QB Room, Week 4: Let’s start with the Indianapolis Colts’ Anthony Richardson/Cam Newton conundrum

The Indianapolis Colts have themselves a Cam Newton conundrum.

For years, the Carolina Panthers struggled to figure out how to get the most out of Cam Newton while exposing him to the least amount of punishment. It’s a unique problem to have, largely because it’s rare to find a wildly athletic quarterback who is also built with the frame of a linebacker. In the last 20 to 30 years, you’ve basically had a small fraternity of Newton, Josh Allen, Ben Roethlisberger and Daunte Culpepper. I’m not putting Lamar Jackson in this group, because his physique is simply different than the rest. And there is some variance within that group when it comes to athleticism, pocket-passing acumen, speed, etc. But what’s important is a trio of common threads: massive size, significant athletic tools — and a need to absorb punishment to unlock their strengths.

This is where the Colts check into the chat with Anthony Richardson.

They have a quarterback with an otherworldly skill set who is already showing signs of breaking down. On Sunday against the Pittsburgh Steelers, Richardson was knocked out of the game after suffering a hip injury while running the football. It’s the fourth time in eight career starts that Richardson has been forced out of a game with injuries, including a severe sprain in his throwing shoulder that ultimately required surgery and ended his rookie season after just four games. That’s some troubling symmetry — four starts per season, four injuries to four different areas of his body: left knee, concussion, right AC joint, and now his right hip.

Now concern is centering around whether Richardson is simply injury prone. Which is a fair question to raise when you haven’t been able to finish half of your career starts. Not that Richardson wants to hear about it.

“People are going to talk about injuries, people are going to say injury-prone, blah, blah, blah,” he lamented to reporters after getting knocked out of the game against Pittsburgh. “But nobody wants to get injured. Everybody wants to stay on the field. Of course, I was like, ‘Man, damn, not again.’ But it’s all good. It’s God’s plan and I’m trusting it.”

Not to engage in blasphemy here, but there’s also the Indianapolis Colts’ plan to consider, too. Which, like Josh Allen early in his career with the Buffalo Bills, requires Richardson playing a significant amount of football — taking a maximum amount of reps in practice, playing in every single game, patiently shaping his skill set with each passing week, month and year. Thus far, that plan has been wrecked, putting Richardson behind schedule.

This is where the whole Cam Newton conundrum comes into play. When Newton was at his best, the Panthers accepted that his full suite of options as a player included both designed runs and off-schedule playmaking with his legs. It allowed him to stress defenses in a multitude of ways, unlocking his ceiling to the point of him winning Offensive Rookie of the Year, making three Pro Bowls, appearing in a Super Bowl and winning a league MVP — all inside the first five seasons of his career. It’s also where the wheels started to come off, largely due to the punishment Newtown was absorbing. In his sixth season, he suffered a concussion in Week 4 of his season, knocking him out of a game against the Atlanta Falcons and then keeping him sidelined through Week 5.

Newton never looked the same the rest of the season, which concluded with him completing a career-low 52.9 percent of his passes and turning the ball over 16 times. The following offseason, he’d have surgery to repair a partially torn rotator cuff in his throwing shoulder. While he rebounded for a solid season in 2017, he’d never get close to the heights he achieved in his MVP season, and then injuries would knock him out of a multitude of games and eventually ruin his throwing shoulder. Looking back, it was a career lost to punishment.

But the Panthers knew what they were getting into when they selected Newton. And they had to make the same decision that the Colts have to make right now with Richardson: Do you allow a quarterback to play free and clear of boundaries, knowing that it could cost him in the long run — or do you inhibit certain aspects of his game, hoping that it will preserve him in the long run?

Unfortunately for the Colts, how they answer that question is a little more complicated than what Carolina faced with Newton. That’s because Newton’s skill set was already at a high level of development as both a passer and runner by the time he stepped on an NFL field. He needed far less development at the outset of his career, which made the physical risks he took a little more palatable. Newton getting hurt and missing time was certainly not a good thing, but it didn’t threaten to throw off a multi-year elongated program for his development as both a runner and passer. With Richardson, it does.

So what’s the answer? Well, the four injuries that Richardson has suffered have all come with him running the ball. Three of the runs were dialed up for him and the fourth was an out-of-structure play. On all four, he took hits rather than getting down on the plays, leading to basically the maximum absorption of punishment. So the simple answer would seem to be either stop calling runs entirely — which isn’t really an option whatsoever — or coach Richardson to either get down at the end of runs or work on taking less punishment on the hits. All of which is more difficult than it sounds, because football is played at a speed that rarely affords someone the time to think about how they’re taking a hit. Maybe the only thing that can be coached, if Richardson is willing to accept it, is learning to slide at the end of plays rather than taking hits for extra yardage.

The one thing the Colts can definitely do is stop trusting Richardson to just protect himself or be honest about his health, which is what they did against the Pittsburgh Steelers. The next play after Richardson returned from his hip pointer, head coach Shane Steichen called a designed run. Which, in retrospect, was a significant mistake that Steichen made because — as he said later — Richardson had told him “he felt good to go.” The result was a play where Richardson ran and then attempted to get down, but still took a head shot from Steelers safety Minkah Fitzpatrick.

It was an error in assessment, but also a teachable moment in what is going to be a long lesson for both the coaching staff and Richardson. Because this isn’t going to get resolved quickly. Not with Richardson’s mentality to make things happen on the fly, and not with the coaching staff wanting to lean into the things that make him a special player. It’s a difficult balancing act that hasn’t gotten off to a good start. Like seemingly everything else in Richardson’s development, it’s going to take time, patience and a lot of failure to turn the corner.

Now on to Week 4 of the QB Room …

• Matt Stafford’s 9-yard flip to tight end Colby Parkinson over the right shoulder of oncoming Chicago Bears defensive end Darrell Taylor, who seems almost stunned at the throw when you slow the play down. It’s the kind of ridiculous throw with a high degree of possible disaster that only a couple QBs in the league will attempt. Given how the blocking sets up, it looks like the play was intended for Parkinson all along, but the angle Taylor takes creates a scenario where most QBs would take the sack or throw it away. Instead, Stafford creates a “wow” play that stuns the analyst booth.

• Baker Mayfield’s 15-yard touchdown pass to wideout Trey Palmer, which went just inches over the fingertips of a Philadelphia Eagles linebacker. When you slow the play down, you can see Mayfield set the opportunity up by giving a slight glance and shoulder square-up toward running back Bucky Irving in the right flat shortly after the ball is snapped. That creates a commitment from the safety, who crashes on Irving’s route, and simultaneously freezes the linebacker over the middle of the field. Mayfield slightly rotates his front foot after the safety crashes on Irving, which is the moment you know he’s going to Palmer over the middle. The throw was distilled perfection between four defenders who are all inside 5 yards from the catch point.

• Sam Darnold’s absurd 14-yard back-shoulder touchdown to Justin Jefferson against the Green Bay Packers. Darnold seems to be making a mind-blowing throw every single week. On this one, he lets go of the ball when Jefferson is just inside the 10-yard line and completely covered up by Packers cornerback Keisean Nixon. The perfection of the throw is that it’s made when Nixon is in a spot that he can’t turn his head and locate the ball. It’s too much of a bang-bang moment. Conversely, it affords Jefferson just enough time to locate the ball and adjust to trap it as it hits the middle of his chest about a yard into the end zone. The defensive coverage was good. The throw and catch were better. This is the kind of stuff that usually takes an immense amount of reps between a quarterback and wideout. For Darnold and Jefferson to have this kind of chemistry at such an early stage is eyebrow-raising.

• Caleb Williams’ 9-yard touchdown to wideout DJ Moore in the back of the end zone late in the third quarter of the Bears’ win over the Rams. When you talk to NFL teams right now about Williams’ early struggles, the defensive approach on him is fairly simple: keep him in the pocket, make him go through his reads and function inside of structure, and force him to be patient and throw to the right read on a play. The hope is that he’ll get frustrated and force himself into an error. On this particular play, Williams does the opposite. He trusts his blocking, goes through his reads and then finds Moore isolated in the end zone on a linebacker. Then he makes a great throw in a tight space for a touchdown. This is the kind of thing that will be scary when Williams does it with regularity — because it shows growth and maturity in one of the critical areas that personnel evaluators questioned about Williams heading into the 2024 NFL Draft.

• Jared Goff’s wild first quarter 360-degree spin completion to wideout Jameson Williams. Maybe we should have seen Goff’s 18-for-18 passing night coming when he made this kind of play early in the Detroit Lions’ win over the Seattle Seahawks. For the most part, Goff isn’t given much credit for his athleticism. But this throw showcases a quarterback who has just enough wiggle to always be dangerous. Not only does Goff deftly avoid a free-rushing Dre’Mont Jones off the right edge, who was picked up critically late in the play by tight end Brock Wright, Goff then re-locates Williams in the middle of the field for a first-down throw after a full spin inside the pocket. This is a remarkably difficult NFL play. Goff won’t get enough credit for it because he made it look too easy.

There are passing charts … and then there are back-to-back weeks that showcase the near-perfect balance the Detroit Lions are achieving on offense with quarterback Jared Goff. Granted, the charts come at the expense of an Arizona Cardinals franchise in Week 3 that is still finding an identity, and a Seattle Seahawks team in Week 4 that arguably hadn’t played a high-level opponent to that point. But that can’t erase the elite level of balance Goff and offensive coordinator Ben Johnson showcased in the past two weeks (and through four games, frankly). Yes, Goff had a historic moment against the Seahawks on Monday night, going 18-for-18 and setting a new mark for passing perfection in an NFL game for QBs with at least 10 attempts.

But back away from that frame a little bit and look at the past two weeks, when Goff has gone an absurd 36-for-41 passing, for 491 yards with four touchdowns and one interception. This passing effort has featured a chef’s kiss mix of running backs David Montgomery and Jahmyr Gibbs, who collectively rushed for 306 yards and four touchdowns in that same two-game span. That is the type of balance NFL teams and offensive coordinators dream of achieving. Right now, the Lions and Johnson are achieving it, thanks to an efficient quarterback, deep backfield, elite offensive line, versatile tight ends and playmaking wideouts. And it’s represented by an offense that has some wicked success across the board through four games, sitting at fourth in the NFL in passing yardage, sixth in rushing and fourth in total yards per game. The three offenses that have been more productive from a total yardage perspective? The Baltimore Ravens, San Francisco 49ers and Green Bay Packers — all sitting at 2-2 and looking dangerous … but also situated behind the 3-1 Lions in the win column.

Despite dealing with injuries and Goff having early hiccups with his decision-making and turnovers, the Lions have the best record in the NFL among the four most balanced offenses in the league. And they’re doing it with a quarterback in Goff who will most likely be considered the lesser player among the other teams in the quartet, which includes Lamar Jackson, Jordan Love and Brock Purdy. With two running backs (Gibbs and Montgomery), two pass-and-block tight ends (Sam LaPorta and Brock Wright), and three opportunistic wideouts (Amon-Ra St. Brown, Jameson Williams and Tim Patrick) who have been labeled something along the lines of “not special” (St. Brown), “too small” (Williams) and “rarely healthy” (Patrick) over the course of their careers.

I struggle to think of an offense, when you include Goff’s supposed athletic limitations, that has more written-off players creating its success. That’s what makes the Lions so intriguing. Goff’s 18-for-18 — and really his past two games of 36-for-41 passing — is built on the shoulders of some element of doubt or disbelief. It makes this team all the more likable in the pantheon of NFL fandom. And it surely makes Johnson that much more attractive as a head coaching candidate in the 2025 hiring cycle.

Stock up

Detroit Lions’ Jared Goff

18-for-18, 292 yards, 2 TDs, 0 INTs; 1 catch for a 7-yard TD; 3 sacks

It’s unlikely we’ll see a more perfect stat line this season, with Goff putting up a 155.8 passer rating and having more touchdown catches (1) than incompletions (0). What’s more important, his night was needed for the Lions, who pulled off a 42-29 win over the Seattle Seahawks that was a boat race in many respects. Goff’s perfection helped the Lions pressure Seattle’s offense to keep pace, and eventually the Seahawks faltered in the fourth quarter. Through three games, Goff had gotten off to a solid but fairly unspectacular start, and that left the Lions’ offense feeling a little thin. This was the breakout both he and the overall unit needed. They got it in a big way, heading into their Week 5 bye week with an opportunity to clean some things up for a long stretch of games to close the season.

Indianapolis Colts’ Joe Flacco

16-for-26, 168 yards, 2 TDs, 0 INTs; 2 sacks

When I was a kid, my grandparents used to let me lay on their living room floor and watch old John Wayne movies whenever I visited. One of my favorites was “El Dorado” — where Wayne plays a fast-drawing, wandering-gun-for-hire named Cole Thornton. Despite being a mercenary, Thornton had a good-guy moral code and honest demeanor that drew you in. This is who Flacco has become to me late in his career, taking his big arm from one NFL city to the next, then stepping in to save the day when someone is in distress. He did exactly that for the Colts in their 27-24 win over the Pittsburgh Steelers, after starter Anthony Richardson went down with a first-quarter hip injury. Flacco checked in and wasted no time throwing his first touchdown pass of the game, immediately changing the tone of the game for the Colts. I’ve seen this movie before with Flacco, during his time with the New York Jets and Cleveland Browns. One thousand years from now, the aliens are going to find nothing but cockroaches, petrified Twinkies and Flacco’s passing arm.

Houston Texans’ C.J. Stroud

27-for-40, 345 yards, 2 TDs, 0 INTs; 3 rushes for 17 yards; 2 sacks

Stroud has been good this season, but this was the game where he looked like the player who was cooking teams as a rookie in 2023. Despite Tank Dell being out with a chest injury, Stroud methodically chewed up the Jacksonville Jaguars’ secondary with wideout Nico Collins, who caught 12 passes for 151 yards and a touchdown in a 24-20 win. But the absolute thing of beauty was Stroud’s comeback-securing scoring drive in the final 2:54 of the game, which started off with Stroud running 11 yards for a first down, then finished with him stringing together a masterful 5-for-5 passing stretch — including a game-clinching touchdown pass to running back Dare Ogunbowale. This was the kind of big-boy drive that lights a fire under a team. That is good because this weekend’s game against the Buffalo Bills is going to be a bit of a measuring stick for Houston.

Stock down

New England Patriots’ Jacoby Brissett

19-for-32, 168 yards, 1 TD, 1 INT; 6 sacks; 1 fumble lost

Brissett threw a pick-6 that put the Patriots into a 13-0 hole against the San Francisco 49ers. New England’s offense was never capable of recovering from that point. Overall, the Patriots’ offense has been very ugly the past two weeks, opening up questions about what the franchise is accomplishing by keeping Brissett in as the starter over rookie Drake Maye. While I wouldn’t say Brissett has been exceptional in any way, the offensive line has given up 11 sacks the past two games and not really offered much room for Brissett to operate. Given the mediocre set of skill position players and the line playing poorly, it’s hard to see Brissett rallying this unit. That said, the longer he holds onto the starting job, the longer Maye has to prepare. That’s probably a good thing because Maye is going to run into many of the same problems that Brissett is dealing with.

Los Angeles Rams’ Matthew Stafford

20-for-29, 224 yards, 0 TDs, 1 INT; 3 sacks; 1 fumble lost

Stafford had two turnovers that easily could have been three in the Rams’ 24-18 loss to the Chicago Bears, after one end-zone interception was taken off the board when replays showed the defender was out of bounds. The two turnovers that held up were both costly, especially the game-sealing pick in the final minute that extinguished any chance of the Rams pulling out a win. To be fair on that pick, Stafford was hit as he let go of the ball, and the Rams have a lot of injury issues on offense that have piled up around him. All of that said, Stafford hasn’t cut the figure of a quarterback who can overcome a diminished cast around him. Maybe that’s age … or maybe the Rams are not that deep. Either way, the Rams can’t overcome his turnovers, and that’s a problem.

Tennessee Titans’ Will Levis

3-for-4, 25 yards, 0 TDs, 1 INT

Levis played only two drives in the Titans’ 31-12 win over the Miami Dolphins, but he ended his first drive with a bad interception and then ended his second drive by hurting his throwing shoulder while diving for a first down. Now he’s headed for tests to determine the extent of any potential damage to his shoulder. Levis has become a bit of a punching bag in the “stock down” section of this column this season, and it’s hard to drill him when he wasn’t able to play more than a few minutes due to injury. But he lands here again due to a real concern for the Titans. When Levis went out, the offense instantly seemed to run more efficiently in the hands of backup Mason Rudolph. From a passing standpoint, Rudolph didn’t do anything special. But the running game and offensive line seemed to operate much more cohesively. Rudolph also took only one sack all night. Head coach Brian Callahan said that Levis is still the team’s starter … but if he misses any time and Rudolph wins games, this is going to get messy. And frankly, after Monday night’s win over the Dolphins with Rudolph at the helm, we might already be there.

○ So New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers pushed back at head coach Robert Saleh, after Saleh suggested Rodgers’ cadence might have been part of the reason for some false start penalties in Sunday’s 10-9 loss to the Denver Broncos. Rodgers disagreed and said the offensive linemen responsible should be held accountable. Two things here …

First, Rodgers is right, his cadence shouldn’t be an issue. Teams practice cadence every day and offensive linemen are expected to get in sync with their quarterback, not vice versa. Rodgers is also arguably the best cadence quarterback in the league when it comes to showing curveballs at opposing defenses. The only caveat here is that it helps the offensive line when the quarterback takes every single opportunity to practice these kinds of things, including in the offseason. While I’m not going to sit here and say that Rodgers skipping full-squad minicamp to go to Egypt is the reason for a one-game false start issue, I will say that Rodgers practicing his cadence with his offensive line at every opportunity does not hurt.

Second, yes, Rodgers went back at Saleh verbally, which triggered former NFL quarterback and New York media personality Boomer Esiason raising an issue of whether or not the quarterback respects his head coach. I’m not even going to wade into Esiason once again decoding Rodgers’ body language or intentions (go look up his 2022 criticisms of Rodgers’ “man bun” if you want a good eyeroll). But I will remind everyone of this: Rodgers has strong opinions about how football teams and schemes should be run, and he can be a pain in the ass for head coaches. This has always been the case. He criticized Mike McCarthy repeatedly in Green Bay. He bristled at Matt LaFleur running pre-snap motions that he thought were an overcomplicating of the offense. Now he’s pushing back on Saleh. This is what he does and it’s exactly what the Jets knew they were getting into when they took him on.

One other thing. The building is always going to back Rodgers. Because this is how aging high-level quarterbacks operate. They see themselves as co-CEOs of the franchise, especially when it comes to the offense. This brings out some chippy moments. At times, Tom Brady butted heads with Bill Belichick in New England. Then he had his moments of frustration with Bruce Arians in Tampa Bay. And even Todd Bowles admitted to feeling a bit “handcuffed” heading into Brady’s final season with the Buccaneers, because of changes he couldn’t make to the team as long as Brady continued playing. Go look up Peyton Manning’s retirement news conference with the Denver Broncos, when then-head coach Gary Kubiak tells a story about Manning feeling like he was ready to return to the lineup from injury rehab. Knowing that Kubiak would see the footage of the workout, the coach recounted Manning flipping off the camera to send his head coach a message. Bottom line, when you’re dealing with aging quarterbacks who have reached a certain level, you’re signing up to occasionally hug a cactus. That’s what we’re seeing with Rodgers and Saleh. And if the Jets lose to the Minnesota Vikings in London on Sunday, I think it could get much worse.

○ I think Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin declaring that he’s going with Justin Fields as his starter Sunday night against the Dallas Cowboys officially makes Fields the permanent starter. I believe that’s the case, whether Tomlin wants to stamp it or not. I also believe Russell Wilson is good to go when it comes to practice. From what I understand, he could start if needed, but that’s not happening. So the Steelers are Fields’ team until he does something to knock himself out of the starting spot.

○ One thing about Goff’s 18-for-18 performance: It steered attention away from a truly awful defensive performance for Detroit. I did a double-take when I saw that Geno Smith and the Seahawks had 38 first downs (38!) and 516 total yards. While I don’t think the Lions defense is going to be that bad consistently, it certainly raises some significant red flags moving forward. And it’s also a quarterback storyline, because it’s suggestive that Goff is going to have to cover up for the defense at times. Maybe not to the level of having to complete 100 percent of his passes, but certainly by putting up big performances against elite teams. I think we’re going to find out if he can do that consistently pretty quickly. Detroit comes out of their week five bye with four tough road games in their next five — at Dallas, Minnesota, Green Bay and Houston. Detroit’s defense is going to absolutely have its hands full in that stretch. How well Goff plays in those games is likely going to be the critical difference between wins and losses.

○ It’s clear the Miami Dolphins are an objectively terrible offense without Tua Tagovailoa. What’s less clear is why on earth the team didn’t protect itself with a better backup quarterback option this season. It feels a lot like the New York Jets last season with Aaron Rodgers (not to mention the Los Angeles Rams with Matthew Stafford). When a quarterback gets to a certain age or has a history of health issues, you’re rolling the dice on a season when you fail to secure a quality backup option. Joe Flacco is costing the Indianapolis Colts $5 million this season. You think Sunday’s win over the Pittsburgh Steelers, which was absolutely Flacco-inspired, isn’t worth $5 million in insurance?

○ The NFC North might have the best quarterback situation in the NFL. Sam Darnold is playing like an MVP candidate for Minnesota. Jordan Love and Malik Willis might be the best two-deep QB depth chart in the league. Caleb Williams is starting to show some of the promise that made him the No. 1 pick in the draft. And Goff looks masterful when he’s protected and Detroit is running a balanced scheme. We’ll see if these trajectories hold, but this could be a brutally tough division to win for at least the next few years.

○ If you missed it, go find the Alabama vs. Georgia game from Saturday. It was loaded with NFL prospects, but particularly intriguing from a quarterback perspective, with the Crimson Tide’s Jalen Milroe and Bulldogs’ Carson Beck facing each other. I texted with a swath of personnel evaluators after the game, which Alabama won 41-34, and they raved about Milroe’s overall development as a player and passer. He definitely would have landed in the “stock up” section if there had been space for him. Here’s an honorary stock up stat line for Milroe: 27-for-33, 374 yards, 2 touchdowns, 1 INT; 16 rushes for 117 yards; 2 touchdowns, 0 sacks. Conversely, Beck struggled with three interceptions … but also battled and helped bring Georgia back from the verge of a blowout.

Just from my conversations with NFL evaluators, you get the sense that the really like where Milroe is headed — especially after he was benched at one point last season — but that they are struggling to figure out an assessment with Beck, who some had pegged as the potential first pick in the 2025 NFL Draft. It’s going to be worth watching how the rest of the season unfolds for both, especially with the potential of a rematch in the expanded college football playoff system.

○ Two analyst moments I enjoyed this weekend …

First, Tom Brady clearly being a little heated about some comments made by Baker Mayfield. I like fired-up Brady and hope we see a lot more of this.

Second, Alex Smith’s thoughts on Justin Fields’ development in Pittsburgh. Smith has been an exceedingly enjoyable watch on Sunday mornings. He’s smart, opinionated and almost never resorts to empty-calorie gags and zingers to be a bright spot in ESPN’s NFL studio.