Justin Fields walked off of the Memorial Stadium field in Bloomington, Indiana this past Saturday having played his worst game as an Ohio State Buckeye.
Lowest rushing total. Most incompletions. Fewest completions. Worst completion percentage.
But it actually wasn’t that bad. He completed 14-of-24 passes for 199 yards and three touchdowns. He also rushed for a touchdown. Fields was careful with the football and led an offense that scored 42 of OSU’s 51 points.
Of course, when measuring his performances against each other, some are bound to fall short. Fields was outstanding in his first two games, which made his “pretty good” game on Saturday stand out.
He missed some passes high and overthrew Chris Olave on a deep ball. If he just connects on the throws he normally makes, Fields would have had a career day on Saturday. Instead, he only accounted for four touchdowns.
After the game, he knew he left some throws out there that he’d like to have back.
“No, I definitely didn’t play up to my potential,” he said. “I know I missed way too many throws out there. So I’ve just gotta work on that and just keep getting better and the team has to keep getting better. So I think there’s a lot of room to grow but we’ll just continue to keep working and just continue to work.”
As with many things when it comes to the quarterbacks, Fields pointed the blame at his footwork on some of his errant throws.
“I just had to get my feet set,” he said. “Just moving around, I think I moved around the pocket well. Just trying to get my feet set before I throw the ball, that’ll make me more accurate.”
The high throws haven’t really been a problem before Saturday, which is either reassuring to know that he can get back to his old accurate ways, or concerning to know that these issues can pop up at any time.
“I think it was just today,” Fields said of his issues. “I was kind of off. I’m not sure why, but I felt the first two games I was setting my feet well and I was throwing the ball pretty accurately. But today, I struggled a little bit with that. So I’m actually glad that happened. It’s just a learning opportunity so I’m actually glad that happened, just for me to get better and just focus on it more in practice.”
Quarterbacks have off days, just as shooters do in basketball. Against the Hoosiers, Justin Fields completed 58.3% of his passes, which he has had to answer for. Meanwhile, Clemson starting quarterback Trevor Lawrence has failed to reach that mark in either of his conference games this year. JT Barrett missed that mark in his first two games of 2017.
The point here, is that it’s not unusual to miss some throws. Nobody should have expected Justin Fields to complete passes at Dwayne Haskins’ level, even though he did for the first two games. The good news is that there were receivers who were running open, and also that the issues are going to be addressed moving forward.
“I thought we missed some deep balls. I thought we had guys open and Justin missed them,” head coach Ryan Day said after the game. “He knows he left some yards on the field. But again, I think the maturity of a coaching staff, the maturity of a team is to go find the issues on film and get them fixed. Because as time goes on, and we start to play other teams, and we get into the thick of the Big Ten, those issues are going to come up.
“And so it’s our job to find them and get them addressed. And to really be critical of the players without creating resentment. And that’s the key. And I thought we did that last week. The kids took the coaching. And we got to keep building from here and find those issues because they’re there.”