Aaron Rodgers played role in Josh Allen’s third-year leap

Josh Allen has made a big leap in his third NFL season, and he has credited studying one of the best quarterbacks in the league as a reason.

In terms or raw talent, Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen is up there with anyone in the league. But this year, is third season, he has made significant progress. His completion percentage (69.9 percent) is up over 10 percent from last year, along with significant gains in yards per attempt (8.0), adjusted yards per attempt (8.3) and passer rating (105.9).

The offseason addition of wide receiver Stefon Diggs has been a big factor in Allen’s progress this year. But in a conversation with NBC’s Jac Collinsworth ahead of Sunday night’s game against the Pittsburgh Steelers, via Syracuse.com, Allen pointed to studying a future Hall of Famer as a factor in his third-year leap.

Josh Allen has taken a mechanical tweak from Aaron Rodgers

“If you’ve seen my throwing motion, I’ve kind of incorporated a little foot hop on the left side. It’s something that Aaron does,” Allen said. “I don’t know what it is about it, but it allows me to just rotate with my hips more and be more of a rotational thrower as opposed to more of a vertical axis thrower. And that’s what caused the ball to sail and dive down (in the past), and it really shouldn’t have.”

Quarterback guru Jordan Palmer had a diagnostics test run on Allen’s throwing motion during the offseason.

“My arm and my shoulder were basically beating my hip and my chest to the actual point of release. It’s really not what you’re supposed to do,” Allen continued. “It should be your hip first, your chest, arm, shoulder and then your hand going through.”

Allen entered the NFL with accuracy concerns, and his first two seasons did nothing to change that. Simply incorporating his hips in his throwing motion seems to be all the difference.

“Literally the packet I got back from my diagnostics or whatever you want to call them, the review was: I don’t know how you’re doing this. Your arm is just different,” Allen said. “It didn’t make sense because my hips were not being incorporated at all in my throwing motion.”

Allen is on pace to break Buffalo’s franchise records for passing yards (4,359, Drew Bledsoe in 2002) and touchdown passes (33, Jim Kelly in 1991). As the 9-3 Bills move toward an AFC East title, Allen is also in the conversation for league MVP.