Chase, Glennon Play Games of the Year

NFL Week 17 – It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. For Ja’Marr Chase, it was the best—the greatest game we have ever measured for a rookie wide receiver, and the most outstanding by any wideout in the better half of a decade. For Mike Glennon, it was the worst—a comedy of errors the likes of which we haven’t seen this century.

We’ll begin with Chase since his game was more important—he led the Bengals to a critical win over Kansas City that clinched Cincinnati’s first division championship since 2015. If you watched the highlight shows, you probably saw Chase’s 72-yard touchdown catch in the first quarter … or his 18-yard touchdown catch in the second … or his 69-yard touchdown catch in the third. And if that’s all you saw, that’s plenty—when you gain 159 yards on your scoring plays alone, that’s already a good day. But Chase did a lot more than that, catching eight other passes for 107 more yards. And even that is underselling Chase’s day, because he also drew a pair of DPIs for 19 more yards. Chase was consistent too; only five of his completions failed to pick up first downs, only three were unsuccessful plays, and he was the target on just one incomplete pass.

Chase was at his best when the Bengals needed him most. He was targeted six times on third downs and picked up four conversions: both DPIs, that 69-yard score, and a 30-yard gain on third-and-27 with the game tied in the fourth quarter. That miracle conversion kept Cincinnati’s game-winning drive alive and helped to ensure that Patrick Mahomes would never get the ball back with a chance to win. Per Stathead, it was the longest third- or fourth-down conversion of the season (excluding Cleveland’s meaningless end-of-half lateral play against Pittsburgh in Week 8).

Add all that up and you get 128 DYAR, comfortably the best of the year. In fact, it makes our list of the top 20 wide receiver games on record, coming in at 10th place—and it moves up to eighth if you ignore rushing data.

Chase has the best game here since DeAndre Hopkins in his second season in 2014. A few other players also made this list in their second seasons—specifically, Flipper Anderson in first place and Kenny Britt just below Chase. But Chase is just the second rookie to qualify, joining Jerry Rice, who is in 20th place (and also fourth place for a game played a decade later). This means, yes, Ja’Marr Chase just produced the best rookie game in our records.

Randy Moss makes the list twice, and narrowly missed making it a third time. (His famous three-catch, 163-yard, three-touchdown game against Dallas had 80 DYAR; aside from his scoring plays, his other five targets were all incomplete.) That’s largely why he finished with 430 DYAR in his first season, virtually tied with Michael Thomas’ 431 with the Saints in 2016 for the rookie record. With 319 DYAR so far (316 receiving, 3 rushing) and one game to go, Chase is within shouting distance of that mark. He’s not going to catch Moss’ 17 touchdowns in his first year, nor Anquan Boldin’s totals of 165 targets or 101 catches. However, he is already up to 1,429 receiving yards, surpassing the NFL rookie record of 1,400 set way back in last year by Justin Jefferson, Chase’s former teammate at LSU. Up next: the pro football rookie record of 1,473 by Bill Groman of the Houston Oilers in the AFL’s first season in 1960. We’ll leave all arguments about the 17-game schedule for a later day.

If Chase’s game was the shot, Glennon’s was the chaser, and it sure was sobering. We’ll start with the raw totals, which are brutally bad on their own. Glennon only threw 11 passes against the Bears, completing four of them for 24 yards. He also lost 34 yards on four sacks. (We’ll pause here for a moment and let you do a little subtraction in your head.) But wait, there’s more: Glennon fumbled four times (one of which you might have missed because Glennon recovered the loose ball and threw an incomplete pass to Pharoh Cooper) and threw a pair of interceptions.

And yet somehow, the details of Glennon’s performance are even worse. He had four dropbacks in the first quarter: a sack and fumble, recovered by Chicago; an interception; another sack; and a 4-yard completion (including 11 yards after the catch … again, we’ll pause while you do some subtraction) on third-and-7.

At that point, the Giants were down 14-0 and Joe Judge virtually benched Glennon, who didn’t throw another pass until eight minutes had expired in the third quarter. In between, the Giants called 15 handoffs in a row (bringing their totals to 27 handoffs and four passing plays) as the Bears extended their lead to 29-3. Finally Judge relented and let Glennon pass again. Glennon threw incomplete on third-and-5 before hitting Evan Engram for a 12-yard gain on second-and-2. Finally, after 33 Giants plays (including two turnovers and a safety) over eight drives, Glennon had thrown for a first down. Three snaps later, he was sacked and fumbled, and the Giants recovered. Glennon threw for another first down in the fourth quarter, but also suffered another interception, another sack, and another fumble. 

It’s hard to measure this kind of ineptitude, even with our numbers. For starters, Glennon does make our list of the 20 worst games since 1983…

… but even that undersells Glennon’s incompetence. He only had 16 dropbacks and rushes, least of anyone in this table. DYAR is a counting stat, even negative DYAR, and Glennon stands out as a part-timer in a table where most quarterbacks had at least twice as many opportunities to screw up.

It’s not unusual, of course, for quarterbacks to suffer multiple fumbles or interceptions in a game. And it’s more common than you might think for players to lose more yards on sacks than they gain in completions. But combining those factors? Glennon is just the second player in Stathead’s database with multiple fumbles, multiple interceptions, and negative net passing yardage. The other: Ryan Leaf in THAT game.

After the game, it was revealed that Glennon had suffered a hand injury against Chicago and would not play in Week 18. That likely explains some of his struggles and New York’s obscenely conservative play calling, though Judge never mentioned Glennon’s name or protecting his quarterback in his bizarre 2,614-word postgame diatribe. Regardless, with Glennon and Daniel Jones sidelined, the Giants will turn once more to Jake Fromm in their season finale against Washington. Fromm was last seen starting against the Eagles last week, when he completed six out of 17 passes for 25 yards with an interception before being benched early in the third quarter. Enjoy, Giants fans!