After giving up 30, 49 and 52 points in the Pack’s last three games, all losses, much of the blame for the losing streak of the team has been placed upon the defense. In some ways this is deserved, as you can’t reasonably expect any offense to score that many points week in and week out. Even with a star quarterback like Russell Wilson throwing to outstanding wide receivers, this would be difficult. But with receivers playing like State’s have over the past couple weeks, Wilson and the offense’s task becomes infinitely more difficult.

As bad as the pass defense has been since the start of conference play, the receivers have struggled to get open and catch the ball as much as the corners and safeties have struggled to prevent the opposition from doing so. Exact stats tracking dropped passes are hard to come by, but it seems safe to say the receivers have dropped at least five or six balls a game over the past couple games. It is one thing to drop the ball because of a jarring hit or a great defensive play, but quite another when, with no defender in their vicinity, receivers simply fail to bring in uncontested throws. Unfortunately, the drops I am referring to fall into the latter category. The number of drops per game over the past few weeks would probably be in the double digits if failed attempts to pull in contested jump balls were considered drops.

The abundance of passes that have gone through the hands of open receivers is even harder to tolerate considering the game experience of those players. Jarvis Williams, Owen Spencer and Darrell Davis are all juniors, and redshirt sophomore tight end George Bryan has more than 10 career starts. Players with that much experience should drop no more than a few balls a season. There is no justifying veteran receivers dropping at least one wide open pass every game.

And regularly failing to make easy catches is not the only problem. It blows my mind how so many times, after Wilson has avoided three or four tackles and reversed field a couple times, he has to throw the ball away because there is still no one open.  Defenses typically only expect their secondary to cover receivers for four or five seconds, as it is unreasonable to expect a corner to be stride for stride with a receiver after they’ve made two or three cuts. But with our receivers, defenders seem to have little difficulty shadowing them for close to ten seconds or until Wilson finally gives up and either takes off to run or throws the ball away.  Receivers are, or should be, taught to come back to the line of scrimmage and give their quarterback a target after he breaks the pocket.

If this passing game is to become more consistent, Spencer, Williams and Davis are going to need to break their routes off, get open and make Wilson’s incredible scrambling ability more than a means to a harmless heave toward the sideline. And if they can manage to catch the ball when they’re wide open, that would be great too. With Spencer the shortest of the trio at 6’3 and all three having plenty of speed, they should be infuriating opposing defenses with great plays down the field, not their own fans and coaches with dropped passes and poor route adjustments on broken plays.