Netflix’s latest sports docuseries, Quarterback, suggests that playing QB is the hardest position anyone can play in a team sport. The filmmakers may be right. But the history and drama that goes into the position is so complicated that reducing it to a TV show means the complications and details that make the position so difficult are missed, at least in the first season.
Quarterback follows three QBs – the Kansas City Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes, the Minnesota Vikings’ Kirk Cousins and the Atlanta Falcons’ Marcus Mariota – as they progress through the 2022 NFL season. But unlike Netflix’s biggest sports series, Formula 1: drive to survive, the football-focused series struggles to bring out the human side of the elite athletes; we see them at home with their kids, but never get a sense of what that means to them on the field. The good news is that there are plenty of ways to fix this Quarterback and help it go from OK to great.
Choose more interesting players
Games are won by putting the best guys on the field. Quarterback season 1 does not. While the show’s main coup landed Mahomes, the 27-year-old Chiefs quarterback/prodigy, the rest of the cast pales in comparison. The aggressively fine Cousins and Mariota, a player who lost his job midway through last season, are inevitably lost in the shadow of Mahomes. A second season of Quarterback would benefit from a more intriguing, more successful cast of QBs. Also just a bigger one. More players being followed by cameras would open up more opportunities for more interwoven storylines and quick edits. Here’s a suggestion: Get Buffalo Bills’ Josh Allen on this show along with Mahomes so we can see their ongoing AFC shootout and rivalry. Or follow an exciting but volatile rookie like Anthony Richardson of the Colts, so we can follow him from his first days on the field.
Let the in-game footage tell us a story
Image: Netflix
The NFL is known for protecting game footage, which makes it pretty exciting Quarterback gets footage from last season to use. Unfortunately, the show often uses it as a mainstay for its episodic storytelling, compressing unrelated games and compressing them into montages rather than building the natural tension the games create. A doc like The last dance is a great example of what is possible when you gain access. Don’t show us a winning touchdown drive with audio from the field; let Cousins or his coach painstakingly explain to us how they made the comeback and point out the details in the plays that we may have missed.
Let the QBs cook
This point is closely related to the above, but the best moments in it Quarterback are the ones where the production staff persuades one of the QBs to go deep into one game, play, or decision. Quarterbacks aren’t always the most charismatic, insightful storytellers — as the show points out, Cousins has been interesting and emotional in public exactly once and it instantly became a meme – but they know football better than almost anyone on the planet. If the players just talk about football, they light up. Listening to the differences in how Kirk Cousins and Patrick Mahomes approach comebacks, or listening to Marcus Mariota try to pull himself out of a rut midway through the game, is exactly the kind of insight that sets the show apart from just another big-budget fancam .
Combining those interview segments with the actual NFL game footage can result in sports analysis that you can’t get from a panel show on ESPN, no matter how many former players they include. Moments like seeing Mahomes go deep into the tics or recounts he notices while watching his opponents on film, and how that helped him score a touchdown or win a game is insight only a player can provide. Even if the QB lineup is missing in season 1, all the topics seem perfectly personal and ready to deliver Quarterback does it best. Patrick Mahomes isn’t himself when he’s driving a camera crew around; he’s himself when he breaks down defensive coverage or talks about the intricacies of offensive game call.
Focusing more on the games would also give the show more space away from the personal lives of the players, which provide great color to the series, but feel stale and repetitive just a few episodes later.
Let the teammates shine
As anyone watching football would expect, Quarterback actually features quite a few of his QB stars addressing their teammates. Receivers, tight ends, running backs, linemen, coaches, and trainers all get major shoutouts that make their lack of participation in the show a little confusing. hearing Justin Jefferson talk about how he ran a route to help Cousins, or Travis Kelce explaining how Mahomes improvises would have deepened the explanation of how plow win games and what relationships behind the scenes made it all happen.
Quarterback is currently in a difficult position. For all its problems, it’s still a pretty entertaining show with moments of big payoff for fans who only superficially understand the 2022 season. Mahomes cutting off a winning ride or watching Cousins battle through a myriad of injuries is fascinating when they tell the story themselves. But those moments are the exception rather than the norm at the moment.
The good news is Quarterback is also exactly where every NFL team would want a promising candidate: successful early, despite the many mistakes, but with plenty of room to grow.