Jacksonville Jaguars Week 6: The Day After

Despite having their most complete performance of the 2014 regular season, the Jacksonville Jaguars fell just short in their comeback attempt this past Sunday against the Tennessee Titans. While the 16-14 loss seems all the more frustrating because of the chance the team had to win at the end of the game, the Jaguars showed a few things they can build upon moving forward.

Thumbs Up

If we’re going to focus on the positives, it starts and ends with Blake Bortles. Even though he missed a few throws, Bortles continues to show the physical traits, mental ability, and the resiliency needed to be a franchise quarterback. If not for a dropped pass by Jordan Todman and a fumble by Cecil Shorts, Bortles would’ve had an incredibly impressive statistical performance. Regardless, Bortles had a very good game with his arms and his legs, and he’s only going to get better as the season goes along.

The Jaguars had trouble covering a talented tight end in Delanie Walker, but the defense certainly did enough to win this game. They got pretty good pressure on Charlie Whitehurst throughout the game, and the Jaguars did a great job of limiting the Titans’ ability to run the ball.

Another subtle positive is the progression of the skill players on offense. They’re not consistent, but the flashes are there from the young wide receivers. Having Cecil Shorts back clearly helped a lot as Bortles had him as a reliable target, but the rookies showed some things to get excited about. Allen Robinson has shown great hands on all of his targets, Allen Hurns continues to get separation pretty consistently, and Marqise Lee got a chance to showcase his speed on a cleverly designed misdirection play.

Thumbs Down

The linebacker play continues to be underwhelming, with Paul Posluszny being the biggest culprit. For all the talk of Posluszny’s leadership and consistent play, every game he seems to have a handful of plays that are awful to borderline embarrassing. It seems like he’s not going anywhere anytime soon, so don’t expect the Jaguars to cover the middle of the field very well the rest of the season.

He’s been inconsistent for most of the season, and left tackle Luke Joeckel did not have a good game on Sunday. He gave up a discouraging amount of hits and hurries, and he got pushed around in the running game. He just cracked double-digits in the amount of professional games he’s played, but he needs to improve dramatically to avoid the “bust” label already being thrown around for players like Eric Fisher and Dion Jordan.

Storm Johnson looked like the most natural runner of all the backs so far this season, but the Jaguars continue to struggle establishing a rushing attack. The Jaguars ended up with 3.6 yards per carry, but that is inflated by Blake Bortles and his 38 yards on 5 carries. Denard Robinson played well, but it’s hard to point to any one thing that makes you believe the Jaguars will be able to run the ball well this season.