Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota are perfect rivals on a path to join NFL's greats

Jay Asser 01:09 04/09/2017
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  • Seven. That’s how many occasions quarterbacks have been drafted one and two overall in the same NFL Draft in the league’s history.

    Only one of those instances, when Jim Plunkett went first and Archie Manning was selected second in 1971, resulted in both players being relatively successful.

    The most recent case is in its infancy, with the jury still out on 2016 draft classmates Jared Goff and Carson Wentz.

    The others that can safely be considered one-sided? Drew Bledsoe and Rick Mirer in 1993, Peyton Manning and Ryan Leaf in 1998, Tim Couch and Donovan McNabb in 1999, and Andrew Luck and Robert Griffin III in 2012.

    The remaining connection is, like Goff and Wentz, in its early stages, but as it stands, 23-year-olds Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota have the potential to be the best cases of quarterbacks drafted 1-2 to both thrive for their respective teams.

    Two years after the Tampa Bay Buccaneers tabbed Winston first and the Tennessee Titans grabbed Mariota second, the young phenoms have gone from rookies getting their feet wet to poised signal-callers on the verge of joining the elite at their position.

    While they presumably yearn to be mentioned in the same breath as Tom Brady and Aaron Rodgers, the first peer to be associated with each will likely always be the other. Even if it’s to their chagrin.

    “He’s an amazing guy, a very talented player, a great quarterback. I think he’d agree with me in saying this: We’re not trying to compete against each other. We’re trying to compete against the top-tier quarterbacks in this league,” Winston said on ESPN in early August.

    “If we’re just trying to focus on each other and how good one another is, we’re limiting ourselves.”

    But the connection between the two doesn’t begin or end with the 2015 draft.

    Both were studs in college and earned the Heisman Trophy, the highest individual honour in college football, with Winston winning the award in 2013 at Florida State and Mariota being chosen in 2014 at Oregon.

    Jameis Winston

    Jameis Winston

    Winston accomplished one goal Mariota never did by leading the Seminoles to a BCS national championship in the same year, but it was the Ducks quarterback who was victorious in the only collegiate meeting between the two, handing Winston the lone loss of his career as a starter in the 2015 Rose Bowl.

    Since entering the NFL, the two, aside from fittingly facing each other in their first regular season game as pros – Mariota’s Titans won 42- 14 – have been steadily developing in opposite conferences.

    In their sophomore campaigns, both improved their team record (six wins to nine for Winston, three wins to eight for Mariota), touchdown passes (22 to 28 for Winston, 19 to 26 for Mariota) and passer rating (84.2 to 86.1 for Winston, 91.5 to 95.6 for Mariota).

    Yet while their upward trajectories have aligned, their differing personalities and varying styles of play make them perfect contrasts. When it comes to leadership, Winston and Mariota couldn’t be more opposed in their approaches.

    If it wasn’t widely known before, Winston’s massive personality has been recognised now with the Buccaneers featured on this summer’s Hard Knocks on HBO.

    Winston appeared on episodes, which go behind the scenes during training camp, as a fun-loving, vocal and supportive team-mate who has earned the respect of the rest of the team, from incoming rookies to established veterans.

    “He’s somebody who’s always been charismatic,” Greg Auman, Buccaneers beat writer for the Tampa Bay Times, told Sport360°.

    “It’s hard to command authority as a 21-year-old when he came into the league. But I think he’s done that very well. This is his team. He’s very vocal leading them in the huddle and leading them in the locker room. I think that’s only going to get easier for him as he gets older.”

    Of course, the flip side of that outspoken personality has also seen a history of immaturity, but Auman believes Hard Knocks has had a positive impact on Winston’s attitude.

    “I think Jameis feels like having the cameras around all the time has made him want to behave, want to be a good team-mate, a good leader, a good player, a good person all the time,” Auman said.

    While viewers have been tuning in every Sunday night at 22:00 (EST) to watch Winston and the Buccaneers, Mariota has been unassumingly toiling away at Titans training camp, no different than the 30 other teams in the league.

    But going under the radar is nothing new for the introvert, whose quiet demeanour ironically stands out even more in a league full of gregarious personalities.

    “He’s a guy that really led by example, didn’t do a lot of talking, but when he spoke, [his team-mates] listened,” Darnell Arceneaux, who coached Mariota during his senior year at Saint Louis School in Honolulu, told Sport360°.

    Marcus Mariota

    Marcus Mariota

    “He was a friend to the starting receiver and he was a friend to the ninth receiver in our rotation. “He was the young man you hope your daughter brings home when she says, ‘Hey mom and dad this is my boyfriend’.”

    On the field, the discrepancies between Winston and Mariota continue. Coming out of Florida State, Winston was well-versed in a prostyle offence and wielded an arm capable of making all the throws.

    While that reputation has come to fruition in the NFL with Winston making countless highlight plays, so has his rep as a risk-taker.

    His interceptions rose from 15 in his rookie year to 18 in 2016, though his interception rate actually dropped from 4.2 per cent to 3.3, as calculated by Football Outsiders.

    Going into year three, the onus placed on Winston from head coach Dirk Koetter and his staff to limit turnovers is as high as ever.

    “There’s definitely more of a focus on him being mindful of when it’s good to take risks and when it’s bad to take risks,” Auman said.

    “And that’s going to be an on-going process.” Mariota, meanwhile, has expanded his game since coming out of Oregon, where he benefitted from playing in a spread offence, almost always in shotgun, with simplified reads.

    In Tennessee, he’s been under centre more than ever, but adapted well to their “exotic smash-mouth” attack, which features a heavy dose of the run game while still taking advantage of Mariota’s abilities as a passer and runner.

    In addition to their own progression, potential breakout seasons for both Winston and Mariota this year could be helped by new weapons in their respective arsenals.

    Tampa Bay signed free agent wide receiver DeSean Jackson – giving Winston a deep threat that has been sorely missing – and drafted rookie tight end O.J. Howard in the first round.

    Mariota hasn’t been blessed with the most talented receiving corps through his first two seasons, but that could change this year with the additions of wideout Eric Decker – one of the league’s best red zone threats – and rookie receiver Corey Davis, drafted fifth overall.

    Along with more playmakers should come more wins, and more wins should result in a push for the playoffs, where elite quarterbacks truly separate themselves from the best of the rest.

    If Winston and Mariota are sick of being compared to each other instead of the game’s greats, it appears their time to create distance from one another is coming sooner than later.

    SCOUTING REPORT

    Breaking down the two quarterbacks in five key aspects and giving the edge to one in each, based on where they are at this point in their respective careers.

    Accuracy

    On the surface, Mariota appears to be the more accurate passer simply based on completion percentage. Diving deeper, however, reveals just how much of an edge he has when you look at his efficiency in high-leverage situations: third downs and in the red zone. Last season, Mariota completed 61.3 per cent of his third-down passes for a 105.9 passer rating, while in the red zone he has 33 TDs to no INTs since entering the league, the best ratio during that span.

    Advantage: Mariota

    Under pressure

    It’s hard to expect any QB to be as effective under pressure, but that’s especially asking a lot for two young signal-callers. While Winston threw six INTs under pressure last season, compared to two by Mariota, he also was under pressure on 38.3 per cent of his dropbacks, ninth-most in the NFL. Mariota, meanwhile, was pressured only 29.6 per cent of the time and yet Winston still had a higher completion % (48.7 to 41.1) and a passer rating just 2.6 points lower (70.0 to 72.6).

    Advantage: Winston

    Decision making

    It’s no secret this is where Winston’s weakness truly stands out. The Bucs cornerstone has a gunslinger mentality and known for trying to make difficult passes through tight windows, while Mariota has shown a penchant for living to fight another day more often. Sometimes it results in a jaw-dropping play for Winston, but many times it results in the other team getting the ball back. And while both QBs are elusive in and out of the pocket, they’ve had fumbling issues.

    Advantage: Mariota

    Deep passing

    This is arguably the area with the least separation between the two. Winston had the edge last season in average air yards per attempt (4.77 to 4.65) and deep pass attempts (69), but Mariota had a better deep pass accuracy percentage (41.9 to 34.8) and deep pass passer rating (101.2 to 71.0). The script was flipped from their rookie seasons, when Winston was considerably better, but he regressed in 2016 while Mariota’s touch vastly improved.

    Advantage: Mariota

    Supporting cast

    Obviously, context matters when comparing quarterbacks. Winston has arguably had better top-end weapons, namely Mike Evans, but Mariota has had a significantly better offensive line and running game to protect him. Both the Bucs and Titans bolstered their offences this offseason, with Tampa Bay adding speedster DeSean Jackson and rookie top prospect O.J. Howard, while Tennessee drafted wide receiver Corey Davis and signed wideout Eric Decker.

    Advantage: Draw

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