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Top 5 Passing Matchups

Tampa Bay vs Washington

Baker Mayfield is coming off of a career-saving year with Tampa Bay. After a strong start to his career and then bouncing around the league to Carolina and Los Angeles, Baker seemed to find a home in Tampa Bay, returning to the early days of his time in Cleveland. Mayfield threw for a career-high in both yards with 4,066 and touchdowns with 28. What is even more impressive for Baker is that he lowered his interception rate from a 2.8% career average down to 1.8%. Mayfield has had to deal with constant turnover throughout his career, and this year is no different. Liam Coen was named the offensive coordinator this spring after Dave Canales was named the Carolina Panthers head coach. Coen comes from the Sean McVay coaching tree and eventually became their offensive coordinator in 2022 after a year coaching Will Levis in college before leaving to go back to Kentucky as their offensive coordinator last season. The Buccaneers brought back nearly the entire offense outside of the center position as Ryan Jensen retired. The team took Graham Barton out of Duke and gave Mayfield a speed option in Jaelen McMillan by using a third-round pick on the receiver from Washington. This is an offense that is primarily going to run through Mike Evans and Chris Godwin, both players topped 1,000 yards while Cade Otton and Rachaad White were the next two leaders in receiving yards. Both should have a role in this passing game but expect both Evans and Godwin to see the primary bulk of the work once again.

Washington's defense was amongst the league's worst last season. They allowed the most fantasy points to the quarterback position in 2023 while allowing 272 passing yards per game, which was the worst in the NFL. While Dan Quinn is amongst the best defensive coaches in the NFL, the team let their best corner depart this offseason as Kendall Fuller went to Miami while safety Kamren Curl left for the Rams. The Commanders will largely rely on second-year players Emmanuel Forbes and Benjamin St-Juste, who they spent first and third-round picks on in the 2023 draft. Both players struggled immensely last season. Washington did add Mike Sainristil, who is expected to start in the slot this year, and Mike Davis, who will likely see playing time competing with Forbes for the starting outside position. A big question for the Commanders will be how they can replace the loss of Montez Sweat and Chase Young, who were traded mid-season last year. Washington brought in Clelin Ferrell, who hasn't had more than 4.5 sacks in his five seasons, while they also brought in Dorance Armstrong from Dallas. Armstrong is coming off of two strong seasons with 7.5 and 8.5 sacks but will now be in a much larger role compared to being an afterthought for offensive lines who had to focus on Micah Parsons and DeMarcus Lawrence.

Buffalo vs Arizona

Josh Allen and the Bills are going through a little bit of a transitional period. They're attempting to mimic the build of the Chiefs in almost every way from a roster construction standpoint as they traded Stefon Diggs this offseason and allowed Gabe Davis to sign with Jacksonville. They're taking the Kansas City approach of having a committee of wide receivers while instead focusing on the tight end as a focal point of the offense. That's what the Bills hope that they have with Dalton Kincaid the second-year former first-round pick out of Utah. Kincaid had a good, but not great, rookie season, catching 73 passes for just 673 yards, which leaves a significant number of yards for the Bills to replace as they lost both Stefon Diggs and Gabriel Davis. This leaves Khalil Shakir as the only returning receiver with over 150 receiving yards as the team brought in rookie Keon Coleman and veteran slot receiver Curtis Samuel.

The Cardinals are expected to have one of the worst secondaries in the NFL this season. Last season, this unit allowed just 225 passing yards per game but allowed the third most passing touchdowns on the season. They rebuilt their secondary compared to last year as Marco Wilson went to New England and Antonio Hamilton left for Atlanta. The Cardinals invested heavily in Sean Murphy-Bunting, signing him to a three-year $25M deal. Murphy-Bunting will be heavily relied upon alongside veteran Budda Baker, as the rest of the secondary is extremely inexperienced. The Cardinals will rely heavily on second-round rookie Max Melton, third-round rookie Elijah Jones, and second-year slot corner Garrett Williams, who played in just nine games last season. The Cardinals' pass rush is unlikely to help them this season as they had the third-fewest sacks in the NFL last season and will be relying on Zaven Collins and second-year sixth-round pick Dante Stills. Both had just 3.5 sacks each last season. If they're unable to get pressure, this could make for a long season for the Cardinals, especially in Week 1 against a quarterback like Josh Allen, who, given time, can beat just about any defense.