Earlier this week, I wrote about the passing breakdown on short throws to both the left and right side of the field.

What about on deep throws? As it turns out, there’s not much of a difference in terms of either quantity or quality, with one notable exception. Last year, there was a nearly perfect 50/50 split on deep throws between being to the left side of the field and the right side of the field.  And the completion percentages were nearly identical, too, at 40%, as were the yards/attempt averages.  One big difference, though, was in touchdown rates.  And this is actually all consistent with what we found in the 2017 season, too: a 50/50 split between left and right side, the same completion percentage, but a much better TD rate on throws to the right side.

So, I suppose, all else being equal, you want to throw more deep passes to the right side of the field.  What’s interesting, though, is someone like Marcus Mariota, who threw 31 passes to the deep left side but just 11 to the deep right.  His top wideout, Corey Davis, caught 6 of 8 passes to the deep right, and was targeted 9 times on the deep left side.  But unless he was throwing to Davis, Mariota rarely threw to the deep right side of the field.

The table below shows the number of deep passes, to both the left and right side, for each passer last year.  It also shows each player’s completion percentages on those passes.