Justin Fields showed steady progress through OTAs and veteran minicamps this spring. He finished with a flourish on Thursday, delivering his sharpest practice to date with multiple big plays and touchdowns. It was an encouraging sign. Everything was punctuated by arguably his best pass of the entire off-season. After his drop, Fields fired a rocket over the outstretched fingertips of T.J. Edwards and between rookie cornerback Tyrique Stevenson and safety Elijah Hicks to Robert Tonyan for a touchdown. Tonyan made a great one-handed catch to finish the play.
It looks like a simple pitch and catch at full speed, but that wasn't the case at all. Fields explained during his presser after practice that there was a specific reason he made that throw the way he did. It had everything to do with the presence of safety Eddie Jackson.
“Bo Jack had inside leverage, so really on that one, it was just beating Bo Jack to the spot right there. That’s why it was kind of a flat throw right there, because Bo Jack has seen our concepts. He knows, and Tyrique – we know he’s going to jump those little out routes – so I was waiting for that one. Just fitting it in the window and really being ready to throw and putting it in a spot where only he can get it.”
In other words, Fields read where Jackson was before the snap, watched where he drifted as the play unfolded, and then put the ball only where Tonyan had a chance at it. The fact he processed all of that in a matter of seconds proves how far Fields has come as a quarterback.
Justin Fields is starting to see the game properly.
Moments like that with Jackson are an everyday occurrence for quarterbacks. People often think they have a good idea of how much information one must process on every snap. They have no clue. If it were easy, many more guys could play the position. It must've taken countless hours of film study for Fields to reach that point where he knew what Jackson would do against the exact play the offense ran. His assessment proved correct. It was a moment of a young quarterback operating like a 10-year veteran.
That is more encouraging than the throw itself. Once Justin Fields is able to see the consistently like that, defenses are in trouble. He's already a lethal threat with his legs. If he can pick you apart before and after the snap with his arm, it's basically over. That is what probably has the Bears excited more than anything. It will be interesting to see how this carries over into training camp. That is when the defense will start rushing him more often and throwing more disguised coverages at him.
If he continues to pick them apart, 2023 just got exciting.
