Virginia quarterback Brennan Armstrong showed a lot of promise in his first year leading the Cavalier offense. The then redshirt sophomore bounced back from a concussion that kept him out of two games and helped the Wahoos to a successful back half of their season in 2020 before coming up short at Virginia Tech in the finale. Armstrong was a threat to score with his arm or legs, and there’s good reason for fans to be optimistic heading into Year 2 of the lefty’s run as the starter.

But if there’s one area that UVa needs Armstrong to be better, it’s ball security. After all, he threw 11 interceptions in eight games and had four games with multiple picks. Turnovers, of course, were incredibly costly to the Wahoos last year so these interceptions were a real setback for the offense. In Virginia’s wins, the Cavaliers had a +9 turnover margin. In their losses, they were -10. It’s not the only metric but one stat related to turnovers in 2020 sticks out like a sore thumb: When UVa won the turnover battle, the Hoos won the game. When they lost the turnover battle, they didn’t. When the season was done, UVa was 5-5.

In fairness to Armstrong, at least one of those losses had nothing to do with him, as he was out injured. But needless to say, the offensive outlook improves in a big way this fall if Armstrong can cut down on the takeaways.

As our Film Room series returns today, we take a look at all 11 interceptions Armstrong threw last year, trying to identify trends and determining how many were on the QB and which ones were out of his control.

Pressure: On the season, per PFF College Armstrong was given a clean pocket on just under 74 percent of his drop backs and was under pressure on 86 passing plays. On two thirds of passing snaps, the defense opted not to blitz and instead dropped more defenders into coverage. This makes sense, as Armstrong is a threat to run and UVa does so much of their passing around the line of scrimmage.

So was Armstrong’s accuracy and turnover rate affected by his line play and the strategy of the defense? The numbers aren’t totally conclusive. His grades were certainly better when he had a clean pocket (which is the case for nearly every quarterback) but also were better when he wasn’t blitzed. This is a change from how Bryce Perkins graded out in 2019, when he actually had higher numbers when defenses brought extra defenders. But Armstrong wasn’t more turnover happy when blitzed: Three of his 11 picks came when defensive coordinators brought the blitz, or 27.3 percent, which is just below the blitz rate, 30.8 percent. In fact, Armstrong found the end zone 10 times when blitzed, or just over 45 percent of his touchdowns. So nearly half of his scores came when extra defenders were sent, which was just over 30 percent of the time.

Armstrong was solid when he had a clean pocket, which was often. Nearly three quarters of his passing attempts came from a pocket with little to no pressure. When he had time to throw, he completed 62 percent of his passes, throwing for 1,647 yards and 15 touchdowns. But he also threw eight picks on plays where he wasn’t under duress.

It’s no surprise but Armstrong’s interception rate went up when faced with pressure. The left-hander threw three picks to three touchdowns on 86 plays where he faced pressure, whether from a blitz or a traditional rush.

Play Design: Almost all of his INTs came on regular drop backs, as opposed to play-action passes. UVa doesn’t run as many play-action looks as many may think, with just 10 percent of its drop backs coming on those plays. Armstrong completed just 46.7 percent of his 30 attempts from play action, with two touchdowns and one interception. So 10 of his 11 picks came on plays without a fake. Since only 10 percent of pass plays were play action, this ratio is not abnormal.

Throw Direction: For several years, it felt like UVa under-utilized the middle third of the field. But in 2020, Armstrong did a lot of his damage between the hashes, yet he threw most of his picks there too. Of Armstrong’s 11 turnovers, seven came on throws between the numbers. Five of those came on throws down the field, of 10 yards or more. These throws are the ones that have the most “traffic” with defenders dropping into zone coverages, especially on plays that don’t feature a blitz.

Some 18.2 percent of Armstrong’s throws were 20+ air yards, but five of his interceptions came on deep throws. These interceptions can be less costly, as the field position losses aren’t as severe and sometimes are a result of a quarterback just trying to make something happen late in a half or under pressure. Three of Armstrong’s INTs came on short throws of less than 10 yards, and three more came on intermediate throws.

His top performing area of the field was that intermediate range, where he threw 28 percent of his passes but threw for nine touchdowns against just the three interceptions. His QB rating on intermediate throws was 99.8, which was 10 points higher than his rating on short throws, and nearly 30 points higher than his score on deep balls.

As far as which side of the field was more dangerous, it was certainly the left. The southpaw didn’t throw to the right side much, which makes sense as those throws are harder to make as a left-hander. Plus, when scrambling, it’s rare for a QB to roll to their non-throwing side. Only 18 percent of Armstrong’s attempts went to the right side of the field, outside the numbers. Only one of his 11 picks came on throws to the right, while three were on throws to the left, and the remainder on throws down the middle.