Arizona Cardinals quarterback Kyler Murray’s second season was fantastic. He improved in pretty much every offensive category. According to Touchdown Wire’s Doug Farrar, he was the league’s best quarterback at one particular throw.
He was No. 1 on throws from a three-step drop.
Murray showed more improvement than he was generally given credit for in his second NFL season, showing upticks in completion rate, touchdown percentage, Adjusted Net Yards per Pass Attempt, and a serious decline in sacks. Murray learned to a point to let the play play out before getting frenetic in the pocket, which certainly helped. Something else that helped was his efficiency on three-step drop throws — he completed 122 of 174 such throws for 1,426 yards, 912 yards, 14 touchdowns, three interceptions and just seven sacks. Murray’s 114.3 quarterback rating on three-step throws was the league’s highest, which put him first here over Ben Roethlisberger, who led the league with 331 three-step drops and threw 23 touchdown passes, but also had six interceptions.
Murray made much better decisions in 2020. His performance on the short drops are evidence of this. He knew where to go with the call and got rid of it. He did a lot less second-guessing and running around trying to wait for a play to emerge.
As a result, he was sacked far less and the Cardinals’ offense was better.
In 2021, he needs to make improvements with other throws. He doesn’t need to be the No. 1 passer at multiple throws, but he just needs to improve in each category and he will be a great passer next season.
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