JaVale McGee stares down Lakers player after dunking on him (VIDEO)

Miguel Montero’s pinch-hit grand slam lifts Cubs over Dodgers

DeMarco Murray was almost traded back to Cowboys this past offseason

Rising, falling QBs after NFL Week 3

Posted by on Sep 25, 2016 22:35

One rookie quarterback proved worthy of the hype in Week 3 of the 2016 NFL season.

A couple of young quarterbacks are still taking their lumps.

Some quarterbacks calmed their restless fans for now and a couple of quarterbacks in their 30s looked every bit their age.

Here’s how the quarterback landscape shakes out after Week 3.

Rising: Carson Wentz

The secret already was out on Carson Wentz. Leading the Eagles to a 2-0 record was enough for a “Welcome to Wentzylvania” billboard to grace I-76 near Lincoln Financial Field.

It was one thing for the rookie to beat the Browns and the hobbled Bears. But steering the Eagles to a 34-3 shellacking of the Steelers Sunday makes Wentz a bona fide star. He notched his first career 300-yard passing game and added two touchdown passes without throwing an interception yet in his career. He’s thrown five TD passes and according to NFL.com he became the first rookie to throw his first 100 passes without an interception.

Wentz completed 23 of 31 passes and averaged 9.7 yards per attempt. Darren Sproles accounted for 128 of Wentz’s 301 passing yards, including a 73-yard, catch-and-run touchdown early in the third quarter that made it 20-3. The visiting Steelers were cooked at that point.

The Eagles’ rookie was compared to Ben Roethlisberger, his Week 3 counterpart, all week. It’s only a matter of time now before the Wentzburger is on every menu in Philly.

Falling: Marcus Mariota

Marcus Mariota appeared to lead the Titans back from a 17-3 deficit with a 13-yard touchdown pass to Andre Johnson with 27 seconds left in the game, but Johnson was called for offensive pass interference. Mariota’s fourth-down pass to Harry Douglas in the end zone fell incomplete and the Titans fell short, 17-10 at home.

Against the league’s worst pass defense entering Week 2, Mariota completed just 17 of 33 passes for 214 yards with no touchdowns and an interception. The second-year quarterback also lost a fumble in the second quarter, and the Raiders converted with a field goal to extend their lead to 10-3.

Anyone expecting Mariota to make a huge leap in his second season will have to be a little more patient.

Rising: Aaron Rodgers

Perhaps this was Aaron Rodgers’ “R-E-L-A-X” moment of 2016. He threw four touchdown passes, more than he did in his first two games combined, in Sunday’s 34-27 home win over the Lions.

Rodgers’ stock as a quarterback doesn’t have much room to rise. But there was some consternation about the Packers’ offense that he put to rest by throwing TD passes on the Packers’ first three possessions for a 21-3 lead 14 seconds into the second quarter.  For the game, Rodgers completed 15 of 24 passes for 205 yards and no interceptions. He only threw six passes in the second half as the Packers milked the clock and hung on to improve to 2-1.

Falling: Carson Palmer

Carson Palmer’s arrow already was sagging downward with the Cardinals trailing 33-16 in the fourth quarter at Buffalo.

Then he threw four interceptions in the last six and a half minutes.

Sure, a West Coast team playing a 1 p.m. game on the East Coast is hard enough. On top of that, the Bills had three more days of rest than the Cardinals.

It’s concerning, however, that Palmer has thrown four interceptions in two of his last four games going back to last year’s NFC championship game.

The Cardinals went three-and-out on their first five possessions and the Bills took a 17-0 lead. Palmer completed just 26 of 50 passes for 287 yards and was sacked five times. This was against a Bills defense that allowed 493 yards to the Jets in Week 2.

The loss dropped the Cardinals to 1-2, and the age whispers regarding the 36-year-old Palmer will get a little louder.

Rising: Trevor Siemian

The Broncos were 2-0 in spite of Trevor Seimian, but on Sunday Siemian helped them get to 3-0 with four touchdown passes in a 29-17 win at Cincinnati.

Siemian came into the game with one touchdown pass and three interceptions. He now has more TD passes than picks and threw the first interception-free game of his career. He completed 23 of 35 passes for 312 yards. He tossed aside his “game manager” name tag and replaced it with his second “fourth-quarter comeback” badge.

The Bengals took a 17-16 lead on a field goal eight seconds into the final quarter. Then Siemian navigated a 13-play, 82-yard touchdown drive that ended with a 1-yard scoring strike to tight end John Phillips. The 2-point conversion failed, but Siemian insured the 22-17 lead with a 55-yard touchdown pass to Demaryius Thomas with 4:23 left.

Siemian also completed 10 of 11 passes in the fourth quarter and quieted any potential quarterback controversy in Denver for the time being.

Falling: Ryan Fitzpatrick

Ten days after finally solving Rex Ryan’s defense, Ryan Fitzpatrick took a big step back against Bob Sutton’s defense.

Fitzpatrick became the first quarterback since Peyton Manning in 2007 to throw six interceptions in a game.

Even Joe Namath threw six interceptions twice. It happens to the best of them. But Fitzpatrick didn’t look like one of the best of them in Sunday’s 24-3 loss at Kansas City. He completed just 20 of his 44 passes for 188 yards.

Two of the Chiefs’ interceptions came on passes that the Chiefs deflected. So this was a tenacious defense that Fitzpatrick faced. But six interceptions would be inexcusable against the ’85 Bears.

It’s not the kind of thing Fitzpatrick should be doing after waiting the entire offseason to sign his contract.

Rising: Kirk Cousins

It wasn’t quite a “You Like That” kind of comeback, but Kirk Cousins did orchestrate the game-winning field goal drive in the Redskins’ 29-27 road victory over the Giants.

Cousins threw just one pass in the 10-play, 56-yard series that culminated in Dustin Hopkins’ 37-yard field goal with 1:51 left. But he made a couple of big plays earlier in the game.

The Redskins fell behind 21-9 in the second quarter, but Cousins threw a 31-yard pass and a 44-yard touchdown pass to DeSean Jackson on consecutive plays to make it 21-16. In the third quarter, the Redskins took a 23-21 lead on Cousins’ 55-yard touchdown pass to Jamison Crowder.

Cousins threw for 296 yards with two touchdowns and no interceptions against a defense that limited Drew Brees to 263 yards and one touchdown a week earlier. In earning their first win of the season, the Redskins put 29 points on the board compared to 13 by the high-octane Saints offense at MetLife Stadium a week earlier.

Cousins evened his touchdown-to-interception ratio at three apiece and put all the panic in Washington on hold for at least a week.

Falling: Blake Bortles

That improvement everyone expected from Blake Bortles and the Jaguars doesn’t seem to be happening. Jacksonville could have jump-started its season with a win at home over the Ravens Sunday. Instead, they’re 0-3 for the third time in four years after losing 19-17.

Bortles threw two touchdown passes and three interceptions. It’s the fifth straight game he’s thrown at least one interception going back to last year and he’s yet to throw more touchdown passes than interceptions in a game this season.

The third-year quarterback completed 24 of 38 passes for 194 yards. Two of his interceptions came in the fourth quarter. The Jaguars led 17-16 with less than five minutes left and were in field-goal range when Bortles threw his second interception. The ball was tipped at the line of scrimmage and Bortles didn’t get much help all day from his offensive line. He was sacked four times.

Bortles was drafted third overall in 2014. In a league full of teams desperate for franchise quarterbacks, a lot of quarterbacks get overdrafted. Bortles is starting to look like the latest to fall into that category.

About Mike Batista

Quantcast