Allen is NOT inaccurate unless Baker, Lamar, Darnold, Rosen, 2017 Watson & 2016 Wentz are, too

[Alphadawg7]

2 hours ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

1) that was a lot of work so I salute you

 

Agreed.

 

2 hours ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

 

2) 49% in junior college, 56% in college, and 52% in the nfl.  When does the lack of accuracy ever become Allen’s fault?  I’m sorry but the guy is a top 10 pick and the highest drafted qb in Bills history.  At some point, can we stop blaming everyone else?

 

I get your point, but a LOT of context is being overlooked here in this comment though.

 

1.  Allen never committed to football in HS as he played multiple sports, which is why he didn’t get recruited.  

2.  Because of the above point, Allen never got high quality coaching comparative to the big schools and the NFL as he played JUCO then at Wyoming.

3.  Furthermore he never played with high quality talent.  People overlook the fact that Allen is the type of passer you really need skilled receivers to excel with because his arm is so strong and his style is very improvised because of his athletic ability.  

 

So I really don’t think it’s fair to Josh and his talents to blanket paint his comp% as an Achilles heal to the point that he may not be able to improve on.  He isn’t the same as some kid who came from a bigger school with high level coaching and fellow future NFL prospect receivers and OL around him.

 

2 hours ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

 

3) Barkley and Anderson, dime a dozen Street FAs, came off the street and both completed 60% of their passes with the same terrible wrs.  The 60% was higher than their career average.  

 

Thats not fair either.  

 

1.  You are comparing veterans to a rookie, they should always be able to have a higher comp % than a rookie just on their ability alone to read defenses.  If not, they really shouldn’t even be a backup in the NFL.

2.  They don’t even come close in the type of passes Allen attempts which are many more lower percentage downfield throws.  McD and Daboll were were substantially more aggressive in down field passing with Allen in the 2nd half the season.

3.  It was one game for Barkley, let’s not also over exaggerate it either and forget his whole career.  This is the NFL, even a backup can have a good game.  Nick Foles our dueled a 500 yard game by Brady in the SB last year, doesn’t make him better.  

 

2 hours ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

 

4) Eric Ebron was considered a bust in Detroit.  He gets with Luck and has a pro bowl season.  Did he suddenly get better?  Or does Luck throw a more catchable football?  This is a thing posters overlook.  As a receiver, you don’t always watch to catch a 95 mile per hour fastball.  This league is about touch.  What separates qbs like Mahomes and Allen, both who have rocket arms, is Mahomes has great touch on his passes.  Allen hasn’t shown that.

 

He was not considered a bust in Detroit.  He wasn’t prolific in the passing game, but he was a good TE while there overall.  The difference was in how he was used there and in Indy.  Your statement suggests he had a terrible catch rate and then suddenly didn’t in Indy given you are blaming the passer and “more catchable ball”.  He was used to a much higher degree as a passing weapon by Indy and more of a focal point.  In Detroit he was not used that way and his lower stats were not because the balls were less “catchable”.  

 

2 hours ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

 

allen is very exciting but the excuse making is getting old.  He isn’t that accurate.  Accept it.  He needs to improve.  Hopefully the regime that traded for Benjamin and Matthews and drafted Zay over JuJu And Kupp (plus the 2 undersized guys that weren’t good this year) will suddenly figure out how to evaluate wrs.  But no matter how many excuses you make, 52% is terrible. 

 

Already showed why your accuracy comment isn’t a fair statement.  Agree he is very exciting.

 

But this “regime” didn’t draft Zay over JuJu and Kupp.  Beane was not the GM and he is a key figure in today’s regime.  THIS regime has only been together one draft.  McD has been here 2 drafts and in that first draft all of their scouting and player evaluation in support of McD came from Whaleys staff.  And in that draft they got a pro bowl level DB and what looks to be a very good LB in Milano plus a solid OL in Dion who should bounce back this year with a new OL coach and better talent around him.  That’s a good draft for any GM when you land 3 key starters.  I will also add, Zay was widely considered the best WR on the board when we took him, not like it was a reach either.

 

Second draft with this current regime landed us 2 stud first round prospects that came into the NFL and showed why they were so highly ranked and that their potential is sky high.  They also landed quality DBs and found our best WR through UDFA.  2 years from now this draft could be looked at as one of the best by any team in a decade if Allen and Edmunds reach their potential.  

 

No Front office, GM, etc is ever going to bat a .1000 on drafting, so to focus on one pick that didn’t work out like it could have if they chose someone else is pointless.  It’s going to happen every single year on every single team where a player chosen later by someone else is going to out perform an earlier pick.  No team in history has landed what turned out to best available player still on board to come out of the draft at every selection.  You grade a draft by the entirety of the results, not one pick that could have worked out better.

[racketmaster]

And to add to this 3rd and long obvious passing situation, most quarterbacks don’t have Allen’s ability to stand tall in the pocket and deliver a high velocity throw into a tight window beyond the sticks. Many other quarterbacks also don’t have Allen’s ability to extend a passing play and run or pass for the first down on 3rd and long. For the first time in a long time, I actually have some confidence that the Bills will pick up the first down on 3rd and long situations. In past years we would just hope for not turning it over and punting for better field position. 

[C.Biscuit97]

38 minutes ago, racketmaster said:

I watched a bunch of Carolina games this year and would be willing to bet his air yards went down from his early years. He was throwing a ton of check downs to McCaffery (the man has double digit targets seemingly every week). He also threw a bunch of short passes and wr screens to Samuel and Moore.  All 3 players are explosive with the ball in their hands and could make plays after the catch so the strategy makes sense. But the amount of easy throws are what made his completion % sky rocket not that he became more accurate. And as you can see the increase in completion % did not cause them to be any better than they had before in terms of wins and losses. 

They were like 6-2 before the bottom fell out.  I think Cam’s shoulder killed their down field passing attack. 

[C.Biscuit97]

12 minutes ago, Alphadawg7 said:

 

Agreed.

 

 

I get your point, but a LOT of context is being overlooked here in this comment though.

 

1.  Allen never committed to football in HS as he played multiple sports, which is why he didn’t get recruited.  

2.  Because of the above point, Allen never got high quality coaching comparative to the big schools and the NFL as he played JUCO then at Wyoming.

3.  Furthermore he never played with high quality talent.  People overlook the fact that Allen is the type of passer you really need skilled receivers to excel with because his arm is so strong and his style is very improvised because of his athletic ability.  

 

So I really don’t think it’s fair to Josh and his talents to blanket paint his comp% as an Achilles heal to the point that he may not be able to improve on.  He isn’t the same as some kid who came from a bigger school with high level coaching and fellow future NFL prospect receivers and OL around him.

 

 

Thats not fair either.  

 

1.  You are comparing veterans to a rookie, they should always be able to have a higher comp % than a rookie just on their ability alone to read defenses.  If not, they really shouldn’t even be a backup in the NFL.

2.  They don’t even come close in the type of passes Allen attempts which are many more lower percentage downfield throws.  McD and Daboll were were substantially more aggressive in down field passing with Allen in the 2nd half the season.

3.  It was one game for Barkley, let’s not also over exaggerate it either and forget his whole career.  This is the NFL, even a backup can have a good game.  Nick Foles our dueled a 500 yard game by Brady in the SB last year, doesn’t make him better.  

 

 

He was not considered a bust in Detroit.  He wasn’t prolific in the passing game, but he was a good TE while there overall.  The difference was in how he was used there and in Indy.  Your statement suggests he had a terrible catch rate and then suddenly didn’t in Indy given you are blaming the passer and “more catchable ball”.  He was used to a much higher degree as a passing weapon by Indy and more of a focal point.  In Detroit he was not used that way and his lower stats were not because the balls were less “catchable”.  

 

 

Already showed why your accuracy comment isn’t a fair statement.  Agree he is very exciting.

 

But this “regime” didn’t draft Zay over JuJu and Kupp.  Beane was not the GM and he is a key figure in today’s regime.  THIS regime has only been together one draft.  McD has been here 2 drafts and in that first draft all of their scouting and player evaluation in support of McD came from Whaleys staff.  And in that draft they got a pro bowl level DB and what looks to be a very good LB in Milano plus a solid OL in Dion who should bounce back this year with a new OL coach and better talent around him.  That’s a good draft for any GM when you land 3 key starters.  I will also add, Zay was widely considered the best WR on the board when we took him, not like it was a reach either.

 

Second draft with this current regime landed us 2 stud first round prospects that came into the NFL and showed why they were so highly ranked and that their potential is sky high.  They also landed quality DBs and found our best WR through UDFA.  2 years from now this draft could be looked at as one of the best by any team in a decade if Allen and Edmunds reach their potential.  

 

No Front office, GM, etc is ever going to bat a .1000 on drafting, so to focus on one pick that didn’t work out like it could have if they chose someone else is pointless.  It’s going to happen every single year on every single team where a player chosen later by someone else is going to out perform an earlier pick.  No team in history has landed what turned out to best available player still on board to come out of the draft at every selection.  You grade a draft by the entirety of the results, not one pick that could have worked out better.

Always I respect your point of view. I responded to a bunch of this in the thread earlier.

 

i do think you are a lot more optimistic about this new regime and are hoping for the best, which I am too but I just see some major red flags.  Their ability to scout wrs has been horrible.  Their plan of going into the season with Peterman/ Allen was horrible.  The red flags on Allen, despite the fact he was definitely exciting to watch, were pretty consistent.  I worry that he will ever be a guy that can consistently win from the pocket.  The scrambles will take their toll and DCa have an offseason to gameplan on him.  I called this the Mike Vick syndrome.  Vick could light up the nfl for like 8 games and then with more film on him, he would struggle.

 

i didn’t like the Allen pick. I believe if he was on another team, we would be much more critical of him.  That said, hopefully they build the offense around him and figure out how to get some real playmakers.  I do believe we will have a good idea what we have by this time next year and if he isn’t the guy, there are some good prospects that will be out then.  Hopefully, he is.

[racketmaster]

1 minute ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

They were like 6-2 before the bottom fell out.  I think Cam’s shoulder killed their down field passing attack. 

The Bills have had a few hot starts as well before teams find their groove and the pretenders fall back to the pack. Again, Cam has been a pretty good qb and at times dominant. I just don’t see things getting better for him as time moves on. Some qbs get better with age and Cam appears to have just leveled off quickly and been negatively impacted by injury (mostly as a result of his physical play as he frequently takes on defenders and the collisions take a toll). If your pressing me on Allen having a career like Cam, here’s what I’d say: if Allen has the same career it would be a good pick and the Bills would have been relevant for a decade. But I am hoping for more from Allen. I hope that he can reach the Rivers Roethlisberger level where we have a very good qb for 15 years. And I want Allen to be a better leader on the team and be an example of that on the field of play. 

[Lieutenant Aldo Raine]

2 minutes ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

I didn’t like the Allen pick.  and you still don't!

 

[corta765]

This is one of the more impressive analysis I've seen recently great job.

[GoBills808]

And Cian Fahey is so bad at football. His takes are just consistent garbage. 

[C.Biscuit97]

3 minutes ago, racketmaster said:

The Bills have had a few hot starts as well before teams find their groove and the pretenders fall back to the pack. Again, Cam has been a pretty good qb and at times dominant. I just don’t see things getting better for him as time moves on. Some qbs get better with age and Cam appears to have just leveled off quickly and been negatively impacted by injury (mostly as a result of his physical play as he frequently takes on defenders and the collisions take a toll). If your pressing me on Allen having a career like Cam, here’s what I’d say: if Allen has the same career it would be a good pick and the Bills would have been relevant for a decade. But I am hoping for more from Allen. I hope that he can reach the Rivers Roethlisberger level where we have a very good qb for 15 years. And I want Allen to be a better leader on the team and be an example of that on the field of play. 

I just don’t think that fair to Allen.  That is complete projection on just potential but he’s never really had dominant performances consistently.  Newton has set records, won championships, MVPs/ Heisman, and went to a SB.  I really don’t see how Allen tops that.  That’s really, really good.

 

and I’d argue that Newton’s highs have been better than Rivers. 

5 minutes ago, Lieutenant Aldo Raine said:

 

I mean he still won’t be the guy I would have picked.  So I can’t just pretend like I love him.  But he has the right attitude and all the skills.  I just get sick of hoping all the potential comes together.  I also think we could have a better and successful OC for him but we will see.

[racketmaster]

11 minutes ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

I just don’t think that fair to Allen.  That is complete projection on just potential but he’s never really had dominant performances consistently.  Newton has set records, won championships, MVPs/ Heisman, and went to a SB.  I really don’t see how Allen tops that.  That’s really, really good.

 

and I’d argue that Newton’s highs have been better than Rivers. 

I mean he still won’t be the guy I would have picked.  So I can’t just pretend like I love him.  But he has the right attitude and all the skills.  I just get sick of hoping all the potential comes together.  I also think we could have a better and successful OC for him but we will see.

We took Allen at 7 overall because we thought he could be a high end franchise qb. Yes, expectations are high and that is part of the gig. I believe in Allen’s skill set (from athletic ability to mental makeup) as well as this regime to bring him along so my expectations are very high for Allen. There have been lots of great college qbs that have done nothing in the NFL so be careful taking college stats and expecting it to be a seemless transition to the NFL. 

[Over 29 years of fanhood]

Nothing to do at this point except let Josh's offseason of improvement take shape. 

 

His improvement will not be confined by projections.

 

He’s shown on any given play he can make the right read and can throw to every spot on the field within 70 yards.

 

He’s an elite athlete at QB. 

 

Let’s see him Live breath & eat football all off season, hit the weights and nutrition harder than ever, trust the front office to get explosive talent and upgraded linemen around him then let’s see where this thing goes.

[Sammy Watkins' Rib]

To hell with accuracy. If Allen can continue to take what the defense gives him with his legs he won't ever need to be a 60%+ completion guy. We can win with him at 58-59% completion. With that said, I don't think it is unreasonable to think he wont get to 60-62% if we dial back the long pass attempts a bit and he just progresses a little as he should with more experience. 

 

And how about this stat:

 

Allen 11 Games Started 2 4QC's 3 GWD's 7.1 ypr

Darnold 13 Games Started 1 4QC 1GWD 3.1ypr

 

One's a play maker and makes things happen. The other not as much. Darnold's actually not that bad. I think his one 4th QC was against us unfortunately and he did make a great play with his legs keeping the play alive. He does have some of that ability. But I don't think he will ever be on Allen's play making level. He won't put pressure on a defense like Allen will.

[dakrider]

If you go thru and look at those drops, many would have been huge plays.  Receivers have to be able to make plays in order for any passing game to be successful.  They have to be able to beat their defenders at times, and be able to make great catches at times.  Drops are inevitable, but shouldn't be a common occurrence like this.  Bills need to show less tolerance for this next year.  If a guy (say like Benjamin) can't produce after 3-4 games, then have to bite the bullet and cut him and bring in someone else.  

During the season and now the playoffs, everyone got to see what some great receivers can do.  Buts it been the other teams receivers doing it! 

[transplantbillsfan]

7 hours ago, Thurman#1 said:

You aren't debunking. You're disagreeing.

 

I do appreciate the effort. Impressive.

 

As you say, though, it's subjective. And your conclusions disagree with everyone else's. And we all know how you feel about Josh Allen (and Tyrod and another one or two before that). You are a huge fan, to the point of apparent wackiness at times, of whichever Bills QB is your fave.

 

As for your methodology, you again have the problem that you have showed over and over in your QB studies through the years. You give only your total conclusion, not breaking things down at all. I've pointed this out to you before, and you've simply ignored it each and every time, telling me it's not necessary to break things down. In fact, it's extremely necessary, because it means the only way to check your work is to exactly duplicate it and look at every play of the season. Effectively unrepeatable. 

 

Except of course by the experts and people who put in the effort because they're paid to do so. Those folks have already already done the same work, and as you yourself point out, they disagree with your conclusions.

 

If you'd broken it down, giving totals for each game for instance, it would've been easy for someone on these boards to check a game or two and see if your per game totals were on target. But as is your method, you don't provide details - no gross numbers, no game by game breakdowns, no nothing except your percentage conclusions - making checks all but impossible.

 

Thanks for the effort. If you'd given a reasonable chance to check, I'd have done so. But you never do, though I've asked before and it wouldn't have required much extra effort. It's not surprising you're not now.

 

Which leaves no choice but to point out that as you yourself point out, you're a huge Josh Allen fan and you're disagreeing with everyone else who did the work. Their work is just more believable, as they don't much care how the tallies come out.

 

I do admire - seriously - your willingness to put in this huge amount of work. As I said, very impressive.

 

As I've always done in the past, given overall conclusion and thoughts first, then more details after.  Here's the breakdown.

 

Josh Allen

Total passes: 320

Catchable passes: 232

Uncatchable passes: 63

Throwaway/Spikes: 23

Tipped/batted passes: 2

Interceptable passes: 26

 

Sam Darnold

Total passes: 414

Catchable passes: 311

Uncatchable passes: 57

Throwaway/Spikes: 23

Tipped/batted passes: 23

Interceptable passes: 44

 

Lamar Jackson

Total passes: 170

Catchable passes: 136

Uncatchable passes: 35

Throwaway/Spikes: 12

Tipped/batted passes: 16

Interceptable passes: 16

 

Baker Mayfield

Total passes: 486

Catchable passes: 360

Throwaway/Spikes: 16

Tipped/batted passes: 32

Interceptable passes: 36

 

Josh Rosen

Total passes: 265

Catchable passes: 86

Throwaway/Spikes: 23

Tipped/batted passes: 19

Interceptable passes: 34

 

 

I have game by game breakdowns for every QB.

 

Like for Allen, week 16 against the Pats:

 

Catchable passes: 9 (Foster slips on one of these attempts that I thought was catchable)

Uncatchable passes:7 (One of these is a back shoulder fade to Zay that he never turns for that I marked uncatchable)

Throwaways: 3 (one of these is the near Safety Allen escaped from and flipped the ball away to the sidelines)

 

Tipped/Batted passes: 0

Interceptable passes: 2

 

 

or week 17 for Allen:

 

Catchable passes: 18

 

Uncatchable passes: 6

 

Throwaways: 2  (one of these was thrown into the ground)

 

Tipped/batted passes: 0

 

Interceptable passes: 1

 

 

 

I have the numbers I came up with for every QB from every week, but rather than going to individual games, since it seems you have game pass, why don't you go through every pass from the season and see what numbers you come up with.  Websites like PFF and Fahey and the ilk that you seem to trust so much typically don't post game by game statistics, just overall findings, assuming--I guess--their audience will trust what they came up with as accurate or nearly accurate.  Count me as one now even more skeptical of findings like those.

 

 

[GoBills808]

2 hours ago, LSHMEAB said:

Risk taking is fine. Since this thread is predicated on sheer statistics, Allen's YPA is 6.5. Not very good. Now we can point to a whole host of "reasons" for that number, but it's an important statistic and something that needs to drastically improve even if you want to discount completion percentage.

 

If his YPA is up near 8 and his completion percentage is 58 percent, that argument will hold up.

If we're going to discount completion %, one idea would be to look at the yards/completion statistic. It would be instructive in this case because it's less an 'accuracy' metric than a measure (albeit imperfect) of efficiency. If we try to control for the nebulous 'accuracy' by removing completion percentage from the equation and then use YPA, you're still introducing the idea of completions/attempt (basically the idea behind YPA) as the standard...they're very closely related.

 

I will freely admit it's a very selective way of looking at it, but again: if we agree on removing the concept of completion% and looking at Allen from a pure 'what does he do on throws that are completions' viewpoint (which totally, totally removes completions%)...suddenly he's ranked 9th in the league among some notables like Mahomes, Goff, Rivers, and Wilson (also Fitz who was actually tearing it up to begin with, Mayfield, Watson, Winston, and Mullens round out the top 10)- bit of a strange list but interestingly all of them outside Allen were 90+ rating (and 6/10 were 100+ rating), 8/10 were 64% passers (Allen and Mayfield the outliers, and Mayfield was 63.8%). Basically, I think Allen's 2018 wasn't an easy one to analyze statistically. What I saw doesn't match the metrics showing him one of the worst QBs in the league, I have him in the 16-20 range.

[Big Turk]

4 hours ago, C.Biscuit97 said:

Love how you didn’t dispute one of my points.  Why are Anderson and Barkley, after like a week with the team, more “accurate” than Allen?  Or that having a rocket doesn’t mean you throw a catchable football?

 

if Allen was on any other team, we would laugh at him and wonder why a team took such an “inaccurate “ qb that high.  He seems like a hard worker and is very exciting.  But despite all the excuses, he is going to need to be a more accurate passer next year. 

More checkdowns and shorter passes. Many pass plays Allen didn't even have a checkdown to go to, his checkdown was to run. By design.  Same reason Cam Newton improved his completion percentage to 67% this year when his career average was 59%...107 completions to Christian McCaffery out of the backfield or split out running short passes will do that.

 

But the NFL Next Gen stats breakdown shows Allen really needs work on his throws to the right all all depths other than long...

 

Edited January 15, 2019 by matter2003

[Big Turk]

10 minutes ago, GoBills808 said:

If we're going to discount completion %, one idea would be to look at the yards/completion statistic. It would be instructive in this case because it's less an 'accuracy' metric than a measure (albeit imperfect) of efficiency. If we try to control for the nebulous 'accuracy' by removing completion percentage from the equation and then use YPA, you're still introducing the idea of completions/attempt (basically the idea behind YPA) as the standard...they're very closely related.

 

I will freely admit it's a very selective way of looking at it, but again: if we agree on removing the concept of completion% and looking at Allen from a pure 'what does he do on throws that are completions' viewpoint (which totally, totally removes completions%)...suddenly he's ranked 9th in the league among some notables like Mahomes, Goff, Rivers, and Wilson (also Fitz who was actually tearing it up to begin with, Mayfield, Watson, Winston, and Mullens round out the top 10)- bit of a strange list but interestingly all of them outside Allen were 90+ rating (and 6/10 were 100+ rating), 8/10 were 64% passers (Allen and Mayfield the outliers, and Mayfield was 63.8%). Basically, I think Allen's 2018 wasn't an easy one to analyze statistically. What I saw doesn't match the metrics showing him one of the worst QBs in the league, I have him in the 16-20 range.

 

I agree with this...I didn't see a QB who was wildly inaccurate...many of his passes hit guys right in the numbers.  Of course there were some that got away or that weren't accurate, and likely most were due to mechanical issues.  

 

Allen's depth of target was first in the NFL, meaning his average pass traveled the furthest.  Most guys with much higher accuracy rates were throwing an average pass 3-4 yards less than Allen was...that makes a big difference over the course of a season. 

[LSHMEAB]

22 minutes ago, GoBills808 said:

If we're going to discount completion %, one idea would be to look at the yards/completion statistic. It would be instructive in this case because it's less an 'accuracy' metric than a measure (albeit imperfect) of efficiency. If we try to control for the nebulous 'accuracy' by removing completion percentage from the equation and then use YPA, you're still introducing the idea of completions/attempt (basically the idea behind YPA) as the standard...they're very closely related.

 

That was precisely the point I was making. One of the "reasons" cited for Allen's poor completion percentage is his proclivity to throw the ball down the field.

 

If that's truly the case and he continues to look down the field, one metric that will need to improve is YPA. An example was cited where Allen is 1/2 for 10 yards(first down) and Mariotta is 2/2 for 10 yards(first down). I believe the example was used to discount completion percentage. If one is going to ascribe poor completion percentage to more aggressive throws, the quarterback making those throws will have to hit them with more regularity than the average QB. That is where YPA comes into play. 

Edited January 15, 2019 by LSHMEAB

[Big Turk]

1 hour ago, Sammy Watkins' Rib said:

To hell with accuracy. If Allen can continue to take what the defense gives him with his legs he won't ever need to be a 60%+ completion guy. We can win with him at 58-59% completion. With that said, I don't think it is unreasonable to think he wont get to 60-62% if we dial back the long pass attempts a bit and he just progresses a little as he should with more experience. 

 

And how about this stat:

 

Allen 11 Games Started 2 4QC's 3 GWD's 7.1 ypr

Darnold 13 Games Started 1 4QC 1GWD 3.1ypr

 

One's a play maker and makes things happen. The other not as much. Darnold's actually not that bad. I think his one 4th QC was against us unfortunately and he did make a great play with his legs keeping the play alive. He does have some of that ability. But I don't think he will ever be on Allen's play making level. He won't put pressure on a defense like Allen will.

Ironically Darnold's 1 4th Q comeback was against the Bills in Buffalo....

Edited January 15, 2019 by matter2003

[GoBills808]

1 minute ago, LSHMEAB said:

That was precisely the point I was making. One of the "reasons" cited for Allen's poor completion percentage is his proclivity to throw the ball down the field.

 

If that's truly the case and he continues to look down the field, one metric that will need to improve is YPA. An example was cited where Allen is 1/2 for 10 yards(first down) and Mariotta is 2/2 for 10 yards(first down). I believe the example was used to discount completion percentage. If one is going to ascribe poor completion percentage to more aggressive throws, the quarterback making those throws will have to hit them with more regularity than the average QB. That is where YPA comes into play. 

No. The example you used proves that you need to hit FEWER aggressive throws to be as productive, as does the YPC stat I mentioned. If you are hitting more aggressive throws at a completion percentage equivalent to a QB making safer (less productive) throws, there's no question as to who is the better QB at that point.