Can Lamar Jackson Break His Playoff Curse?

Lamar Jackson is a one-time MVP, looking like he’s going to be a two-time MVP in a couple of weeks. He is a regular feature in the Pro Bowl when healthy, and by any measurement or consideration is one of the best quarterbacks in football today. He is at the helm of the fifth-best team in DVOA history, has the top seed, and is coming off of a bye week. 

He also has an opportunity to expunge a big, black spot on his record. He is, by at least one metric, the worst playoff quarterback in modern NFL history.

This past weekend, we added playoff DYAR/DVOA stats back to 1981 to the DVOA Historical Archive for subscribers, a treasure trove of data from nearly the entirety of the modern passing game. You will, perhaps, not be surprised to learn that Tom Brady laps the field with 4,392 playoff passing DYAR, or that 1989 Joe Montana has the best single postseason of all time, or that Kurt Warner has the highest average DVOA among postseason quarterbacks. It’s nice to see that quantified, but those aren’t surprises.

No, the biggest surprise comes when you scroll to the bottom of the lists. Here’s the list of the players with the worst total playoff passing DYAR since 1981.

That is not the sort of company Jackson usually keeps. That’s a lot of journeymen, lucky seasons, and solid but unspectacular players. “Unspectacular” might well be the last adjective in the world you’d use to describe Jackson; this is not where MVPs can be found.

Some of those names got on the list from one terrible game. We can, instead, look at players with solid sample sizes. Here’s the list of the players with the lowest average passing DVOA, weighted by attempts per season, with a minimum of 150 attempts. (Jared Goff‘s first game this year is not included.)

There should not be a comparison between Jackson and Jay Schroeder. Schroeder is the guy who replaced Joe Theismann after he suffered his career-ending broken leg and ended up starting for Washington for a season, and later popped up with the Los Angeles Raiders as well. While he had a cannon for an arm and was certainly capable of good play – he led the league in DVOA in 1990 and had two seasons over 1,000 DYAR – Schroeder is better remembered for frequently getting hurt, fighting with other quarterbacks on the depth chart, and bouncing in and out of starting lineups across the league. He was good enough to keep getting opportunities, but never someone you would build a franchise around. If he can be compared to any playoff quarterback, it’s Baker Mayfield, not the first-team All-Pro.

Jackson’s track record is one of the very few things people point to if they doubt Baltimore’s path to the Super Bowl. “Playoff Lamar,” some people moan. All the regular-season accolades and numbers are great for what they are, but some people want to see Jackson and the Baltimore offense have postseason success before they can really trust the Ravens in January. Most people who think this way aren’t thinking about DVOA and analytics, but they point to Jackson’s 1-3 record, his 6.6 yards per attempt, his 19 sacks and his three touchdowns to five interceptions as reasons to be wary of putting too much trust in Baltimore.

Even Jackson’s legs don’t fully blunt the criticism. While Jackson did rush for a touchdown against Tennessee in the 2020 Wild Card Round, he has an underwhelming 357 yards and 6.8 yards per attempt in his four postseason starts. That’s good for 55 DYAR, but even that doesn’t let him pass Andy Dalton on the all-time postseason DYAR chart.

There’s no denying that Jackson’s first four postseason starts have been underwhelming, at best:

• As a rookie in 2018, Jackson took seven sacks, threw an interception, and fumbled three times against the Chargers in the Wild Card Round. The home crowd booed Jackson off the field as the Chargers took a 23-3 lead late in the fourth quarter, before a couple late Jackson-to-Michael Crabtree touchdowns very briefly made things interesting. Result: -110 passing DYAR; -64.5% passing DVOA; 11 rushing DYAR.
• The very next year, Baltimore entered the postseason as one of the best teams of all time with a 38.9% DVOA. In a few weeks, Jackson would be named MVP of the league. But in the Divisional Round game against Tennessee, the Ravens came up small. Jackson’s raw numbers were more impressive – 31-for-59 for 365 yards, with 143 more yards on the ground – but Jackson was again sacked four times, threw a couple picks, lost a fumble and was generally bottled up by a very average Titans defense. Result: -101 passing DYAR; -36.9% passing DVOA; 40 rushing DYAR.
• In 2020, Jackson and the Ravens picked up their one postseason win, getting revenge on the Titans in the Wild Card Round. Jackson’s legs were again the highlight, as he rushed for 136 yards and a score, but he was still sacked five times and threw an interception. Result: -43 passing DYAR; -34.1% passing DVOA; 25 rushing DYAR
• The momentum didn’t carry into the Divisional Round against Buffalo. Jackson was sacked three times, fumbled, threw a pick-six, and left the game in the third quarter with a concussion after a bad snap ended up with Jackson buried under multiple Bills defenders. Result: -83 passing DYAR; -65.2% passing DVOA; -21 rushing DYAR. The combined -104 DYAR makes it one of the worst 70 playoff games ever from a quarterback.

And that’s it. Ankle and knee injuries ended Jackson’s season early in each of the last two seasons, so we haven’t seen Jackson in the postseason since 2020. It’s not one bad game dragging Jackson down. He has never had a playoff game with positive DYAR. Even his one win wasn’t particularly impressive in advanced stats. He comes by his last place ranking honestly.

Now let us be clear – absolutely none of that means that Jackson can not and will not go off this postseason. Jackson is a better football player now than he was when he was making regular playoff appearances. He throws fewer interceptions. He has a better command of the offense – an offense better tuned to allow him to pass the ball than Greg Roman’s schemes ever were. While his advanced stats this season are not nearly as good as they were in 2019, it’s hard to argue that Jackson isn’t a better player now, even if his results haven’t been quite as good. He’s playing with a level of confidence we have never really seen from Jackson before.

And more to the point, there is not some sort of magical barrier between December and January, through which Jackson’s skillset cannot translate. Jackson does not get blinded by the lights; he does not flinch away from the best teams in the league; he does not lose all motor control when entered into a single-elimination tournament. On Christmas, in a playoff atmosphere, on the road against the best team in the NFC, Jackson shredded the 49ers – 146 DYAR and a 52.5% passing DVOA on the way to a comfortable win. Jackson has put up positive DVOA in both games against the Browns, one of the 20 best defenses in DVOA history. He blew up Miami, a playoff team, in Week 17 in a game that clinched home field advantage for Baltimore – 240 passing DYAR and a 166.9% DVOA. There’s absolutely no reason that Jackson can’t put up those same numbers just because the calendar has passed the Ides of January.

That’s why we’re phrasing this as the chance to expunge something from his record, rather than some sort of massive hurdle or piece of personal growth Jackson must experience if the Ravens are going to capitalize on their great season. Jackson is too good of a player to belong on these tables. He has simply had four bad games in a row, and as his sample size increases, he’s almost assuredly going to drag himself out of that hole and get out of the company of such a milquetoast and depressing bunch. Just because Jackson struggled against Melvin Ingram five years ago doesn’t mean he’s going to be spending Saturday being ground into the M&T Bank turf by Will Anderson.

That being said, there is not a long history of quarterbacks starting their postseason careers so poorly and then turning things around. Most quarterbacks who have had starts anywhere near as bad as Jackson’s don’t make it back to the playoffs; they’re simply not that good to begin with. There have only been seven quarterbacks to start their postseason career with at least -100 passing DYAR and eventually get back to positive numbers: Stan Humphries, Jalen Hurts, Eli Manning, Neil O’Donnell, Phil Simms, Deshaun Watson and Doug Williams. Most of those guys had one particularly bad game and climbed out of it gradually with a Super Bowl run. Williams is the only one to start below -200 DYAR, and he only managed to get to 11 after winning a championship with Washington. Jackson is starting in a bigger hole than any of them.

And Jackson does have to face Houston to start things off. In Week 1 against the Texans, Jackson had -54 DYAR and a -43.6% DVOA, turning the ball over twice and being held to under 200 yards. That’s very much on par with his postseason performances to date.

But no. The Ravens are heavily favored, and they’re favored because Jackson has been putting up fantastic numbers down the stretch. The most logical, likely scenario for this weekend is for Jackson to get the monkey off his back and finally have a playoff game that matches his talent. Maybe that will finally quiet down some of Jackson’s final remaining naysayers. 

And if not, well, it’ll be a long offseason in Baltimore.