Why Trevor Lawrence Must Exhibit Patience vs. 49ers

Trevor Lawrence needs patience

Coming out of Clemson, Trevor Lawrence had just about every trait that a team would want from a quarterback prospect. His arm talent, audacity, and physical tools were all elite.

With the Jacksonville Jaguars, though, he's shown plenty of room for improvement in a few different areas, such as decision-making and pocket presence.

49ers will test Lawrence

Another key aspect of his game that Lawrence has to develop is patience. While he has the capability to make tight-window passes and launch bombs downfield, sometimes it'd behoove the Jags quarterback to wait for his wide receivers' routes to develop a little bit longer, check it down, or even throw it away. Head Coach Liam Coen told Jacksonville media that T-Law faces a staunch test against the San Francisco 49ers in Week 4:

"That's basically what the [49ers'] scheme is saying out loud is we are going to play this defense, obviously try to get after you with four, which they've been able to do, and say you're going to get greedy at some point. You're going to get bored at some point of kind of playing the 12-to-15-and-in game, because they do play a ton of quarters, lead the NFL, I believe, in shell coverage and quarters and cover-six, quarter-quarter-half variations. We'll see if that holds true this week for sure, but that's definitely what they've wanted to do through three games, and it just makes you, as a play caller and as a quarterback, have to be patient and meticulous and just keep taking what they end up giving you."

"And then yeah, we have to take advantage of the ops that we do get down the field that we didn't take advantage of this past week and get them to initially maybe get into some single high to be able to go throw it a little bit more, whatever it is. But it's a patient defense, because it's really hard to say we’ve got to go operate for 10, 11 plays and go execute all those 10 plays up and down the field. They're counting on not giving up the explosives so that they can say you're going to punt to us more than you're going to score if you have to go on these long, extended drives.”

Lawrence has a penchant for forcing the issue sometimes, for better and for worse. Last time he played the Niners, he threw two interceptions. This is a different Jaguars team now, much better equipped to pull off the upset. But T-Law has to show that he's grown significantly as a quarterback since 2023, too.