Lawrence in the last six games has 19 touchdowns – 15 passing and four rushing – with one giveaway and a 113.2 passer rating. Lawrence during the eight-game season-ending winning streak has 20 passing touchdowns, five rushing touchdowns and five turnovers – and Hainsey said Lawrence’s improvement and development goes far beyond statistics.
“With all the stuff that goes on that you see – all the shifts, all the motions, all the cans, all the protection changes – he has a lot of this plate throughout this year,” Hainsey said. “He has done such an excellent job of just handling it constantly and handling it better and better and better each week: The calmness at the line of scrimmage, handling some of those protection checks.”
“There are, like, five or six unbelievable examples in the Colts game of him getting to different plays, getting to the checks we need to get to, then beating the blitz, making a play.
“Those things are very hard to do. He’s done an excellent job at it.”
Lawrence in recent weeks has been mentioned in the MVP conversation with players such as New England Patriots quarterback Drake Maye (34 total touchdowns, 11 interceptions, 14-3 record) and Los Angeles Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford (46 total touchdowns, eight interceptions, 12-5 record).
“So many different names were thrown around for MVP within the first eight games of the season and some of those teams aren’t in the playoffs,” Coen said. “It’s like, ‘How can that be?’ Every season does this (goes up and down) for so many different teams, different players. It’s just the way it goes and there are so many good players in this league.
“Some guys get hot early and then some guys get hot later and it’s really what you do in January that matters.”