The Pittsburgh Steelers acquired tight end Vance McDonald in a Tuesday morning trade with the San Francisco 49ers and since that deal happened there’s been a lot of talk about his reliability as a pass catcher and especially when it comes to drops.
While Alex Kozora has already done a fine job of breaking down a lot of the good that comes along with McDonald, in this post, I’ll look at the 21 pass targets to him from last season that were incomplete.
Below is a video of all 21 incompleted targets thrown to McDonald last season and all are from the end zone view of the play. The table below is in chronological order for you to follow along with as well.
As you will see in the video, quite a few of those incompleted passes were a result of off-target by the 49ers quarterbacks. In fact, you can probably say that at least 13 of those incompleted throws were uncatchable and maybe even 14.
Now, one throw was undercut by a defensive back and intercepted while three others were broken up by defensive players and those should be easy to identify.
McDonald did indeed have a few bad drops last season. Three really noticeable drops and one that might be debated and that’s the one in the end zone against the Miami Dolphins. (see below)
If you consider that one a drop and I won’t hate you if you did, McDonald can probably be charged for four drops in 2016 on 45 total targets.
In a future post, I will look at McDonalds 2015 incompleted targets but wanted to start with his most recent season for obvious reasons.
| OPP | QRT | TIME | DWN | DIST | LOS | PLAY BY PLAY | BREAKDOWN |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rams | 3 | 11:08 | 1 | 10 | SFO 18 | Gabbert INC SR for Vance McDonald | Batted down at LOS |
| Panthers | 4 | 4:08 | 1 | 10 | SFO 25 | Gabbert INC DM for Vance McDonald | Dropped off fingertips MOF |
| Buccaneers | 4 | 14:12 | 1 | 10 | SFO 40 | Kaepernick INC DR for Vance McDonald | Wide throw outside to right |
| Buccaneers | 2 | 0:36 | 1 | 10 | SFO 38 | Kaepernick INC SR for Vance McDonald | Bad drop on in-breaking wide open route |
| Buccaneers | 2 | 7:44 | 2 | 13 | TAM 44 | Kaepernick INT DL for Vance McDonald | Undercut and intercepted by DB |
| Buccaneers | 2 | 9:38 | 2 | 7 | SFO 28 | Kaepernick INC SR for Vance McDonald | Pass broken up by DB |
| Buccaneers | 1 | 9:02 | 1 | 10 | 50 | Kaepernick INC SR for Vance McDonald | Overthrown deep pass to right almost picked |
| Saints | 4 | 6:17 | 3 | 5 | NOR 10 | Kaepernick INC SR for Vance McDonald | Throw behind MOF |
| Saints | 4 | 13:09 | 2 | 10 | SFO 25 | Kaepernick INC SM for Vance McDonald | Pass broken up by LB |
| Saints | 4 | 13:13 | 1 | 10 | SFO 25 | Kaepernick INC SM for Vance McDonald | Overthrown deep pass to right corner of EZ |
| Cardinals | 3 | 14:30 | 2 | 8 | SFO 27 | Kaepernick INC SM for Vance McDonald | Wide throw MOF |
| Cardinals | 2 | 2:00 | 2 | 8 | CRD 32 | Kaepernick INC SM for Vance McDonald | Pass broken up by DB |
| Patriots | 4 | 12:13 | 3 | 13 | SFO 27 | Kaepernick INC SL for Vance McDonald | Throw behind to right of MOF |
| Patriots | 4 | 13:02 | 1 | 10 | SFO 30 | Kaepernick INC DR for Vance McDonald | Overthrown deep pass to right |
| Patriots | 3 | 4:29 | 3 | 9 | NWE 45 | Kaepernick INC SR for Vance McDonald | Underthrown pass off back foot |
| Dolphins | 4 | 0:34 | 2 | 8 | MIA 44 | Kaepernick INC DR for Vance McDonald | Pass broken up MOF in EZ by DB |
| Dolphins | 4 | 11:22 | 1 | 10 | SFO 42 | Kaepernick INC SR for Vance McDonald | Overthrown short pass to right side |
| Dolphins | 2 | 1:07 | 2 | 9 | SFO 32 | Kaepernick INC SR for Vance McDonald | Wide throw MOF |
| Dolphins | 1 | 9:55 | 1 | 10 | MIA 11 | Kaepernick INC SM for Vance McDonald | Overthrown pass MOF |
| Bears | 4 | 12:07 | 3 | 10 | SFO 34 | Gabbert INC SR for Vance McDonald | Overthrown deep pass to right |
| Bears | 3 | 1:27 | 3 | 4 | SFO 21 | Kaepernick INC DR for Vance McDonald | Bad drop on in-breaking wide open route |
