Josh Allen has been a constant Most Valuable Player candidate for a reason. His 2024 campaign which has so far included 3,731 passing yards, a 28:6 touchdown to interception ratio, and the second best QBR in the NFL is just the tip of the iceberg when making a case for him to win the illustrious award.
That hardware won't make or break just how hard Allen's worked this season to cut down on his turnovers and lead this Buffalo Bills team from a projected struggling team in the AFC to first in the AFC East once again. That work ethic has allowed for the Bills to make yet another run at the Super Bowl this season.
But, numbers don't lie, while the eye test sometimes does. That's why this one stat reflecting a huge change that Allen made after his rookie season was wrapped up is so important - it goes to show just how hard Allen is willing to work improve himself as the team's most important player.
Allen's accuracy rate boost from his rookie year was historically good
In a video shared by the NFL, Allen is shown going over the change he made to his passing mechanics in an interview with Jason Garrett. He discusses how he was using his shoulder and arm strength incorrectly, putting so much power into both that he was causing himself pain.
Once his rookie season was over, he had finished up with a 52 percent accuracy rate on his passes. He knew a change was necessary. So, he tells Garrett, he met with Chris Hess. Hess, who owns a company called Biometric focused on fixing mechnical issues in athletes like Allen, explained to Allen that he had to drop his arm and stop "muscling" passes out.
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Instead, he told Allen that he should be using his leg to set himself up before passes and to not use his arm as the be all, end all to his passes. That suggestion to drop his arm and to stop overextending himself led to a 69 percent accuracy rate on his passes in 2020 - a 17 percent increase from his rookie season, and the biggest increase in NFL history.
A biometric specialist, and a whole lot of reps 💪
— NFL Films (@NFLFilms) January 9, 2025
A deep dive on how @JoshAllenQB reined in his rocket arm, fixing his rookie year accuracy issues 👀 pic.twitter.com/EL6wQmiRWl
"I've always believed that accuracy is something that you really can't coach. Guys can either put the ball where they want to or they can't. Josh Allen proved me wrong on this," said Troy Aikman in the video when discussing the major improvement from Allen over his career.
Since his rookie season, and since 2020, Allen has hovered around 63 percent in completion percentage. And, this season, because of his drastic cut down in turnovers, he's posted his best QBR of his career. Allen is only going to continue to do what's needed to improve on his already-polished passing game - his historic rise in accuracy is just one piece of proof to that.