Blake Bortles ‘pretty much’ corrected throwing motion

When Jacksonville Jaguars practices are open to the media and the public, the talk that will likely dominate the air waves, etc. is likely to be about Blake Bortles throwing motion. Bortles’ mechanics have been a point of emphasis, which as MMQB points out, has been a point of emphasis every offseason. This offseason however, Bortles returned to the coaching guru he spent time with prior to his breakout 2015 season.

According to Jaguars VP of football operations, Tom Coughlin on The Rich Eisen Show, it’s paying off.

"Two years ago, he had an outstanding year, had a lot of yards, over 4,000 yards. I won't say outstanding because the team didn't do outstanding, but he certainly was much more productive." Coughlin told Eisen. "This past year, a lack of production, if you will, turnovers, too many. And, so, he's a talented young man. Had some flaws in his throwing motion that he did a nice job of working on in the offseason and pretty much correcting. So, we've seen some good things there."

While turnovers have always been a problem for Bortles, even in his 2015 season, he has been working on some mechanical issues all offseason. Coughlin indicates that he’s “pretty much” corrected them, though we don’t really have much evidence other than taking what Coughlin says at face value.

The team has tweeted some videos from OTA practices and done some highlight videos, which still show Bortles dropping the ball down before pulling back and throwing, though it’s not nearly as deep a drop as before. In all honesty, there were bigger issues in Bortles’ shortcomings than his throwing mechanics, but that has been the focus this offseason and something the team is working on correcting.

As I wrote a few weeks ago, hearing that Bortles throwing mechanics look much better and are fixed is something we should expect to hear this offseason. That shouldn’t really be “news”, the real news will be when we get to the preseason and the regular season. How does his throwing motion look then, when you’re playing full speed and working off muscle memory?