Let’s put the “Burrow Holds It Too Long” debate to bed
November 6, 2025
Let’s put the “Burrow Holds It Too Long” debate to bed
33 comments
Yes please.
joe literally has one of the fastest releases in the nfl, he’s just being let down by our trash o-line every week.
Yes. I hate hat all these ‘fans’ who just take any opportunity to blame or trash Burrow. Especially when they have no idea what makes Burrow so good
I’ve said this a lot. I’ll say it again: when you get sacked, you don’t have those seconds count against your “time to throw” because you never threw. This stat is good for one thing: comparing QBs time to get to their first or second reads when they’re open. That’s it.
Joe Flacco gets pressured less because the offense is more balanced. Joe Burrow’s offense is heavier pass because that is what Joe Burrow prefers. Joe Burrow should evolve and realize that as great as he is, he’d be safer and better if he balanced out the passing with running.
All that this is conveying is that Burrow is really, really good when he is pressured. None of these stats back up that he holds the ball “too long”. If anything, it reinforces that he holds on to the ball longer when he is pressured. Which is a good thing, and a bad thing.
It’s a good thing when he extends the play and gets an explosive out of it. It’s a bad thing when he can’t extend the play, gets sacked, and gets injured.
I don’t want Burrow to go full on pocket passer with zero interest in trying to extend the play (this is when he’s at his best). What I do want him to do is to have more awareness of when it just aint happening and to live to play another day.
Perfect example of this was the preseason game, coming back from injury, and taking a 20 yard loss on a sack scrambling around like a bafoon out there. Have some awareness.
I mean, he does, but he has to because the O-line in front of him had the blocking potential of a warm bowl of oatmeal. He had to check down, look back, see if his receivers were covered, keep checking, dance away from the edge rushers, weave out of the tackles, run forward, look again, aw, hell just throw it: Chase and Tee are out there somewhere.
Or…yknow…just run for it himself.
He holds the ball 3/10ths of a second longer on average when under pressure. Meaning he is squeezing as much time as possible to find an opening. The question appears to be, is the 3/10s of a second the statistical difference between being sacked or not?
Is the lower throw away rate resulting in the longer time to throw. Does this mean he is in fact holding on to the ball and getting hit/sacked more often? Do opposing defenses plan around Joes Tendencies to hold on to the ball and send more pressure to go for the sack since there is a higher likelihood of sacking Burrow vs say a Flacco who gets rid of the ball quicker when under pressure. A 7% difference in pressure rates seems to suggest defenses are taking a different approach against Flacco.
Sure he has the highest grade when under pressure but at what cost, a a knee, a hand, a toe? Maybe he should in fact work on getting his time to throw down when under pressure. Maybe he wouldn’t get hit as often and would sustain less injuries.
Burrow can’t play if he isn’t healthy.
Flacco has seen a significant increase in pressures this year over last and has a significantly higher tendency to throw the ball way this year than last. otherwise there is only about a one percent difference between the two which i attribute to flacco being older and less likely to extend the play
We play a different offense with Burrow. We play a scheme that protects the QB when Browning and Flacco are on the field, but not with Joe.
But I don’t think this matters, and its NOT why Joe keeps getting hurt. Joe gets hurt on “fluke” plays where he lands “wrong”. Plays that most other players survive.
The problem is Joe Burrow is fragile. He easily tears ligaments. Any time he his tackled or knocked down his season can end, even though other QBs would be fine.
Burrow is better at playing QB.
Burrow could also learn some things from a SB champion 18 year vet who has this offense humming at a level that only Burrow himself has achieved.
That doesn’t mean Flacco is better. It doesn’t mean that anyone should hope the team moves on from Burrow.
Burrow is the future and maximizes the Bengals’ chances of winning a SB. Burrow isn’t perfect and other guys do individual things slightly better. He could learn from that, but in aggregate Burrow is a top 3 QB. Any opinion besides this one is dumb.
Burrow is the man and anybody who thinks otherwise is crazy. But I still think he can learn a little pocket presence from Flacco. Where Burrow is great, Flacco is wise. I know it’s ambiguous but the eye test shows what the stats can’t.
And if the pressured throw time is .39 seconds longer with Burrow, well that’s room for ~11% improvement and I’m confident Burrow would agree. He’s *always* trying to improve.
None of those stats figure in sacks. Why dont we look at the percentages of sacks on those pressures. We’ve known Joe is great under pressure…he showed that in 2021. The issue is the hits/sacks he takes. Not thats he is bad under pressure. This post is only showing the stats that work his narrative and not a complete picture
Burrow is the fucking man.
But he gets hurt too much. I don’t want him hurt so often.
Burrow put the debate to bed last year when he acknowledged that he often holds onto the ball too long.
It’s not about holding onto the ball too long. It’s about being in shotgun too often. If the defense knows where you are going to be every play, it’s a lot easier to go get you. That pretty basic logic. Even when we do go under center they run the vast majority of the time and the defense knows that. You can see with Flacco that changing it up helps both the pressure rate (see the almost 7% decrease with Flacco) and the running game.
Him holding the ball isn’t the big issue. I will say though, him always trying to step up and rarely running out of the pocket to the side is a tendency that if I can pick up I’m sure nfl coaches and players can.
All that to say his reluctance to mix up his place in the formation leads to higher pressure/sack rates and a worse running game. He needs to adapt that part of his game to have this offense continue to improve under him and hopefully keep him healthy.🤞
To be clear. Anyone who gets sacked held onto the ball for too long.
I’ll put it to bed when burrow stops holding the ball too long and stops getting hurt on hits that should have never been
I don’t think that this data alone is something we ought to put anything to bed over. If there was corresponding OL PFF scores presented alongside it’d be useful and start to paint a picture.
Isn’t this goodberry post confirming he does hold the ball too long? I’m confused what information we’re seeing here that confirms the opposite.
3.47 seconds under pressure to flaccos 3.08
I don’t know what is so hard to understand about this topic. Burrow is an amazing QB. But he can be an amazing QB and not be perfect.
Similarly, it can both be true that Burrow is very successful when he holds the ball a long time AND he still likely holds the ball a little bit too much.
Does that mean he needs to become Joe Flacco and get it out as fast as Flacco does? No, it doesn’t. But it does mean that he can get rid of the ball ever so slightly quicker and not take as many sacks, which would likely improve his play a bit.
Multiple things can be true.
No, I’ll trust my eyes on this one thanks.
Does the offense have too many long route concepts and not enough hot routes considering they have one of the worst offensive lines in the league? In other words does the offense simply ask the QB to hold the ball too long?
The tweet literally shows Burrow holding it longer than Flacco under pressure. It’s a valid and continued criticism. He
Burrow needs to line up under center more to help the run game and the o line.
Turns out they AREN’T willing to listen to facts
The O line couldn’t have improved just a little bit throughout 9 games could they?
Goodberry’s stats don’t make any sense. 8 yards per attempt seems high when his career average is 7.4.
TBH avg yards and completion percentage don’t make sense as a metric when throwing the ball away is considered a neutral to positive outcome
Goodberry, posting sanity. I already knew this and so should all the real fans paying attention. This narrative of holding the ball too long continues to grow against the reality of the situation.
So your proof that burrow is not holding onto the ball too long, is that he holds onto it longer than another qb with the same team???
All this does is support that he holds onto the ball too long
to the some of the commenters above: why don’t u trade burrrow and use flacco instead then? the difference is what makes burrow special and some of u just dont deserve burrow
It’s high reward, but also high risk 🤷♂️
How is “pressure” determined? I’m not even trying to make an argument, just curious.
33 comments
Yes please.
joe literally has one of the fastest releases in the nfl, he’s just being let down by our trash o-line every week.
Yes. I hate hat all these ‘fans’ who just take any opportunity to blame or trash Burrow. Especially when they have no idea what makes Burrow so good
I’ve said this a lot. I’ll say it again: when you get sacked, you don’t have those seconds count against your “time to throw” because you never threw. This stat is good for one thing: comparing QBs time to get to their first or second reads when they’re open. That’s it.
Joe Flacco gets pressured less because the offense is more balanced. Joe Burrow’s offense is heavier pass because that is what Joe Burrow prefers. Joe Burrow should evolve and realize that as great as he is, he’d be safer and better if he balanced out the passing with running.
All that this is conveying is that Burrow is really, really good when he is pressured. None of these stats back up that he holds the ball “too long”. If anything, it reinforces that he holds on to the ball longer when he is pressured. Which is a good thing, and a bad thing.
It’s a good thing when he extends the play and gets an explosive out of it. It’s a bad thing when he can’t extend the play, gets sacked, and gets injured.
I don’t want Burrow to go full on pocket passer with zero interest in trying to extend the play (this is when he’s at his best). What I do want him to do is to have more awareness of when it just aint happening and to live to play another day.
Perfect example of this was the preseason game, coming back from injury, and taking a 20 yard loss on a sack scrambling around like a bafoon out there. Have some awareness.
I mean, he does, but he has to because the O-line in front of him had the blocking potential of a warm bowl of oatmeal. He had to check down, look back, see if his receivers were covered, keep checking, dance away from the edge rushers, weave out of the tackles, run forward, look again, aw, hell just throw it: Chase and Tee are out there somewhere.
Or…yknow…just run for it himself.
He holds the ball 3/10ths of a second longer on average when under pressure. Meaning he is squeezing as much time as possible to find an opening. The question appears to be, is the 3/10s of a second the statistical difference between being sacked or not?
Is the lower throw away rate resulting in the longer time to throw. Does this mean he is in fact holding on to the ball and getting hit/sacked more often? Do opposing defenses plan around Joes Tendencies to hold on to the ball and send more pressure to go for the sack since there is a higher likelihood of sacking Burrow vs say a Flacco who gets rid of the ball quicker when under pressure. A 7% difference in pressure rates seems to suggest defenses are taking a different approach against Flacco.
Sure he has the highest grade when under pressure but at what cost, a a knee, a hand, a toe? Maybe he should in fact work on getting his time to throw down when under pressure. Maybe he wouldn’t get hit as often and would sustain less injuries.
Burrow can’t play if he isn’t healthy.
Flacco has seen a significant increase in pressures this year over last and has a significantly higher tendency to throw the ball way this year than last. otherwise there is only about a one percent difference between the two which i attribute to flacco being older and less likely to extend the play
We play a different offense with Burrow. We play a scheme that protects the QB when Browning and Flacco are on the field, but not with Joe.
But I don’t think this matters, and its NOT why Joe keeps getting hurt. Joe gets hurt on “fluke” plays where he lands “wrong”. Plays that most other players survive.
The problem is Joe Burrow is fragile. He easily tears ligaments. Any time he his tackled or knocked down his season can end, even though other QBs would be fine.
Burrow is better at playing QB.
Burrow could also learn some things from a SB champion 18 year vet who has this offense humming at a level that only Burrow himself has achieved.
That doesn’t mean Flacco is better. It doesn’t mean that anyone should hope the team moves on from Burrow.
Burrow is the future and maximizes the Bengals’ chances of winning a SB. Burrow isn’t perfect and other guys do individual things slightly better. He could learn from that, but in aggregate Burrow is a top 3 QB. Any opinion besides this one is dumb.
Burrow is the man and anybody who thinks otherwise is crazy. But I still think he can learn a little pocket presence from Flacco. Where Burrow is great, Flacco is wise. I know it’s ambiguous but the eye test shows what the stats can’t.
And if the pressured throw time is .39 seconds longer with Burrow, well that’s room for ~11% improvement and I’m confident Burrow would agree. He’s *always* trying to improve.
None of those stats figure in sacks. Why dont we look at the percentages of sacks on those pressures. We’ve known Joe is great under pressure…he showed that in 2021. The issue is the hits/sacks he takes. Not thats he is bad under pressure. This post is only showing the stats that work his narrative and not a complete picture
Burrow is the fucking man.
But he gets hurt too much. I don’t want him hurt so often.
Burrow put the debate to bed last year when he acknowledged that he often holds onto the ball too long.
It’s not about holding onto the ball too long. It’s about being in shotgun too often. If the defense knows where you are going to be every play, it’s a lot easier to go get you. That pretty basic logic. Even when we do go under center they run the vast majority of the time and the defense knows that. You can see with Flacco that changing it up helps both the pressure rate (see the almost 7% decrease with Flacco) and the running game.
Him holding the ball isn’t the big issue. I will say though, him always trying to step up and rarely running out of the pocket to the side is a tendency that if I can pick up I’m sure nfl coaches and players can.
All that to say his reluctance to mix up his place in the formation leads to higher pressure/sack rates and a worse running game. He needs to adapt that part of his game to have this offense continue to improve under him and hopefully keep him healthy.🤞
To be clear. Anyone who gets sacked held onto the ball for too long.
I’ll put it to bed when burrow stops holding the ball too long and stops getting hurt on hits that should have never been
I don’t think that this data alone is something we ought to put anything to bed over. If there was corresponding OL PFF scores presented alongside it’d be useful and start to paint a picture.
Isn’t this goodberry post confirming he does hold the ball too long? I’m confused what information we’re seeing here that confirms the opposite.
3.47 seconds under pressure to flaccos 3.08
I don’t know what is so hard to understand about this topic. Burrow is an amazing QB. But he can be an amazing QB and not be perfect.
Similarly, it can both be true that Burrow is very successful when he holds the ball a long time AND he still likely holds the ball a little bit too much.
Does that mean he needs to become Joe Flacco and get it out as fast as Flacco does? No, it doesn’t. But it does mean that he can get rid of the ball ever so slightly quicker and not take as many sacks, which would likely improve his play a bit.
Multiple things can be true.
No, I’ll trust my eyes on this one thanks.
Does the offense have too many long route concepts and not enough hot routes considering they have one of the worst offensive lines in the league? In other words does the offense simply ask the QB to hold the ball too long?
The tweet literally shows Burrow holding it longer than Flacco under pressure. It’s a valid and continued criticism. He
Burrow needs to line up under center more to help the run game and the o line.
Turns out they AREN’T willing to listen to facts
The O line couldn’t have improved just a little bit throughout 9 games could they?
Goodberry’s stats don’t make any sense. 8 yards per attempt seems high when his career average is 7.4.
TBH avg yards and completion percentage don’t make sense as a metric when throwing the ball away is considered a neutral to positive outcome
Goodberry, posting sanity. I already knew this and so should all the real fans paying attention. This narrative of holding the ball too long continues to grow against the reality of the situation.
So your proof that burrow is not holding onto the ball too long, is that he holds onto it longer than another qb with the same team???
All this does is support that he holds onto the ball too long
to the some of the commenters above: why don’t u trade burrrow and use flacco instead then? the difference is what makes burrow special and some of u just dont deserve burrow
It’s high reward, but also high risk 🤷♂️
How is “pressure” determined? I’m not even trying to make an argument, just curious.