Oregon's Bo Nix Has Become Something We Never Thought He Could

Bo Nix has done a complete a 180 from his time at Auburn.

Bo Nix’s career arc is one of the weirdest we’ve seen from a quarterback prospect in recent years. 

Think about it. What do you remember about Nix from Auburn? He was a reckless, erratic quarterback with the highest of highs and the lowest of lows. His mobility and arm talent kept him relevant, but he looked way too unpredictable to be an NFL QB. 

Fast forward to after almost two seasons at Oregon, and Nix is an entirely different player. 

Nix isn’t risk-prone anymore. In fact, he rarely puts the ball in harm’s way. Nix was known for trying to do too much out of structure early in his career. Now, he operates from the pocket and quickly gets the ball out of his hands. 

If we didn’t know any better, we’d assume Nix was body snatched or being impersonated by a Skrull. It’s rare for a quarterback prospect to swing the pendulum this far in the other direction. He has just three turnover-worthy plays this season compared with 14 in his last season at Auburn. 

Nix’s entire mindset and play style have changed. 

Quarterbacks get better and worse all the time. However, rarely — if ever — do they suddenly become different players altogether. Take Josh Allen, for example. 

Allen at Wyoming was a lot like Nix at Auburn — reckless and relying on traits to get by. Since entering the NFL, Allen has gotten a lot less reckless. With that said, he’s still due for a few head-scratchers every game. He still hasn’t quite gotten rid of the “bozo gene” completely. 

Nix (mostly) has, and it’s allowed him to go from an undraftable mess to a quarterback who might get first-round consideration. 

All of that sounds great, and it is. But there’s a catch. 

Nix might have gone too far in the other direction. The “bozo gene” is what allows Allen to be one of the NFL’s best QBs. He’s willing to take shots other quarterbacks are not. 

There must be a balance between taking shots and making the safe play. First-round quarterbacks should have some arrogance. Nix seems to have lost his. 

In Nix’s defense, it’s better to be too safe than too reckless with the football. But still, Nix looks scared to attack the middle of the field and unwilling to move through progressions. 

Nix’s second progression is usually a checkdown. It keeps Oregon’s offense on schedule and will do the same in the NFL. The issue is it might come at the cost of true starter upside. 

Short-Yardage Downside

When watching Oregon’s offense, it can be challenging to tell just how much of it is implemented to accommodate Nix’s limitations and how much of it is just what they want to do. 

One thing is for sure: Nix throws behind the line of scrimmage a ton. Nix has attempted 94 passes behind the line of scrimmage this season, according to PFF. That number is concerning on its own, but it becomes worse when looking at the other top quarterback prospects. 

Caleb Williams has 76, Drake Maye has 61, Jayden Daniels has 38, and Michael Penix has 58. Even Quinn Ewers, who many say gets too much help from his offense, is at 70 such attempts. 

It is almost an understatement to say Nix has it easy in Oregon’s offense. This makes scouting him all the more challenging. Some of his games have less than three NFL throws. 

His performance against Colorado is a great example. He completed 28-of-33 passes for 276 yards, three touchdowns, and one interception. It seems like a nice day at the office, right? 

Well, the film showed Nix barely pushed the ball down the field or even read the defense post-snap. 

This passing chart is courtesy of Cory Kinnan (@fakecorykinnan on Twitter). He does tremendous work charting college QBs on his SubStack Daft on Draft, which we highly recommend checking out and subscribing to. 

Look at all of the green around the line of scrimmage. There are almost no attempts deep or in the middle of the field. Many of Nix’s games look similar, although this is probably the most extreme example. 

It’s easy to imagine an NFL offense thriving on the quick game, RPOs, and the occasional schemed open shot play. NFL offenses have functioned with much less. 

But if this is the type of offense Nix has to run to prevent his erratic side from taking over, he won’t be anything more than a backup at the next level. 

This is the bones of an NFL offense, but Nix’s potential limitations would be a massive roadblock to developing an offense that can lead a team for a whole season. 

Passing Up Open Options

A lot of Nix’s propensity to work behind and around the line of scrimmage comes from Oregon’s offense. Most college QBs have those scripted reads — it’s not entirely surprising to see. 

What’s more concerning is watching Nix pass up open receivers downfield just to check the ball down. 

Nix looks to his right where both the out and TE are open. And for some reason, he just doesn’t throw the ball, instead checking It down to the underneath receiver.

This is far more concerning than the volume of throws Nix attempts in the short area. Why? Passing up these throws makes us question whether Nix’s confidence in his difference-making ability is shaken. 

Again, it’s the overcorrection mentioned earlier. Nix got so much backlash from his reckless, freestyle ways he hesitates to test windows down the field. 

What’s maddening is Nix has the arm talent to make these throws. He can drive the ball to all three levels of the field when he wants to. 

Look at this throw! Nix has the natural ability to make big-time throws. He doesn’t have to be a checkdown merchant. 

There has to be balance in taking the safe route and making a few daring throws. It’s understandable why Nix has gone so far in the other direction, but it will hold him back a lot in the NFL. 

Downfield Accuracy 

There’s one last piece to the puzzle to cover. Even on the rare occasions Nix pushes the ball down the field, he struggles with accuracy and placement. 

He’s got a nasty habit of underthrowing deep balls, forcing his receivers to work back through cornerbacks to make difficult contested catches. Nix will get a lot of OPI calls in the NFL. While we joke about that play being the best one in football, you can’t build an entire offense around it. 

If Nix isn’t missing short on his deep routes, he sends his receivers on a side quest to haul in his passes. Watch both angles of this throw against Stanford. 

This pass is supposed to land somewhere near the front pylon. Instead, Nix leads his receiver upfield and into the middle of the endzone. Sure, it hit his receiver in the hands. This was technically an “accurate” throw, but the placement is miserable. 

It’s the difference between an easy touchdown and an incompletion. 

Nix plays in an offense designed to work the quick game; he passes up open receivers down the field, and his deep ball accuracy is sporadic. There’s just no ceiling to glean from Nix’s tape. 

Why Consider Nix At All? 

Okay, we’ve been harsh on Nix, but it’s important to remember what we said at the top. Nix has made significant progress in his game and positioned himself as a functional NFL QB. 

Being an excellent quick-game passer isn’t a weakness. It’s a tremendous and necessary tool for a QB to have in his bag. Penix Jr. is a player we’ve raved about because of his deep passing ability. 

However, he struggles in the quick game. His down-to-down placement is erratic, and he tends to miss some layups Nix would hit in his sleep.

Bringing back Kinnan’s charting, he uses a stat called Weight on Target percentage to measure QB accuracy better than something like completion percentage. You can read his explanation here. 

Through the season’s first six games, Nix’s 69.95% WOT beats out Penix’s 67.04% pretty easily. WOT accounts for the difficulty of throws — an area Penix has Nix beat — and Nix still came out on top. 

It’s much easier to build an offense around a QB that will hit his layups and not turn the ball over, especially in the NFL. It’s an incredibly valuable trait. 

Look at the state of QB play across the league. Tommy DeVito, Zach Wilson, and Aidan O’Connell are just a few of the names who started games in Week 10. 

There’s no reason Nix can’t start in the NFL and win some games with a competent team around him. 

The odd part of Nix’s evaluation is after five seasons — and what feels like 300 starts — we don’t know for sure who Nix is. 

Is he the safe, checkdown-happy player he’s been at Oregon? Is he the looney toon impersonator we saw at Auburn? Is he something in between? 

He’s probably what we’ve seen at Oregon, but something in between would be nice because there is a clear hole at QB3 in this class. The reality is the gap between Williams, Maye, and the rest of the class is much wider than we predicted it would be this summer. 

Nix hasn’t done anything to close that gap. He looks too limited to be the third quarterback off the board. Still, Nix appears like a safe option in a class filled with unknowns outside the top two. 

Nix is the vanilla ice cream prospect, but that in itself is an accomplishment for him, especially considering how rocky the road was to get there. Just don’t expect him to change your franchise, and you should be fine.