Air yards are an increasingly important factor in today’s NFL, and I wanted to look at and provide data on quarterback Kenny Pickett’s rookie year for the Pittsburgh Steelers in this regard. Those of us who watched how the 2022 season unfolded know that pushing the ball downfield left much to be desired and should be a big focus for the 2023 Steelers offense. Today I will use Sports Info Solutions (SIS) to calculate air yard percentages (air yards/intended air yards) for NFL quarterbacks with a minimum of 200 regular-season drop backs in 2022 and also see how things progressed by looking at the first and last half of the year.
Here are the 2022 regular season results:
Throughout the regular season, Pickett ranked 21st with a 47.65 air yard percentage (AYP) out of the 35 qualifying quarterbacks. This came on 444 drop backs (18th), 389 attempts (21st), 1,340 air yards (22nd), and 2,812 intended air yards (21st). While he didn’t bottom the results, we get comparative context on where he stacked up in the NFL and can gauge what a realistic and hopeful improvement for 2023 could look like. Seeing names above him that have a reputation or an offensive style that prefers the short passing game, for example Tom Brady (20th) and Justin Herbert (14th), this would be a great range for Pickett to target in 2023 (or optimistically even better). Of course, it’s not all about air yards and there are many factors to consider, such as defensive coverages, but when the opportunities present themselves, connecting on these plays should be the ultimate goal.
Next, let’s look at the first half of the 2022 season:
With the growing pains we saw from Pittsburgh’s offense, and the beginning of Pickett’s NFL journey, we see him towards the bottom of the results as expected and highlights my last point, ranking 30th with a 43.72 air yard percentage. In this span, he had 191 drop backs (29th), 165 attempts (30th), 498 air yards (31st), and 1,139 intended air yards (30th). An important factor to weigh in is just five games played in the span, but using air yard percentages gives specific context to the total numbers on the lack of success at the start of 2022 and how it stacked up across the league. There are some important factors to this result that will hopefully be much different out of the gate in 2023, namely the conservative approach the Steelers and offensive coordinator Matt Canada employed, particularly early on with Pickett as a rookie. This is a well-documented huge factor to monitor in Year Two, and I’m really hoping we see the playbook open up, putting more on Pickett’s plate that will knock on wood lead to more success through the air.
To close, here are how things progressed the last half of 2022:
Here we see a desired improvement from Pickett the latter half of his rookie season, with an air yards percentage that eclipsed 50 (50.33) and ranked 21st. This is a nice bump recalling his 43.72 air yards percentage in Weeks One through Nine. In the latter half of 2022, Pickett had 253 drop backs (15th), 224 attempts (16th), 842 air yards (17th), and 1,673 intended air yards (18th). More specifically, I took a look at the air yards percentage differential (weeks 10-18 AYP – Weeks One through Nine -9 AYP) to get more context to his improvements, and Pickett encouragingly ranked 14th.
For fun, I wanted to take his late season results and extrapolate it across the entire regular season to see how that fared: 506 drop backs (17th), 448 attempts (17th), 1,684 air yards (15th), 3,346 intended air yards (16th), for a 50.33 air yards percentage (16th). Of course, this is far from a perfect method but gives a gauge to what a more consistent season from Pickett could look like, and aligns with my earlier point on what I’m hopeful for his 2023 season, hopefully moving into the top half of the NFL in air yards. While I don’t expect him to all of a sudden become a gunslinger, the data and team factors discussed today lead me to be optimistic for Pickett’s air yards to improve in 2023, with a knock-on wood more consistent year.
What are your thoughts on the data from 2022? Do you think Pickett and the 2023 offense will improve in this regard? Thanks for reading and let me know your thoughts in the comments.
