Michael Vick isn’t bitter about Lamar Jackson breaking his record for rushing yards by a quarterback, but he thinks the Baltimore Ravens signal-caller deserves more respect for another part of his game.
Vick, who set the NFL alight with his running ability at football’s most important position, believes Jackson’s “playing the game the way he should be playing it — pass first then be running it,” per The Baltimore Sun’s Brian Wacker.
That statement represents the evolution of Jackson’s game. Now Vick thinks Jackson is “a better passer than runner. Lamar’s always been able to run — that’s a natural instinct. The passing game is something you have to learn, and it has to be coordinated with timing and receivers and routes and you got to be on the same page and thinking on the same page. He’s accurate, threading the needle, seeing the field. And understanding what the defense is doing supersedes any throw that you can make.”
It’s a surprising compliment given how the current focus is naturally on comparisons between Vick and Jackson as runners. Yet Vick is right to point to the maturation in how Jackson is reading coverages and throwing the football.
Those things are ultimately more valuable to the Ravens than anything Jackson achieves on the ground.