday show. We're going to be joined by Shane Alexander of Inside the Pylon. Shane and I go way back. We're going to work through some potential options for the New England Patriots via free agency in the draft. We might even talk a little bit about Nick Mullins. Then Friday

is the last Friday off until after the draft. We are back post-combined to five shows a week. Oy, that's going to be super duper duper fun. Back at it, baby. For the love. Nothing but love for the listeners, baby.

Alright, let's talk about Nick Mullins from a sort of weaknesses standpoint. And there are some things that he needs to get better at. I think one of the things that he does, and this is kind of a general criticism, and it might be in part because of who he was throwing to when he often did this, but he would force throws at times into coverage. Generally, he would do that in the direction of George Kittle. And when you have a weapon such as a George Kittle, you want to obviously get him the football as much as you can,

particularly down the stretch when he's trying to set records and things like that. So I sort of understand it. But, for example, there was a really bad interception, and I talked about this before the Super Bowl when I broke down the Rams and their interceptions as a defense last year looking ahead to the Super Bowl itself. But he forced a throw in the red zone to Kittle, basically into triple coverage, and you can't do that.

You just can't do it. And so force and throws is an area of concern that I have with him. There's a minor mechanical thing that is something that I always pick up on and it irks me when I see quarterbacks do it. And I don't even know if it truly matters that much because he still has that quick release, but I cover these guys head to toe. So I got to mention it. He burps the baby. And it's this little tick sometimes that quarterbacks have. Right before they start their throw in motion, they'll pat the ball with the offhand, just a quick little pat, and then they'll start to throw.

And I don't know why some quarterbacks do that. I never did it. Maybe I should have. Maybe it would have made me better. I don't know. I would have tried anything if somebody had told me about it but it does sort of trigger the minds of the

defenders to break on the ball, right? Think about it, you're a cover three corner and you've got a guy running a comeback route in front of you you've got no safety help over the top so you've got to stay over the top of that vertical route you don't want to get beat on a double move so you're dropping, you're dropping, you're giving that cushion you see the corner

route develop in front of either wide receiver starts to break back towards the outside but you're wondering if this is a double move or not then you see that QB burp the baby because remember if you're in zone you're sort of keeping your eyes on the quarterback as well if you see that you know he's throwing so you start driving downhill on it and chances are you might drive to the ball make a play one of his interceptions came on such a play against the giants it was a week 10 play where he went through multiple reads and we're going to talk about that in a second too and he's working through his reads he checks a dig he checks the fullback in the flat then he throws late to a comeback route and he burps that baby and the corner drives he clicks and drives on that once

he sees that and he gets a hand in there at the catch point he doesn't make the interception but he deflects the ball and the linebacker peeling off the fullback in the flat is able to snare it for an interception and so that's an example of how burping the baby can lead to problems for a quarterback. You know, it's not a fatal thing. It's not something I think is going to prevent him from being, you know, a great quarterback or a good quarterback or developing, but it's one of those things that you see from a quarterback. One of those things that I, maybe it's a pet peeve of mine, I don't know. But when I see it, I get worried about that quarterback

and his ability to sort of make those throws from the pocket and how he might lead defenders to the football with that little mannerism. And I'm working my way, I pulled up this play right now to watch it, and again, you see him, He's working through the reads. He has that last second pat before he throws, and it allows the defensive back to break on the ball. And so it is something to consider and to think about and something I think that he will need to clean up as a passer.

Another thing to talk about, just briefly, because, again, I'm not Mr. Arm Talent or Velocity, but upper-end velocity might be a bit lacking some throws more downfield hunt a bit sometimes he has to put a little bit more touch on throws he can't really drive the ball vertically 25 yards or more downfield on a line those need some more touch he had a couple throws wide throwbacks and other designs where the ball hung up a bit. And as a result, you know, they missed potential huge plays. They were just big plays like gains of 25, 30, 35 yards that could have been touchdowns.

You know, if he's able to throw it out there and lead the receiver a bit. And these were throws made from a clean pocket. And so you wonder a bit about upper end velocity. Maybe that's more of a scheme fit question. And if you're listening to the show, you probably understand that the Patriots aren't a vertical based offense right now. But if you're thinking about a life after Tom Brady and potentially Nick Mullen's taken over, you know, you might realize that you would still be that kind of offense that you

are now. You wouldn't be able to sort of expand the playbook that much. He can still make downfield throws. It's not, again, it's not a bar to him doing that. It doesn't prevent him from doing that, but you have to understand and incorporate what he can do as a passer. So you might have to have some reasonable expectations of what you might get out of the vertical passing game. Now, if there is an area that I have the most concern with, it is this. It is process and speed work into that second concept. And here's what I mean by that. He can make full field reads. And a lot of Shanahan's plays, reading his playbook,

spent a lot of time the past couple of nights reading that playbook, you've got five reads, full field reads on a given play. And sometimes they are of the half field, two concept variety. For example, go back to that H choice ninja play we were just talking about, right? What you've basically got on that design are two half field reads. You've got the choice route. You've got that flag over the top of it, that corner route from Y. And then you've also got to the backside of that play, that ninja concept. Now, on that design, this is a four-receiver progression.

And the progression works as follows. You're going to take an alert. You're going to peak that flag route. So we'll call it four and a half, okay? Because you're going to peak that flag route. It's an alert route where if you get a bust, a coverage, or a guy falls down or something, if that guy just wins that matchup off the ball, if you get a favorable matchup and he's open right away, you throw it. So it's one of those peak routes.

But you come off of that quickly. And your first read is that choice route from the running back. So on that play, F fly to speed right, 3 scat, H choice, ninja. Again, nerdy football stuff. You're going to have that corner route from the tight end on the right deep and then that choice route from the back out of the backfield. He could break out to the flat. He could run a deeper out route. He could run an angle route. He could run more of a deeper slant route. He could curl up. He's got like five different things that he could do on that.

And so you're going to peak that corner out. You're going to come to that choice from the running back. Now, if those are all covered, then you work back to your left and you are working the dig from the middle receiver, that F receiver that's coming motion across the formation. That's a 12 to 14 yard dig route working left to over the middle. Then the inside China route, which is that four to six yards, break out and come back under. And then outside to the outside receiver

on his China route. Up, out, break back in, all at 4-6. And so again, that all happens in like 2 seconds, 2-3 seconds as a quarterback. Again, you want to play quarterback in the NFL? You want to play quarterback anywhere? These are the kinds of things you

got to do in like three seconds. It just took me two minutes to talk about it. When he struggles from a processing standpoint, it is when that first concept is covered and he has to work back to the second concept. And so using this play again as an example, F fly to speed right, three scat, H choice ninja. He will look at that

corner route from the tight end, then read that choice route. And if those are covered, it's when his eyes have to work back to the other side, into the second concept, so to speak. Now that ninja concept with that dig in those two China routes, that's when the process and speed is slow. And sometimes you will see him, even if one of those routes is open, double or triple clutch on it before he gets it out. And so that's where he needs to get faster as a quarterback. It isn't that he can't make full field reads or that he can't go through full field progression,

four or five receiver progression type things, as we're talking about here with this play. But he just needs to get faster at doing it. And that might be a thing that comes with time. Look, he's making his first bunch of starts. He's a quarterback in his first season. And so you've got to understand that it's going to take some time for him to sort of speed up that part of his game. And so you have to have some reasonable expectations. And so those are some of the areas I need to see him sort of clean up, some of the concerns I have with him on film.

Now the big question, the scheme fit one and the availability one. We'll talk about those to close out this Wednesday installment of Locked on Patriots. Mark Schofield back with you now to close out this Wednesday installment of the Locked on Patriots. Mark Schofield back with you now to close out this Wednesday installment of the Locked on Patriots podcast. We are talking Nick Mullins, I guess you could call him the current starting quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers. But let's talk about the fact that he is one of three quarterbacks

they have on their roster. They've got Jimmy Garoppolo, who is their starter, and they have C.J. Beathard, who they drafted earlier than people expected. Maybe, and we'll talk about this more in the availability section, but maybe Beathard might be the quarterback that becomes available. Who knows? But there is potentially an opportunity here for the 49ers

to look to deal one of these quarterbacks. You know they're not going to trade Jimmy G. Anybody that wants to have that sort of dream scenario, there's probably some radio stations you can listen to, but let's face it, that's probably not happening. And so if a 49ers quarterback becomes available, it might be Mullins. Maybe it's more likely Beathard. I wanted to talk about Mullins. Let's analyze him from a scheme fit perspective before we get to whether he could be available.

And his scheme fit in New England might be his ultimate strength when you're evaluating him from a New England Patriots perspective through Patriots colored glasses. because all of the things that Shanahan does schematically, his playbook, there are concepts that you can pull up a recent Patriots playbook, put it side by side, and you see, oh man, there's a lot of similarity here. And spoiler alert, it's kind of that way for a lot of NFL teams. Somebody like me that spends so much time talking about schemes and stuff and how offensive coordinators and head coaches and stuff can be so creative there's a lot of overlap every team has a three-level stretch every team has a mesh concept every team has a four vertical series like there are concepts right now that all teams use and so it makes it interesting come sort of evaluation season

when you talk about the draft and thinking about scheme fits for quarterbacks well most teams run a bunch of the same stuff you know so there is that aspect to it but there is a lot that is similar from these two playbooks and these two you know shanahan and josh mcdaniels they do a lot of things similar as play callers using motion and movement and things like that so the scheme fit might be his ultimate strength when you look at him potentially coming to New England. You know, and that being said, when you talk about his strengths as a passer, manipulation, attack in the blitz, quick release, timing and rhythm, deciphering man versus zone, ball placement in the short and intermediate areas of the field, does that sound like a quarterback that, I don't know,

you might have been watching for the past nearly two decades? And I am not making a one-to-one comparison of Nick Mullins is the next Tom Brady or anything like that. But it seems like the fence that the Patriots have started to value over the past two decades at the quarterback position, the strengths of Tom Brady as a passer, the quote-unquote non-negotiables, so to speak, those are things that Mullins can do,

and he showed you on tape in his first year starting games. And so his traits, his scheme fit experience, might make the ideal quarterback for the New England Patriots. And so perhaps that is his ultimate strength as a passer, as a potential acquisition, is that his trait base and his experience in this offense make him a great fit. Bigger question though, would he even be available now look this is a these are two teams that have dealt with each other before there's the jimmy g trade the trent brown trade you know these are teams that have some familiarity with each other and so could something happen

i think theoretically it could the issue becomes if you are the 49ers and you're looking, say, to perhaps move one of your quarterbacks, you know it's not going to be Jimmy G. Just again, throw that out the window, kids. You've got Nick Mullins on the quarterback for the 2019 season, right? Now, he was signed to a two-year deal September 26, 2018. He was on their practice squad. His salary last year, base salary of $480,000.

His salary for this upcoming season is $570,000. And, yeah, that's not a lot of money. Now, interestingly enough, CJ Beathard isn't really that much more. Beathard signed a four-year contract worth $3.5 million, $3.5 and change basically, on June 13th of 2017. His base salary that first year, $465,000 with a bonus of $176,000. That bumped up to $625,000 last year. It bumps to $785,000 next year. And it bumps to $946,000 for the 2020 season. And so what's interesting is that with Mullins, you've got to redo it. He becomes a free agent for the 2020 season,

so you'd have to have a new deal. Yeah, he's going to be cheaper in 2019 by about $215,000 than Beathard, but Beathard's still under contract for below a million dollars in 2020, whereas Mullins is now a free agent. And so if you're San Francisco, you might think that now he's an ERFA. You know, he's not even a restricted free agent. He's tighter than that. But you know you're going to have to do a new deal with him.

And so maybe because you'd have Beathard under contract for 2020, maybe the 49ers might find that more appealing to hold on to that guy because it gives you some more cap flexibility in 2020 than Mullins who you might have to negotiate a new deal with. And let's face it, Mullins looks pretty good right now. And if you're the 49ers and best case scenario for you is that Garoppolo comes back completely healthy and neither Mullins nor Beathard sees the field in 2019 then what do you got to work with when you're thinking about doing a new deal with Nick Mullins it's how great he played or how

good he played or how attractive he might have seemed when he played last season and so he might have seemed when he played last season. And so he might cost you more than Beathard. And so that is an interesting aspect to think about. Now, I'm going to put my Kyle Shanahan hat on for a second and say, I just saw what he can do. I've got a quarterback coming off of an ACL injury who also got hurt. Obviously, it was a different injury, but he also was hurt when he took over for Brady during Brady's suspension. I got to make sure I have a plan B and C again.

Because look, let's face it. If Garoppolo gets hurt again, maybe I want to go to Mullins instead. And so I'm not so sure he is available, but this would be the time, I think, if you're going to move Nick Mullins, you do it. From the 49ers' perspective, value's probably not going to get better if he doesn't play next season, and you've got that situation from your perspective

where, yeah, he's cheap in 2019, but you might have to re-sign him. So it's an interesting thing. What would I give up for him? Well, let's think about this for a second. Let's play sort of the if-or. Jarrett Stidham in the second round or a third-round pick for Nick Mullins?

I'm taking Mullins there. Brett Rippert in the third. Nick Mullins in the third. Probably going to take Mullins as much as I love Brett Rippon that's an interesting question one that I'll probably struggle with Mullins in the third, Rippon in the fourth

now I'm talking Brett Rippon Kyler Murray at 32 Nick Mullins for a third that's a really tough one and we'll leave that one for Shane Alexander because I don't want to answer that one right now but that will do it for today's show

like I said I will be back tomorrow with Shane we're going to work through some draft stuff some scenarios and things like that Shane's going to bring some takes always fun to talk with him and that will be off Friday then we are back to it post combine five shows a week gear it up right through the draft.

And then maybe I'm going to go sail around the world or something. I kid. I love you guys. Wouldn't do that. But until tomorrow, keep it locked right here to me, Mark Schofield, and Locked on Patriots. you