Start em or Sit em: QBs
Ruminations
One of the big stories to come out of last weeks games was the replacement of Eagles QB Nick Foles with Mark Sanchez. You will, of course, remember Sanchez for one of the most inglorious plays of all time: the Buttfumble
This happened on Thankgiving Day, the biggest football day of the year, in prime time. Poor Sanchez, he played out the rest of the 2012 season and then sat out the 2013 season because of a broken heart shoulder. Earlier this year the NY Jets traded him to the Eagles. Sanchez played four years with the Jets, two good ones and two bad ones. I watched him quite closely, and saw him play live in NYC. The media was all over him and he got a really bad rap, but I blame the coaches and support personnel more than I blame Sanch. Under pressure, in hurry-up mode he was sharp, fast and good. Make him wait in the pocket for ever with no good blockers and, surprise, he gets sacked, throws an interception or runs into his own players butt. I always thought Sanch would be good in a system that promoted his skills and downplayed his suckiness. You know, like you would expect a coach to do if he wanted to actually win. But for many coaches, getting the most out of the QB is not the priority, the priority is making sure the QB does as he is told, irrespective the bad demands that are made.
Good news for Sanch, he looks real good for the Eagles. The media are on his side and talking him up and he gets to start for the Eagles with Foles out for 6-8 weeks.
But despite what I just said about him, I'm not as hot for him as the media is. He played well in pre-season and he played well enough in last weeks game. But you will remember, Marcy in particular, the raps that Kirk Cousins got earlier in the season. His first throw in a game this year was for a TD, but he got progressively worse. So many back-up QBs start strong and die real quickly; seems the media forgets this.
I hope Sanch is different. I like him, I like his attitude and I think the Jets really screwed him over. I'll be cheering for him, but I don't have faith in him. Yet.
Another interesting QB is Eli Manning. Eli, Peyton's younger brother, has led the NY Giants for 11 or 12 years and won two Superbowls. Two. That's one more than Peyton who is the NFL-Overlord. Eli is more successful! This year the Giants brought in a new coordinator, a new offensive system, new playbook. You'd think coming into the Giants with a two-time SB champion QB you'd match your team to Eli. No. Eli has been forced to learn, from scratch, all these new things, including a new throwing stance! How is that working out? Really really badly. Maybe Eli can get it together, but it doesn't look like it.
Let's contrast Eli with Peyton. Coming off neck surgery where Peyton couldn't even hold a football, he eventually had his pick of teams in 2012. Everyone wanted to hire Peyton. He picked the Broncos. Did the Broncos make Peyton learn a new system, stand differently? No. They tailor built the offensive system around Peyton, gave him a lot of control and authority. How did that work out? Really well.
Lesson?
Some QBs need to brought along. You can't take a rookie and let him do what he wants. But you also can't ignore the strengths and weaknesses, the talents, of your players. If you want a QB to succeed, and teams surely want that, then they need to build the team around the QB. Pick the right one to start with, give him weapons, give him support. Andrew Luck seems to have that in Indy, and he is flourishing there. Wilson in Seattle. Kaepernick, to a degree, in SF. Most other QBs in their rookie contract? Pretty poor. Pretty damn poor coaching.
I wonder if that can be applied to a corporate setting? Imagine, if you dare, a corporate area with two teams of people. One is small, but manages its activities, money and systems really well. So well, in fact, it has no major issues for years and users actually like the helpdesk staff(!). The other team is bloated, vomits money and everyone hates them. If you're a manager, which team should you be modelling if you want success? Tip, it aint the second team. And you certainly shouldn't be making the first team work the same as the second.
Celtics: 1-3
Timberwolves: 2-2
Hornets: 2-3
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