John Clayton eschews reality-based analysis, decides Young is next great QB
Aug 12, 2008 Logo by Chris, Overrated, Predictions Guaranteed To Go Wrong, Ranting, Rebuttals, Vince Young can't read this post, Vinsanity, Weak-ass arguments
No, really. Time to fisk.
The Pittsburgh Steelers‘ personnel officials assembled on the practice field in Latrobe, Pa., Sunday to watch workouts for Byron Leftwich and Daunte Culpepper, two talented quarterbacks who went through the offseason looking for work instead of preparing for the season.
Replacing Chaz Batch with Leftwich or Culpepper? Was Kordell Stewart unavailable? How about Spergon Wynn? Could no one reach Shaun King?
They were amazed. “What are these guys doing on the street?” scouts muttered to themselves.
What were they doing on the street? Hanging out with other people who are not viable NFL QBs, I guess. Oh, and in Leftwich’s case, eating. A lot.
Both quarterbacks are in great shape. They are big and physical with powerful arms.
And all the mobility of a tectonic plate.
Both have been winners in this league.
Jacksonville was 24-20 in games started by Leftwich. His best record as a starter was 8-3 in 2005. Winner winner, give this man his chicken dinner.
Feeling as though they had hit the lottery for a quick fix while Charlie Batch heals from a broken collarbone, the Steelers signed Leftwich for the minimum salary.
Their version of the lottery sounds a lot like Shirley Jackson’s. Can I volunteer to throw the first rock?
The NFL chews up quarterbacks like patrons at a football game devour hot dogs. Alex Smith, the top pick in the 2005 draft, is struggling in San Francisco and could be beaten out by journeyman J.T. O’Sullivan. Matt Leinart is the starter in Arizona, but one stumble could bring Kurt Warner into a starting role again. Rex Grossman isn’t exactly wowing them in the great Chicago Bears quarterback debate.
Yes, it is the NFL’s fault the the QBs you just mentioned are shitty. That makes sense. All failed QBs fail not because of their own lack of talent, but, rather, from the evil NFL machine eating them like a hotdog.
With Peyton Manning sidelined with a knee infection and Tom Brady nursing an ankle injury, you wonder, “Where are the next great quarterbacks coming from?”
Hmm…let’s see. My guesses for places you could look for the next great QB would be: 1. Cincinnati 2. New York (Giants) 3. New Orleans 4. Denver 5. Dallas 6. Washington 7. Houston 8. Jacksonville 9. Cleveland and 10. Anywhere other than Nashville or Kansas City.
On a recent trip to Nashville, Tenn., to see Titans quarterback Vince Young, I saw hope for the present and the future.
Well fuck me runnin’.
Young might not be a fantasy football delight because he’s not a numbers guy, but in time, the numbers might come.
“he’s not a numbers guy” = “he fucking blows as a QB under any traditional metric you might care to use, save for ‘being ambiguously gay at da club,’ where he is among the league leaders.”
In the meantime, Young, under the instruction of offensive coordinator Mike Heimerdinger, is taking the next step in developing into an elite NFL quarterback.
Step 1: Run just enough as a rookie that people overlook your mediocre passing.
Step 2: Regress in your second year, cease to run, and ride a great defense to the playoffs.
Step 3: Throw your offensive coordinator under the bus.
Step 4: ???
Step 5: Profit?
Heimerdinger watched all of Young’s game tapes and developed a plan for taking his immense talents to the next level.
That plan was relayed to Vince using simple, crayon drawings:
While Young is still a work in progress, the Titans are fortunate to have a quarterback who can be a winner on the field while he learns.
Obligatory reminder: VY’s career record: 17-11 (0-1 playoffs). Rex Grossman, WHO CLAYTON JUST SAID SUCKED ABOUT FOUR PARAGRAPHS AGO: 19-11 (2-2 playoffs).
“Eventually, I think he’ll be pretty darn good,” Heimerdinger said. “This guy’s physical presence is amazing. He’s 6-4 or 6-5. I didn’t think I would see anybody bigger than Steve McNair and John Elway, two guys I worked with.”
So, there you have it. Vince will be good because he is tall. Other tall QBs who came in with a lot of hype: Todd Marinovich (6-4) and Ryan Leaf (6-5). (Also, Heimerdinger didn’t think he’d ever see someone bigger than McNair (6-2) or Elway (6-3)? Really? Chad Pennington, whom he worked with, was as big or bigger than both of those guys.)
Young has Michael Vick-type running ability, but his height gives him a downfield edge when he stays in the pocket to pass.
Which would matter if he ever stayed in the pocket to pass. And if he could read defenses.
In two seasons, he has gone through some interesting configurations. Coming out of Texas, he was a running quarterback who could throw.
And who could probably spell his name if you spotted him the “V-I-N-C.”
He went 8-5 as a rookie starter in 2006 and was billed as the NFL’s next star. He was on the cover of the Madden game. He threw for 12 touchdowns and ran for seven. He was the offensive rookie of the year and earned a trip to the Pro Bowl.
He also threw 13 INTs, which John leaves out because that would be the verbal equivalent of using teeth in this written blowjob.
Not only did he beat the Madden jinx by starting 15 games last season, Young, through his leadership, took the Titans on a surprise ride to the playoffs.
Yup. That’s exactly what happened. The playoffs had nothing to do with Tennessee having the best defense in the league. It was Young’s “leadership” that took them to playoffs. That leadership included standing away from all the other players, pouting like a little ho when he was not the starter in the game at Houston. But that kind of leadership is so powerful, it can overcome a 9 TD, 17 INT, year. That leadership is not fazed by a fall off in yards per attempt, yards per completion, or yards per carry. Amazing. He’s like General fucking Patton out there.
Despite that success, things were holding him back.
Based on what we’ve seen and heard from him, I’m betting those “things” were Norm Chow and the itchy, restrictive nature of shirts.
He played a good portion of the season with an agonizing quad injury that handcuffed him.
Little-known fact: An injured quad makes it so that you can’t see the opposing teams’ defensive backs, thus forcing you to throw into coverage a LOT.
Worse, he struggled in his second season, trying to be more of a pocket passer than a multidimensional quarterback.
Sooo…the “next great QB” struggled when trying to be a QB? Weird.
“My quad, man, it was bad,” Young said. “Every week you get it better, then you go out and play and hurt it again. The quad would get weak. I was taking those pills for the pain. I was running around trying to make plays when it’s not there. The quad is definitely back where it needs to be although I still have a little hole in there.”
Brett Favre thinks you are a total fucking pussy if you can’t plan through some pain while hopped up on Vicodin. Also, just fyi, the fact that the pain pills make it not hurt during the week does not mean it has gotten “better.” Further, if it was that bad, why the fuck didn’t you take a few weeks off and rest/rehab it, especially since the team did not miss a beat with Vodka Collins at the wheel. (Because, you know, that whole “we’re riding our defense” thing)
Heimerdinger returns to the Titans at the right time for Young. Having worked with McNair and Elway, Heimerdinger knows how to craft a plan for a talented quarterback.
OK, first of all, the next person to mention Heimerdinger and Elway in the same sentence gets smacked in the head. Mike Heimerdinger was the WIDE RECEIVERS COACH for the Broncos from 1995 to 1999. He had literally DICK to do with developing John Elway. Yet that is exactly what Clayton is insinuating.
Secondly, though, Heimerdinger also worked with Brooks Bollinger and Chad Pennington when they were in their developmental stages as QBs and neither of them became much of anything. (That’s called an “understatment.”) So, it looks like ‘Dinger does well when he has a talented QB (McNair) and not well at all when he doesn’t. Which makes him no different from anyone else, really. Besides, you can argue pretty convincingly that it is EASIER to devlop a talented QB, so McNair’s development under Heimer (which, incidentally, came after McNair had been starting in the league for three years, which is the point where many QBs make a large leap in terms of production) is not some merit badge for the OC.
FINALLY, all of this presupposes that Vince is a “talented” QB in the same manner that Elway and McNair were, which has yet to be proven.
Norm Chow, the Titans’ offensive coordinator the past two seasons, helped in Young’s early development but a different set of eyes was needed.
The first thing Heimerdinger did was work extensively on defense recognition.
Not a bad plan.
Young was lax in making pre-snap reads in his first two seasons.
Yes, yes he was. And Mike Vick was “lax” in taking proper care of his pets, Charlie Casserly was “lax” in properly evaluating free agents and trade proposals, and John Clayton is “lax” on supporting his arguments with anything resembling proof.
For Young, it was back to school and he had plenty of tutors.
The Titans signed veteran tight end and former Atlanta Falcon Alge Crumpler, who’s known as much for his recognition of defenses as he is for his pass-catching ability.
So, they had to bring in someone to yell out the correct answer to Vince? “R-o-C-k!” “Ohhhh, the ‘c’ is silent!” Sounds like the teaching of Vince was going really well.
Crumpler often bailed out Vick during Vick’s mad scrambles by putting his big body in a spot where the quarterback could see it.
I fail to see how Mike Vick being consistently bailed out by a TE will make Vince a better QB. I mean, when the guy is having to change his route on the fly and go get the ball from the QB, it doesn’t really sound to me like the QB is “developing” as a QB. For example, imagine I am horribly shitty at my job (real stretch, I know). Then, one day, my boss hires a co-worker who, for whatever reason, is an incredibly hardworker and he does all his work and all my work, but I still the get the praise and the bonuses. Have I “developed” as an employee? No. Of course not.
“I see the maturation of Vince,” Crumpler said. “I just want to make sure he doesn’t lose his confidence. Can he weather the storm of being the third pick in the draft and can I be one of those guys who help to get him there? Eli Manning took all the shots in his first few years and he weathered the storm. It’s a great story. I would hope the same thing can happen to Vince.”
And Ryan Leaf took all the shots but didn’t weather the storm. I would hope the same thing can happen to Vince.
Vick’s dogfighting trial and later imprisonment were the story in 2007, as much a part of the daily headlines as Brett Favre’s divorce from the Packers this offseason. That experience adds perspective to Crumpler’s move from Atlanta to Nashville to help Young.
Huh?
Vick’s demise and Crumpler’s season of noncommunication with Bobby Petrino were a personal hell for the Pro Bowl tight end and his Falcons teammates. Being with Young is heaven to Crumpler because he can help.
Ah, ok. Because Crumpler lost his starting QB to federal prison, that makes it much better for him in Nashville. Fine. Whatever. Glad he’s happy. Quick—name all the QBs who have gone from below average to great due to the signing of a veteran TE!
“Look at it, Vince threw nine touchdown passes and 18 interceptions last year,” Crumpler said.
Close, Alge. Though it’s funny that you just made his numbers even worse than they really were.
“He had the Pacman Jones distraction.
Everyone who thinks Vince struggled to throw the ball because Pacman was in trouble with the law and suspended by Herr Goodell, please raise your hand.
He had an injury.
Fair enough. Though, again, if it was so bad that he was hurting the team by playing, then he should have been benched or placed on IR. If it wasn’t bad enough to affect his play, then it shouldn’t be an excuse for his play. But, still, I’ll grant the injury as a viable thing that might have distracted a young QB.
Yet he wins 10 games and goes to the playoffs in the AFC South, a tough division.
Actually, he “won” 9 games, at least according to how such things are recorded. In reality, a much better argument can be made that the team won many of those games despite Vince’s play:
Week 1: 11-18, 78 yds, 1 INT, 1 rushing TD, 1 fumble. Team wins.
Week 5: 20-33, 157 yds, 3 INT. Team wins.
Week 8: 6-14, 42 yds, 1 fumble. Team wins.
Week 9: 14-23, 110 yds, 2 INT, 1 rushing TD. Team wins.
Week 16: 12-22, 166 yds, 1 INT, 3 fumbles. Team wins.
Week 17: 14-18, 157 yds. Team wins.
We have a quarterback. His game management just has to get a little bit better. He’s a difference-maker.”
He’s a difference-maker as a QB like ebola is a difference-maker as a weight-loss tool.
In his first practice this summer against non-Titans, Young completed 22 of 26 passes against the Rams last week in a scrimmage.
Two questions: 1. What were the other numbers, John? 2. You do realize that scrimmage (not even a preseason game!) is rather meaningless, right?
Despite the struggles with confidence and the quad injury last season, Young improved from a 51.5 to a 62.3 percent passer.
And his TD % went down, his INT % went up, and his number of passes over 20 yards went down. Besides, David Carr was a 68% passer in 2006 with a similar YPC and a better INT %. I don’t see anyone calling him the next great QB.
In his third season, he’s starting to figure out who he is as a quarterback.
Mediocre and overrated.
“I’m going to try to be rookie year Vince Young that everybody was talking about,” Young said. “I’m going to go out, win games and try to go further in the playoffs.”
Rookie Year Vince: 51.5% completion, 12 TDs/13 INTs, 12 fumbles, 146.6 passing YPG, 8-5 as a starter…way to set those goals high, Vincent.
His improvements are noticeable.
IN TRAINING CAMP. NOT IN A REAL GAME. PLEASE REMOVE YOUR PBS-LOGO-LOOKING HEAD FROM HIS CROTCH.
Thanks to his offseason of studying pre-snap reads, Young is comfortable behind center. Heimerdinger has worked him in drills to improve his footwork.
File this under “Things They Hope You Have A Basic Grasp On When You Enter The League.”
“Different drills improved my base on five- and seven-step drops,” Young said. “Now, I’m keeping my feet underneath me and I’m sliding up and moving in the pocket. I’m not just standing in one place and bouncing. Having my feet underneath me, I’m throwing more accurately. You watch Tom Brady. He brings his whole body with him when he moves in the pocket. Sometimes, I would use my arm more and not bring my whole body with me.”
You know who else was fundamentally flawed as a thrower when he entered the league? David Carr. All kidding aside, though, did you really just mention Tom Brady in a paragraph about your own development? That feels wrong on a number of levels.
Heimerdinger showed Young tape of how he would stand eight yards behind the line of scrimmage, bouncing with his feet and looking downfield.
“Bouncing with his feet,” huh, John? What the fuck else would he be bouncing on? That’s quality sportswriting. I suddenly have this feeling that you are going to work some ridiculous pun into this article.
If Young had to run, he was so far behind the line of scrimmage, it would be hard to make a gain.
Yet people talked about how he was a much better runner than a passer. Odd.
From reads to foot placement to depth in the pocket, Young is starting to turn old school. He’s getting better.
Translation: Now that he is learning some of the most basic tenets of quarterbacking at any level, Young is starting to at least resemble a real QB. (As for the “he’s getting better,” again, can we PLEASE wait until he does something in a real game before we start throwing this shit around?)
Thanks to Young’s development, remember the Titans when picking playoff contenders.
Welcome to Punsville, population: you. Admit it, you ugly fuck—you wrote this whole goddamned article so you could use that shitty quip, didn’t you?
I get email
Aug 5, 2008 2007 Season, 2008 Season, 2008 Training Camp, Rebuttals, Super Mario
This arrived in my inbox this afternoon:
Subject: Mario Williams maybe [sic] overhyped
Message: I understand that Mario Williams is having a good camp, but look at what he is going against. With the zone blocking system, during practice, he is going one-on-one against quicker, but SMALLER offensive lineman [sic]. This allows Mario to use his strength - power rush against the smaller offensive lineman. Against other teams, most of whom don’t have zone blocking system, and have bigger offensive lineman, Mario Williams won’t have a size advantage and won’t be able to use his strength - power rush ; he will have to use his weakness against them : the finess [sic] rush techniques.
Quick, spot the main flaw in this argument! (Note: While glaring, “punctuation and grammatical errors” is not the correct answer.)
Hint: To the best of my knowledge, Mario did not play any regular season games against the Texans last year.
Patron Tequila is a no-good, lying bastard
Jun 29, 2007 2007 Draft, Demarcus Faggins sucks, Dunta Robinson, Like whoa, Rebuttals, Secondary issues are primary
It’s Friday and I’m hungover. Hungover like whoa. Even the thought of writing something long and (semi-) coherent makes my head hurt a little more. So you are getting some randomness right now, with a possibility of real posting should this coffee and McDonald’s turn out to be a panacea.
- Big Blue Shoe surrenders.1 He also writes a pretty fair post about our revamped defense, though he seems to have misunderstood the gist of my Dunta Robinson breakdown. (Note: It’s not that I don’t think he’s as good as advertised; it’s that the numbers actually SHOW that he’s not as good as advertised.) Oh, well… baby steps.
- The NFL Supplemental Draft is next month. For those teams looking to pick up guys who were kicked off of teams, academically ineligible, and/or otherwise not going to play anymore NCAA pigskin, the Supplemental Draft is a godsend. Yahoo! Sports has a breakdown of some of the higher profile low profile players. The author of that piece seems to think we’ll be in the mix for Nebraska OL Chris Patrick. To which I say “blah.” I am somewhat interested, however, in UConn SS/OLB Donta Moore. Dude is tough, fast, and can tackle like a mofo (that’s a technical term). Which is a description that you generally don’t give to C.C. Brown.
- Thomas Hilton has a nice recap of pre-camp player news from around the web. There’s even some fantasy football talk. At some later point, I want to do a fantasy football breakdown of this team that goes further than the “Andre Johnson is good” chatter we usually get. I’ll give you a sneak peak, though, right now. If you are in a 50-team league that uses individual defensive players, you should try to snag Petey Faggins somewhere around pick 985.
- Finally, Pro Football Talk reports, in a very smug and condescending manner, that the Texans’ string of sell-outs might be coming to an end. Please note, though, that you have to scroll down past where he drops the soap for Sprint-Nextel.
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Though the Houston Texans like to boast about the fact that they’ve had 50 straight sellouts in five years of existence, there’s a chance that the number might not get much higher. Or any higher.
Thanks to a head’s-up from a reader, it appears that the Texans are having trouble selling their season tickets. Currently, “less than 2,000” are available, which means that as many as 1,999 are left — despite the prior existence of a “priority wait list.”
So the inference that can be drawn is that, after a chunk of last year’s season-ticket holders passed on renewing and after the folks on the waiting list got their chance to buy tickets, there are still about $1 million worth of unsold season seats.
But should any of this be surprising to anyone? After three years of improvement, the Texans tanked in 2005, and then committed the football equivalent of passing on Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson by leaving Reggie Bush and Vince Young on the draft board in April 2006. [Author's Note: You can almost smell the exaggeration, it's so thick.] If either of those guys were playing in Houston, we suspect that every 2007 game would be already sold out.
As it stands, it could be that the only 2007 games that will be fully sold out will be those in which Bush and Young will make their visits to town.
Jerk.
1 I can’t decide if I am amused or annoyed that he tried to sound magnanimous about the whole ordeal with the “he kicked my post’s metaphorical ass, but at least I didn’t call him names” bit. (I’m paraphrasing.) Like I said to him in the comments, I called his mom names. And that’s only if you find the scent of rotting French cheese to be offensive.
Jim Sorgi is better than Peyton Manning
Jun 27, 2007 David Carr has Post-Concussion Syndrome, Posts that list too many players, Preview, Rebuttals, Teams that aren't the Texans, The Schaub Experiment
One of the best things about writing a Texans blog, aside from getting to write about the greatest team to never post a winning record, is that there just aren’t that many other Texans blogs out there. Which means that, any time one of us posts something of interest (or just something really dumb), it doesn’t get lost in a crush of other posts from other blogs. Nope, it pretty much stays at the forefront for a day or two, until someone (usually Stephanie) posts something that is actually, you know, appropriate and not inflamatory and devoid of ad hominem attacks. If you are into that sort of thing.
Anyway, I guess I should not have been surprised when Big Blue Shoe caught wind of my reply to his stupidity post about the Texans. (Big thanks to reader Casey, who alerted me to this.) What was surprising was that he only felt the need to respond to one point I made before piling on some more of his own arguments (most of which are SCREAMING for a rebuttal). So, without Freddy Adu…
I’m fighting an ear infection (gross), which explains why I haven’t blogged in the last few days. It’s nice to be missed though.
I gotta be honest, I was hoping that you would go with the “I’m fighting an ear infection and the antibiotics are why my last post about the Texans was pretty much devoid of substantive argument” angle. Whatever, though.
Payton Menning apparently doesn’t like Matt Schaub’s smiling mug on our site. Come on now! What’s not to love? That’s the face of the future for Houston. And speaking of the Texas, it seems Texans fans were none to happy with my assessment of their QB situation as part of the AFC South Roundtable. Not only did Tim at BRB take exception, but so did Matt at Da Good, Da Bad, and DeMarco.
“DeMarco?” Seriously? As to Schaub’s face, I’m just going to use that as an excuse to post another link to this picture of David Carr. Never gets old.
DeMarco was the site that offered the most heated response. Matt, the writer there, reminds me a lot of… well, me.
That’s low.
Matt attacked my opinion like a wounded lioness protecting her cubs. While I respect his opinion and his passion (and his utter desperation that Schaub please, please, please work out as the starting QB), I take exception to one comment:
A quick primer, Mr. Shoe. The way it works generally is that you make a statement–say “Carr is better than Schaub”–and then you back it up with some supporting evidence. Please note, however, that “supporting evidence” does not include conjecture and some first-hand, hyperbole-riddled “evidence” that is completely unverifiable.Sorry Matt, but that ain’t how it works. I don’t have to prove jack-friggin’-squat. Matt Schaub is the one who has to prove something.
Man, wouldn’t it be great if you were right? Think of the possibilities if one could make baseless assertions and then stand back and say “I don’t have to prove it!” For instance, I could say that Hill Country women are much hotter than women in Indianapolis and I wouldn’t even have to mention the androgyny, raw tonnage, or facial hair of the Hoosier broads. The world would be my oyster.
Sadly, however, that’s just not the case. At least not to anyone trying to make some sort of coherent argument about anything. YOU said that Carr was better than Schaub, so it’s on YOU to prove it. This isn’t some taste-test like “Pepsi v. Coke” or “Shoe’s Mom v. moldy camembert,1” where there is no objective way to measure such things. No, no… this is a direct apples-to-apples comparison. So compare. Or just sit back and say “I don’t have to and you can’t make me.” Because that’s clearly just as convincing.
Matt Schaub has to prove that he is better than David Carr, that he can do more with the tools given him than the rusty, bent set of junk the Texans dumped on Carr the four years he spent getting sacked there.
In terms of what he needs to do on the field to justify the price paid for him, you are correct. However, if you are relying on what Schaub needs to do going forward to prove that he is worse than David Carr in the past, you really aren’t saying much of anything. Think about that–you are saying that things Matt Schaub may or may not do in the future are worse than things David Carr has already done. What kind of comparison is that? “Yeah, the 2015 Giants are WAY better than the 2001 Patriots. Sorry Pats fans… you just need to face this truth right now.”
HOWEVER, if you are saying that–right now–Schaub is worse than Carr, then you should be able to point to something (anything!) to support this hypothesis. So which is it? Are you saying that Future Schaub is worse than yesterday’s David Carr, in which case we can pretty much ignore your post because you aren’t saying anything, or are you saying that Current Schaub is worse than Current Carr (or even last year’s Carr), in which case we can pretty much ignore your post because you are offering nothing that would back this claim?
Oh, wait! Maybe you do have some evidence. Let’s read on.
Right now, Schaub is started a grand total of ONE GAME, a game in which he lost.
What’s that old cliche? “Lesbians can smell fear.” No, wait… wrong one. “There’s lies, damn lies, and statistics” Yeah, that’s the one. First, the lie: Schaubby has started two games–the one you keep trying to beat into the ground and one the year before, against New Orleans. Second, the damn lie: You keep trying to equate this loss with poor performance on Schaub’s part. Well, the Boston Globe disagrees. In an article titled “QB Passes A Huge Test,” the author tosses out the following nuggets:
But with each completion to his big tight end, Alge Crumpler, and each toss downfield to wide receiver Brian Finneran, it became apparent Schaub was, at the very least, a capable replacement.
This team felt confident that we could perform with Matt Schaub, and I think that we proved that to be true.
White said Schaub is a natural fit for the offense. ‘We know whenever he steps in there, nobody loses a beat and we expect him to do the same things that he does every week in practice,’ White said after the game. ‘He’s a different quarterback than Mike’ [Author's note: This is a good thing.]
Vick he is not, but yesterday he might have served notice to quarterback-hungry NFL teams that he’s ready to lead his own team.
‘He’s a big player in this league, and when his contract’s up, it’s going to be interesting to see what happens with that guy,’ Finneran said.
Finally, there are the statistics: In this game, Schaub was 18 for 34, with 298 yards and three TDs. He led a 62-yard, game-tying drive in the fourth quarter and capped it with a two-point conversion pass. His rating for that game was 112.1. And, though you said last time that it was a “decimated” Patriots squad, McGinest, Warren, Vrabel, Samuel, Brown, Colvin, and Wilfork all played on the defense. Tom Brady spent his day throwing to two of his top three receivers (Givens and Branch) and both of his favorite TEs (Graham and Watson). He also handed the ball off 23 times to Corey Dillon. So, it sounds to me like “decimated” means “Troy Brown didn’t play much” in your book.
And since that is the only “evidence” to Matt has to back up his claim that Schaub is better, it kind of suggests that Matt’s inflated opinion of Schaub is based on “conjecture and some first-hand, hyperbole-riddled ‘evidence’ that is completely unverifiable.”
Um, there’s nothing conjectural or hyperbolic about 18-34, 3TDs, and 298 yards. That’s all pretty much verifiable. See, for instance, here. Thankfully, though, that’s not all I am relying upon. When I said he has a faster release and better pocket presence, I was referring to the video from NFL Network I linked to here as well as my own observations (echoed by other bloggers) gleaned from watching the Texans’ minicamp. (Note, while the minicamp stuff is first-hand, it is not hyperbole-ridden and it is easily verifiable by reading others’ thoughts on it as well as simply by watching the tape. Please don’t conflate me saying “I saw it on TV” with your ridiculous statement about watching Carr “several times” and being “amazed” at how well he played. Not the same.)
Which kind of makes Matt a hypocrite.
Hypocrite. n. “A person who professes beliefs and opinions that he or she does not hold in order to conceal his or her real feelings or motives.” I am professing a belief and an opinion that Schaub is better than David Carr, which happens to be a belief that I also hold. Sorry to ruin your best attempt at a pithy punchline.
All that said, the sheer ferociousness of Texans fans on the subject of Schaub v. Carr tells me that they are afraid.
OR… it could mean that they are sick of hearing how Carr was getting a bum rap, when anyone with half a brain could see that David Carr was responsible for a large number of the sacks of David Carr. It doesn’t really matter how good your line is when you hold the ball forever.
If Carr succeeds in Carolina and Schaub flounders in Houston, it means the problem was always something other than Carr, which means a majority of Texans fans were wrong to bash him.
And if the Queen had balls, she’d be the King. Your point? If Carr rides the pine in Carolina and Schaub makes the Pro Bowl, then we were all right. You can’t play the “If” game to justify a claim Carr is better than Schaub. “Car travel is safer than air travel. If a lot of planes crash this year, that will mean the people who bashed cars were wrong.”
And no one likes to be wrong.
You certainly seem to enjoy it.
Sorry Texans fans, but this time you are.
Man, after all the evidence and persuasive argument you’ve offered, you MUST be right.
I don’t know if David Carr will succeed with the Panthers, but I certainly will pull for him. In the years I watched him play in Houston, I never saw a whiny Ryan Leaf-like punk or an oft-injured bust ala Tim Couch.
You also apparently didn’t see a guy who made little effort to bond with his teammates, was told not to try to read defenses because he wasn’t good at it, and allowed his overbearing dad to become a fixture around the facilities. You must’ve been napping during those parts.
[Author's note: Shoe concludes with some stuff about how David was a gamer and never complained and his line was shitty and he had no receivers and lot of other tired stuff that we've gone over time and time again. At this point, though, I am bored and should probably actually do some work. Suffice it to say that he's wrong over the last few paragraphs, too.]
1 Best known for its creamy texture and mushroomy aroma.
