Observations from Watching Case Keenum Live for the First Time
Jroskamp
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It was a cold day in Charlotte when we stepped off the plane. Snow was coming down, but it wasn’t quite cold enough to stick so everything was wet. Fog covered the city’s skyline. My dad and I were making our annual trip to a Vikings’ away game. This year we chose to go to Carolina because it worked out well with my school schedule. We had a great time seeing the city and the NASCAR hall of fame. We had a wonderful meal at the Charlotte Ale House, but that wasn’t why we were there. We were there to watch our favorite team play football.
All week leading up to the game I knew what I was going to write about after seeing them play for the first time this year. I was going to write about how Case Keenum was winning me over and how seeing him live finally gave me confidence in him and trust that he could lead us to the promise land. But that is not what I came out of the game thinking.
The team came out and made far too many mistakes throughout the game. They weren’t necessarily bad, they were just uncharacteristically sloppy. I’m not really too worried that this will be a continuous trend, I just more think it was a result of their circumstance. This was the final game of a three-road game stretch, all of which were against potential playoff teams. And before that, we had two more tough games in Washington and against Los Angeles. I think in hindsight to have gone 4-1 through those five games is a pretty impressive stretch. It wasn’t what the team showed me that made me hesitate, it was what Case Keenum showed me that left me unimpressed.
Now, before everyone starts to blow up at me about how I am just a Teddy Bridgewater supporter or that I just don’t like Case Keenum, that simply isn’t true. I like Case Keenum, a lot. I think that he has cemented himself as the starter for the remainder of the season and has the potential to lead us to the Super Bowl. He has landed in the perfect situation with a great offensive coordinator and a fantastic supporting cast to truly maximize his potential. He has thrived over the last month or so and proved a lot of people wrong. My only concern with Case is that he is not a great quarterback.
Let me explain. Case Keenum is a very good quarterback. Well above average, and we could certainly be worse off as a franchise. The difference between a good quarterback and a great quarterback is what happens when the team around him doesn’t perform as well as usual. Can that guy lift the team by himself? On Sunday, we saw that the answer is no, at least for now.
All season long, Keenum has played at a certain level and one knock on him that has been there all season is that he isn’t the most accurate quarterback. A lot of his inaccurate passes ended up being hauled in by absolutely insane catches from his other worldly receivers. And that isn’t necessarily me saying that he is bad. I applaud and appreciate the fact that he trusts his receivers enough to just throw them the ball no matter what and know that they will win the fight for it 90% of the time. This is something that we haven’t really seen over the last few seasons. A lot of the criticism of Sam Bradford and Teddy Bridgewater was that they sometimes would not trust their receivers. Often settling for the easy or safe throws and not gambling for the big play. It is very refreshing to have a quarterback that is willing to roll the dice and take a chance. But today was that other 10%.
Adam Thielen and Stefon Diggs probably had their worst outings of the season this week. Each not making the plays that we are used to seeing them make. And maybe we have come to expect too much out of this duo. Week after week, these two guys make play after play and when they don’t make that spectacular play we are surprised. And this really hurt Keenum’s performance.
This was probably most evident on the second interception he threw. The play call was a simple bubble screen to Stefon Diggs on the right side, an easy throw that most quarterbacks should make. However, Keenum threw the ball high and to the left. Diggs had to take a big step to his right and jump to just catch the ball. It still hit him the shoulder after he made his adjustment. The ball bounced off of his shoulder and right into the hands of Panthers cornerback James Bradbury. Yes, Diggs should have caught the ball, but even if he did, Bradbury was coming down and would have tackled him at the stop anyway. Keenum in the future needs to put that ball on Diggs to allow him to make the catch and have time to make a move in space.
Now, I was impressed by Keenum’s mental fortitude in this game. He never changed as the game went along. After both interceptions, he came out on the next drive and threw touchdowns. And after being down by eleven in the fourth quarter, he was able to lead the team back and tie it up with three and a half minutes to go. But he couldn’t get the job done.
The only thing that I was waiting to see from Case Keenum was his ability to put the team on his back and win the game. That is what great quarterbacks do. Even if the rest of the team is struggling around them, they manage the carry them to a victory. It is the one thing that we have not seen Keenum have to do throughout this season and when given his first chance to do that, he failed.
This is not to say that he is unable to do this later on in the season. It is just that when given the opportunity on Sunday, he wasn’t able to follow through. And please do not take this as me saying that we should bench Case Keenum because that is not at all what I am saying. In fact, I think we should stick with him for the remainder of the year and throughout the playoffs. This is not an argument for us to start Teddy because, frankly, he has not shown this ability either. I am just voicing my concern that if we need Case to step up and carry the team, he may not be able to do so. From what we have seen, if this team wants to win the Super Bowl, the whole team will have to be playing at a very high level.