Rodgers, Brady Dig the Long Ball

It's been bombs away from Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady in leading the Packers and Buccaneers to the NFC Championship Game.

GREEN BAY, Wis. – When Aaron Rodgers dialed long distance and connected with Allen Lazard for the clinching touchdown on Saturday, it continued a season-long trend of the Green Bay Packers’ star quarterback digging the long ball.

On Sunday, Rodgers will face another of the game’s best and most frequent throwers of the deep ball, Tampa Bay’s Tom Brady, for the NFC Championship and a right to go to the Super Bowl.

During the regular season, Rodgers hit on 32 deep completions – a pass thrown 20-plus yards downfield. That was the fourth-most in the NFL, according to Pro Football Focus. His 1,242 yards and 12 touchdowns on those deep passes led the league.

Brady, on the other hand, was first with 36 completions and second with 1,233 yards and 11 touchdowns. Brady continually pressed the ball downfield in his first season with the Buccaneers. His 9.08 air yards per attempt was tops in the league, according to the league’s official stats.

For Rodgers, his improvement in deep passing mirrors just about everything else from this blast-from-the-past season.

“It's just something that I've worked on over the years,” Rodgers said in November. “I think when I got in the league, I really had Level 1 balls figured out. I'm talking about lasers. I could throw the ball all over the field, but there wasn't a lot of touch at times, so I really had to learn the Level 1 and the Level 3 trajectories. It's something that I worked really, really hard on. I still work hard on it, trying to match the muscle memory with the feeling, with the result, and I've felt good about a lot of those throws this year. A lot of it has been some of the work I did in the offseason, some of the things I've picked up in training camp watching some of that old film, and then just tying it all together and being markedly more accurate this year.”

Here are his season-by-season numbers on deep passes from PFF, with the completion percentage being adjusted to turn the four drops into completions.

2020: 46.8 percent, 123.0 passer rating.

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2019: 37.6 percent, 111.2 passer rating.

2018: 40.7 percent, 124.0 passer rating.

2017: 43.5 percent, 90.4 passer rating.

2016: 38.1 percent, 82.7 passer rating.

2015: 39.1 percent, 99.7 passer rating.

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2014: 51.8 percent, 125.0 passer rating.

2013: 52.8 percent, 112.0 passer rating.

2012: 53.2 percent, 115.3 passer rating.

2011: 60.7 percent, 130.6 passer rating.