Landry Jones' Knowledge of Steelers' System Gives Him Clear Edge over Mike Vick

It appears that the Pittsburgh Steelers are readying for the Landry Jones era to continue one more week. Jones, the Steelers' third-string quarterback since being drafted in Round 4 in 2013, took over for Mike Vick, who suffered a small hamstring tear in the team's eventual 25-13 victory over the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday.

Vick himself was in because of the knee injury suffered by starter Ben Roethlisberger in Week 3. Before then, Jones had never dressed for a regular-season game; though he had spent his entire Steelers career up to this point on the team's 53-man roster, he was never among the 46 players active for gamedays. With Roethlisberger hurt, though, he became No. 2 on the quarterback depth chart. 

To say Jones provided a spark on Sunday would be an understatement. Vick had six total yards on his three completions, and, after factoring in the one sack he took that cost the Steelers five yards, just one net passing yard total. Of the 169 total passing yards the Steelers had on Sunday, 168 belonged to Jones.

Jones finished the contest completing eight of his 12 passes for (the aforementioned) 168 yards and two scores. He threw no picks nor was he sacked once. It was the best Jones has ever looked, preseason included, and it came as a surprise, to say the least.

Player	Snaps	Atts.	Comp.	Comp.%	Yds.	TD	INT	Sacks
Vick	174	66	40	60.0%	371	2	1	10
Jones	28	12	8	66.7%	168	2	0	0

Jones had spent the previous two seasons lodged behind Bruce Gradkowski (who is currently on injured reserve) and, until this summer, had thrown only two touchdown passes to four interceptions in the Steelers' exhibition period. For what it's worth, Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin was not shocked by what he saw from Jones on Sunday, saying: "We're not going to throw a pep rally because he did what was expected."

For all of the flaws Jones has put on display in training camps and preseasons past, he is the best man to handle Pittsburgh's quarterback job until Roethlisberger returns. That's not just because of Vick's injury either; Jones is also preferable to a healthy Vick, if Sunday was any indication.

Why? Because while Vick has the NFL-experience edge over Jones, Jones has the experience edge over Vick when it comes to his familiarity with Pittsburgh's offense.

Year	Snaps	Atts.	Comp.	Comp.%	Yds.	TD	INT	Sacks
2013	115	66	30	45.5%	348	2	3	3
2014	84	44	27	61.4%	224	0	1	6
2015	229	120	65	54.2%	724	4	2	9
Total	428	230	122	53.0%	1,296	6	6	18

This is Jones' third year working in coordinator Todd Haley's system. For Vick, he's barely two months into it. And even if Vick had more time to prepare, it still wouldn't have been perfect. Haley's system does include roll-outs and shotgun passing, but it also prioritizes pocket passing, something Vick has never been comfortable doing.

It also requires full use of the Steelers' offensive weapons—players like Antonio Brown, Martavis Bryant, Le'Veon Bell, Heath Miller and Markus Wheaton—which means quarterbacks in this system should not be relying solely on throwing to their first reads. Vick, meanwhile, has always been a first- (or second) read quarterback, one who does not routinely make pre-snap adjustments, as Christopher Carter at Behind The Steel Curtain relayed recently.

Gregory Shamus/Getty Images

As such, Vick has struggled to take advantage of the bounty of help the Steelers have provided him and the results have been mixed, if we're being generous, and poor, if we're not. In approximately two-and-a-half games played, Vick has completed only 60.6 percent of his 66 pass attempts, for 371 yards, two touchdowns and an interception, while being sacked 10 times. 

That's not to say that we can expect Jones to throw only touchdowns or never be sacked. He's certainly no Roethlisberger. No quarterback controversy is going to come of whatever Jones does this Sunday. But Jones' obvious knowledge of Pittsburgh's offensive system makes him a better option than even a healthy Vick.