Quarterback Offer Breakdown: Sam Howell

Roman Marciante
3 min read
Sam Howell is a play making quarterback from Monroe, North Carolina. Howell captained Sun Valley high school to an 11-4 record and compiled a video game-esque 5000 total yards last year. (3400 through the air and 1600 on the ground) Listed at 6'1" 215 pounds let's see how Howell measures up in this week's offer breakdown.

Sam Howell

Footwork/Rhythm Footwork can improve. Noticed a very elongated plant step at times which in turn occasionally caused him to slip. The long plant step also caused him to dip down in the pocket which in turn can impede vision. Can be lackadaisical in certain gun drops and needs to hit the steps quicker. Noted Howell to drop back with his shoulders "open" in the direction of his target allowing DB's to "key." Front stride is charted at different lengths on similar throws.

Rhythm was inconsistent. Balls were late at times with no understandable rationale. Best repeatable on time ball was on seem routes.

Accuracy/Arm Strength/Mechanics Some completions were not in optimal locations. Some completions were. Howell has a .589 career varsity completion percentage and 33 career interceptions. Needs to improve at reading the field and shoring up footwork and I believe these numbers will improve.

Arm Strength is good. Deep ball left some receivers short in some cases but overall nice zip on intermediate to short passes. Most impressive throw noted was a 30 yard post on a rope. The football had little drop off and maintained an essential straight line trajectory. Has the capability to factor in a vertical passing attack.

Mechanics show some variable tenancy. Howell will "wind up" on some balls when he wants to add power and he will drop the ball early in an attempt to run. Needs to allow the play to develop and is not a consistent repeatable deliverer of the football. When in form and upright after the throw he shows good mechanical potential.

Mobility is unequivocally the strength of Howell's game. Strong runner with elusiveness. Howell can extend the pocket and has great awareness of the pressure. He is an effective threat on roll outs and shows equal ability rolling in either direction. Does not have the high end speed of a Michael Johnson Jr but can easily factor in a myriad of QB run concepts. Howell does have lateral cutting ability and noted to make several defenders miss.

Roman Rank: Howell has received dozens of offers and you can see why with his play making ability. He is a maestro of mayhem for defenders because of his unique ability to extend and make plays. I do feel Howell still needs to hone his craft passing wise in order to be the refined rhythmic reliability I know he can be. You cannot argue the fact that he had 60 total touchdowns including 34 passing but issues are still glaring.

For example, his offensive coordinator ran a dig, corner, flat combo numerous times. The #2 wide receiver running the corner was taught correctly and would "flatten" out his corner into an out vs closed cover two safety looks. The anticipation to hit this concept was missing and it flashed open repeatedly time after time. Yes. The 30 yard flash and dash first down run was brilliant but this kind of repeated miss will drive offensive coordinators crazy.

33 interceptions and less than a .600% passer in high school are causes for concern but Howell's productivity cannot be denied. Roman Rank: 4.2 stars
 

Comments (61)

Just going to put this up now. I am not a big huge comparison to others person. (Occasionally when it is merited sure) I will admit Sam has some mannerisms similar to Baker Mayfield in terms of running. Sam also has that "gunslinger" vibe as well. But for reference Mayfield was a .644 career passer in high school and only threw 8 interceptions in his varsity career. Not really fair to compare the 2.
 
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Lots of interceptions and a low completion percentage should exclude QBs from getting UM offers. Those are death knells in my book.

Funny you should say that. I tend to look at stats last. I don't want to be influenced unnecessarily. But halfway through the various film breakdowns and I had this sneaky suspicion that he would have a high interception count and a low completion percentage. 33 interceptions is a TON of picks at the high school level.

But those are definite warning signs for me as well Franchise.
 
Rate statistics are more useful than raw numbers. Howell has thrown 1062 attempts which puts him at 3% INT rate. 1 INT every 33 attempts is acceptable. Rosier has an almost identical INT rate at Miami.
 
And let me show some of my work. In this case you have trips towards the filed side and a 1 to the boundary to solidify the 3x1 look. The 1 will run a slant. The trips will essentially run a "sucker route" Tight End runs a stop/stick and the Receiver will run a drag in behind.

The defense is in a single high look. (Not pictured because of depth) Before you say cover 2, please note several things. 1. The safety is cheated so boundary side that he essentially gives away his "RAT" or Robber technique. He will jump the slant concept from the jump. 2. The depth and positioning of the free safety (not pictured) signifies the single high. Corners positioning and immediate trail show cover 3 tenancy. These are ALL things that a QB could pick up pre-snap.

Ultimately Howell will open up flared to the 1 side predetermined to hit this slant. The robber drops down and he ultimately tucks and runs. I think the pre-snap read could have shown him that at the very least he didn't have the sheer numbers on the boundary side alone.

Ultimately he had favorable numbers towards the trip side and the sucker combo read is easy in this single high look. Read the LB over the TE stop/Stick. If he creeps up here (he did) the drag behind is the right read AS LONG as you keep eye discipline and keep the Single High safety at bay. QB's in this case need to come out shoulders squared in the middle of the field to accomplish this. (Use your eyes to read, not your shoulders)

(Trying to attach the CLIP I will get there boys, keep patient with me)
 
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Rate statistics are more useful than raw numbers. Howell has thrown 1062 attempts which puts him at 3% INT rate. 1 INT every 33 attempts is acceptable. Rosier has an almost identical INT rate at Miami.

Absolutely and I'll soften a bit on that in terms of the #. The 33 interceptions are "High" in premise but the % is acceptable. But the raw data IMO isn't apples to apples in terms of college to high school. (Talent level interjection there) And for reference I ultimately just went to Trevor Lawrence statistical break down because I knew he was a 4 year starter in high school and would have over 1000 attempts.

Trevor had 1335 attempts and only threw 21 interceptions. N'kosi Perry was at only 13 interceptions for his 512 attempts. (We can easily see the pace he was on (aprox 26) Those just happened to be the first two that came to mind. I am sure there are more fortuitous cases in Sam's direction.
 
Funny you should say that. I tend to look at stats last. I don't want to be influenced unnecessarily. But halfway through the various film breakdowns and I had this sneaky suspicion that he would have a high interception count and a low completion percentage. 33 interceptions is a TON of picks at the high school level.

But those are definite warning signs for me as well Franchise.
You have to pay attention to stats for a HS QB. I don't usually pay attention to guys racking up a ton of yards because that can be a result of the system or players around him.

But if he's throwing a ton of picks and is inaccurate, those guys almost never work out. There are probably a small handful of guys in the history of the game who have gone from being big interception and low completion percentage guys in HS to big-time P5 QBs.
 
I live in Charlotte. Kids school is about 20 minutes outside the city, have seen him numerous times. Kid can sling it and has mobility. Built very similar to Rosier in terms of height and weight. His pops is the OC at his school so I can assume his IQ if the game is sharp for that age. They say he is very quiet off the field, definitely a leader they say but leads by example instead of being a rah rah type of leader. Loves the weight room also. He plays 3A ball, wish he would transfer to one of the 4A power houses in the Charlotte school district so he can play better competition, some of those schools are really good, including Mallard Creek and Butler. Clemson UGA and Bama have all offered recently. He also has stated that leaving home and going far for college is not a problem. I think he fits what Richt wants to do with the offense and bc he is built like a grown man he won’t have to get adjusted to the beating he will take, like the issue going on with Perry trying to put on weight at first.
 
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You have to pay attention to stats for a HS QB. I don't usually pay attention to guys racking up a ton of yards because that can be a result of the system or players around him.

But if he's throwing a ton of picks and is inaccurate, those guys almost never work out. There are probably a small handful of guys in the history of the game who have gone from being big interception and low completion percentage guys in HS to big-time P5 QBs.

The speed of the college game is unlikely to help him any.
 
Yeah, that's exactly why it's not acceptable.

Sam Darnold and Deshaun Watson were around 2.7% INT rate. Rosier's issue is comp% not turnovers. 3% turnover rate isn't good by any means but it's acceptable.
 
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Sam Darnold and Deshaun Watson were around 2.7% INT rate. Rosier's issue is comp% not turnovers. 3% turnover rate isn't good by any means but it's acceptable.

Fair point. The INTs weren't good, but it was the completion percentage that really hurt.
 
Rosier was doing it against college opponents though. That interception rate against HS opponents is terrible and so is his completion percentage.

Yeah I don't look at HS stats very often so I don't have a baseline to compare to. It makes sense that the speed of the game is slower so there should be less INTs.
 
Lots of interceptions and a low completion percentage should exclude QBs from getting UM offers. Those are death knells in my book.
uh yeah sub 60% and 33!!!! ******* INTs is just stupid lol, I don't care how many ******* yards you have if you have a complete *** TD:IINT ratio. Even ignoring frosh stats, he had 18 last 2 yrs. Not good..

his rushing numbers are what is really crazy. Dude had 24 ******* rushing TDs last year and averaged over 100 yards/game. There is literally no way his competition is even remotely good with the kind of stats he has....yet the int number is still way too high and comp% way too low.
 
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