Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback Blake Bortles shattered franchise passing numbers with his sophomore season, crushing the franchise record for touchdown passes in a season with 35 and breaking Mark Brunell's long standing passing yardage record. Bortles did all of this, allegedly while struggling to grasp an NFL playbook according to Dave Dameshek.
"From people within the organizaiton, I have been told there is some concern about Blake [Bortles]'s ability to grasp the NFL playbook," Dameshek said the Around the NFL podcast on Tuesday (h/t Reddit).
The first thing I did when I saw this in my inbox was laugh, because this is a rookie year leak story, not a he just ended second in the NFL in touchdown passes story. I don't know who Dameshak's sources are, but the ones I talked to said they'd never heard this anywhere in the building.
There might be some issues with Blake Bortles reading coverages, but he's also entering his third year in the NFL, so that's to be expected. But hell, if he's doing what he did in 2015 and struggles to grasp a playbook? Buckle up, folks.
Dameshek recently tweeted this, as if it's some kind of evidence to what he reported his source told him about Bortles struggling to grasp an NFL playbook:
Attention, @Jaguars fans! https://t.co/ZMcRcyIxAC pic.twitter.com/c6Abwd4brq
— Dave Dameshek (@Dameshek) July 13, 2016
So, let me make sure I understand this: An NFL quarterback coach said that entering the second year in an system, his quarterback has a better grasp of it than he did the first season? What? Isn't that normal? This doesn't point to Bortles struggling to grasp an NFL playbook, to the point of concern. It just shows that he was in the first year of a system, and now is more comfortable in it.
Dameshek continued to tweet through it (you can view the replies to that tweet) trying to frame that quote from Nathaniel Hackett, who he incorrectly labeled as the Jaguars offensive coordinator, as proof Bortles struggled to grasp the playbook.
Well, golly gee, a player is more comfortable with an offensive system the longer they're in it. Earth shatteribg stuff, Dave.
Edit: Well, now it's gone from being told there was concern, to a rumor he heard from a source. BEEEEEEP. BEEEEEP. Dave Dameshek? More like Dave Back-track-oshek.
@Melhyphen @MadeByTim Confused by your confusion. First, My "point" was mentioning a rumor I got from a very good source...
— Dave Dameshek (@Dameshek) July 13, 2016