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Lamar Jackson couldn’t have performed much better as a passer when he threw five TD passes, only five incompletions and no interceptions while throwing for 281 yards in a victory for Baltimore over Tampa Bay.
It just wasn’t perfect, according to the NFL’s arcane passer rating formula.
Jackson fell two-tenths of a point short in completion percentage from generating the highest attainable rating of 158.3 for a record-setting fourth time in his career.
That mark has been hit 60 times in the regular season or playoffs in the last 75 seasons for a player with at least 15 attempts in a game. Kyler Murray is the only player to hit it this season, doing so in Week 2 for Arizona against the Los Angeles Rams.
While a passer rating is often referenced, the formula is little understood by even the most avid of NFL fans. It grades players on four metrics — completion percentage, yards per attempt, TD pass percentage and interception percentage — and converts that into a scale from 0 to 158.3 The formula is based on data of how quarterbacks performed from 1960-70 and was adopted for use in the NFL in 1973.
To reach the “perfect” score — more accurately described as the highest attainable rating — a player must complete at least 77.5% of his passes, average at least 12.5 yards per attempt, throw TD passes on at least 11.875% of attempts and have no interceptions.
Jackson came short in only one mark when he completed 17 of 22 passes (77.3%) for 281 yards (12.8 per attempt), five TDs (22.7% of passes) and no interceptions. One additional completion for at least 7 yards would have put Jackson into “perfect” territory for the fourth time in his career.
He did it in Week 17 last season against Miami and twice in 2019: in Week 1 against Miami and in Week 10 against Cincinnati. That’s tied for the most for any player ever in the regular season, with Ben Roethlisberger, Kurt Warner, Peyton Manning and Tom Brady also doing it. Manning had a fourth in the 2003 wild-card round against Denver for one of two perfect passer ratings in the postseason.
Streaking Chiefs
The Kansas City Chiefs haven’t lost since a Christmas Day upset at home against the Las Vegas Raiders, with their 12 straight wins in the regular season and playoffs since then just one shy of the franchise record set in 2019-20.
That mark was snapped by the Raiders, who have a chance to do it again when they host Kansas City on Sunday.
If the Raiders can pull it off, it will be just the second time in NFL history that a team had a winning streak of at least 12 games, playoffs included, bracketed by losses to the same opponent, according to Sportradar.
The only other time it happened was in 1933-34 when the Chicago Bears had an 18-game winning streak between losses to the New York Giants.
How Kansas City has gone on this streak has been a bit unusual, as the Chiefs are the only team to win 12 games in a row without scoring more than 28 points in any of them. The previous long was 11 straight by the 1927-28 Giants and 1928-29 Packers.
The Chiefs won their first six games this season — the second-longest season-opening winning streak for a two-time defending Super Bowl champion — despite Patrick Mahomes throwing only six TD passes with eight interceptions.
Mahomes is the sixth starting QB to win the first six games of a season while throwing more interceptions than touchdowns since starts were first tracked in 1950. The last time it happened was in 2015, when Manning had seven TD passes and 10 interceptions for the Denver Broncos, who went on to win the Super Bowl that season.
Good Goff
Jared Goff pulled off another perfect first half last week.
Goff completed all 12 passes in the first half of Detroit’s win at Minnesota, marking the third time this season he has completed every pass he threw in the opening half. He went 12 for 12 in Week 3 at Arizona, and in Week 4 against Seattle, he completed all 18 passes in the game.
There have been only 16 other times since 1991 that a QB had a perfect completion percentage with at least 12 attempts in the first half. Manning is the only other quarterback to do it twice in that span, one coming in 2008 and the other in 2009.
Goff finished the win against the Vikings with a 140 passer rating, joining Aaron Rodgers (2011), Warner (1999) and Roger Staubach (1971) as the only quarterbacks with a passer rating of at least 140 in three straight games.
Goff and the Lions have been so efficient the past four games that he has led more touchdown drives in that span (18) than the number of incomplete passes he has thrown (15).
Slow starters
The Philadelphia Eagles are off to a strong start to the season with a 4-2 record, but that’s not because of how they have started games on offense.
The Eagles are the only team in the NFL that hasn’t scored on its opening drive this season, having three three-and-outs, one turnover and two other punts on six game-opening drives that have generated two first downs and 39 yards. Philadelphia has gone nine straight games in the regular season and playoffs dating to last season without scoring on the first drive.
The first quarter in its entirety has been an issue for the Eagles, who became the 13th team in the Super Bowl era that didn’t score a point in the opening quarter in the first six games after being shut out last week by the Giants.
The only other teams to do that this century are the 2021 Jets, the winless Lions in 2008, the 2005 Texans and the 2004 Dolphins.
Not ready for prime time
The New York Jets and Giants get more than their fair share of prime-time games thanks to being in a big television market that brings extra viewers to the screen.
The biggest beneficiaries aren’t the TV networks but the opponents.
Since the start of the 2019 season, the Jets and Giants have combined for a putrid 4-31 record in prime-time games, according to Sportradar. The Jets are 2-14 and have the second-worst winning percentage at .125 after losing to Pittsburgh on Sunday night.
The Giants are the only team worse, with a 2-17 mark and .105 win percentage headed into a Monday night game against the Steelers.
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