Carson Palmer by the numbers: Passing numbers and pressure

We got to perhaps the most telling statistical breakdown when it come to Arizona Cardinals quarterback Carson Palmer. It is a discussion of passing when pressured and when not pressured.

What will you see?

Palmer is damn good when he is not pressured.

The numbers come from the Pro Football Focus breakdown of all the QBs in the league. Check it out to see how all of the do.

According to PFF's numbers, the league average with time to throw (no pressure) is a QB rating of 96.9. With pressure, it is 60.7. Against the blitz and against no bllitz, it is pretty even.

Let's look at Palmer's numbers.

No pressure:

Palmer faced no pressure on 367 of his 572 throws. He was 261/367 (71.1 percent!!!) for 3125 yards, 21 TDs and only seven INTs. That is good for a QB rating of 108.0, well above the league average. Only seven players had a higher QB rating. His yards per attempt was 8.5, but what is a little bit interesting is that his depth of throw is only 8.9 -- almost all of the other numbers we have looked at thus far has been un the mid nines or low tens.

Against pressure:

Palmer wasn't good, to say the least. He was pressured on 205 of his throws (almost 36 percent of his throws). He was 101/205 (less than 50 percent completion rate) for 1149 yards. The touchdowns and interceptions are notable -- only three scores and 15 interceptions. His QB rating was 40.9.

Those numbers are like what John Skelton and Ryan Lindley put up in 2012.

You will notice this -- he was pressured trying to make deeper throws. His average depth of throw when pressured was 11.5 yards. He was waiting longer -- on average it was 2.9 seconds before he woudl throw the ball. He would see pressure in 2.58 seconds. That starkly contrasts the 2.17 seconds it took to throw the ball on average when there wasn't pressure.

Against the blitz:

Palmer was solid against the blitz. He was blitzed on 169 of his throws (30 percent) and he was sacked 14 times. But he completed 60 percent of thos throws for 1356 yards for 10 TDs and six INTs. That is a QB rating of 90.6 -- above the league average. He also took slightly deeper shots, averaging 10.7 yards down the field per throw against the blitz. It was one of the deepest averages in the league. He got rid of the ball in 2.28 second on average and was pressured on average in 2.12 seconds.

Against no blitz:

Against no blitz, Palmer was sacked 27 times. Pressure came in 2.26 seconds and he got rid of the ball on average in 2.55 seconds. He completed 64.5 percent of his 403 attempts for 2918 yards, 14 scores and 16 picks. His depth of throw was 9.4 yards and his QB rating was 81.1.

Commentary:

Palmer was really good when he had time and terrible when he didn't. That was painfully obvious. He tended to get pressured when trying to throw the ball further down the field.

What you can also see is that the offensive line just was unable to hold up when it came to deeper throws. Palmer was making shorter throws when not pressured.

How much will change in 2014? The line should improve. But does that mean taking more down the field throws? We will see.

But one thing is clear -- Palmer is damn good when he has time to make a decision. That wasn't the case with some previous quarterbacks. With time to throw, there were still bad throws, bad decisions and bad results.