Rob's House

When you have a top 10 QB to run your high output offense you can absorb some special teams gaffes (although I should point out that ST cost Denver the chance to win against Indy) but when you've got your rookie game manager QB operating a run first offense trying to out-point a team relying largely on your defense to pull these games out, special teams becomes much more important. Also, it's not that you need special teams to dominate; just that it not lose the game or steal your chance of winning.

I said after the NE game that if Marrone insisted on keeping Crossman he should be fired, which I know sounds extreme but to me that decision speaks to his overall judgment and ability to effectively and introspectively assess the strengths and weaknesses of the team as well as the ability and willingness to do what needs to be done to improve and win. If I'm trying real hard to defend him though, I suppose it's possible that some of the blame for the poor performance is not on Crossman, but due to massive mid-year roster moves. There was a lot of roster shifting that did not so much effect the offense or defense, but had a significant impact on ST. Cutting Choice, for example, deprived the ST unit of a solid contributor toward the end of the year. I've not done in depth evaluation of ST so I don't know if this is the case, but if Crossman coached the right coverage but inexperienced players missed plays I could at least see why Marrone might give him another chance. None of this addresses Crossman's prior record of failure, but I really want to believe this move isn't as bad as it appears. For Marrone's sake he better hope Crossman can get his unit together b/c every HC gets a pass on his first season. Now's when he's expected to "show us the baby," and another abortion isn't going to cut it.

My mistake

He'd certainly add some fire to this team; and he'll probably be available for a reasonable price. I know there would be a very vocal minority that would be outraged, but I'd be okay with it. Also, I believe Michael Oher is a UFA at the end of the year and Ravens have shown they're not afraid to let a guy walk and I think they have Pitta to deal with too. Of course, if Oher hits the market I predict it'll be about 3.5 minutes before the Foreskins sign him.

The funniest part is he's not even in on the joke.

I'm not busting on Whaley, or even Buddy. It just always irks me when someone uses a "defer to authority" argument. I mean, if we're discussing the inner workings of the human ass hole and there's a proctologist in the group I'll naturally defer to him. But if he tells me that if I shove food up my ass I'll **** out my mouth I'm going to take issue with that. (South Park reference for those not in the know). Knee benders would take him at his word because after all, he's a doctor. Not only that, but it's also basically a declaration that everyone should shut up and stop questioning anything the FO does because someone hired them to work for their NFL team so we all better listen to them. Well where's the fun in that?

I assume you're being sarcastic, and my apologies if I am wrong, but there's always some clever guy who points out that the front office is made up of professionals and we're not so we should all shut up and defer to authority. The problem with that is, if you haven't noticed, all the brilliant "professionals" have done a piss poor job of fielding a decent team for the better part of a decade and many of the posters you mockingly refer to as "experts" have been right more often than the supposed experts you look up to like you're sick of wearing pants. I don't claim to be one of these posters, but it's football. Any one of us can get all 22, watch what's going on, and make assessments of what's going on in front of us. I don't always claim to know more than the deified losers the Bills have paraded through the FO for the last several years, but sometimes the mistakes are glaring and perhpas the "experts" are too close to it to see what's plainly obvious to everyone else.

I was all for legalizing pot until I saw what it's done to people like dog48579 and gatorboy.

Stat line per ESPN (Looks like Nelson's having a hell of a game ) : PASS: RUSH: REC: Rodgers 0-1, 0 yds, 0 tds Lacy 3 car, 9 yds, 0 tds Nelson 85 rec, 1314 yds, 8 tds

If the team makes smart moves and wins they get credit. If they make stupid moves and lose they get blame. I said earlier, what happens next year (and to be fair, the year after next) will shed a lot of light on the wisdom of this staff. This too

Okay, I actually did laugh out loud at this post. I didn't spit out any coffee, but I caught some strange glances from my co-workers. Well, it was pretty childish to start a thread about taking a poop. Prematurely, perhaps.

Uh. No offense, but I think it does.

You are correct. I was off by a year. A team that hasn't been able to reach .500 in 9 yrs.

I think it's sad that we have posters here that know more about this than Chris Brown. Couldn't he have at least pm'd NoSaint to get himself at least minimally informed before writing a pice for public consumption?

I'm not sure what you find so ridiculous or confusing. A team that hasn't been able to reach the lofty goal of finishing .500 in the last 10 years and is trying to build for the future cut bait early on a highly talented prospect that potentially could have gone a long way to making this team competetive. Sure, there's no guarantee he would have worked out, and maybe sending him packing was the right move, but maybe it wasn't. Certainly there are plausible explanations as to why this was done, but to tell fans not to second guess the new rookie coach but to instead swear blind allegiance to him like he's Jesus Christ, and then get upset when someone disagrees is far more ridiculous than this thread IMO.

I don't know that I totally agree with the 6th WR bit, but I find it hard to believe that any player's going to look at a guy with that skill set playing on the practice squad and infer anything other than bad behavior can keep you off the 53.

I think the issue is that most of us would not be happy with the majority of guys on that list. You're actually making a very strong case for drafting another QB early. Other than Luck, Stafford, and I'll go so far as to say Newton after this year, who among them are unquestioned franchise QBs? You could even question Stafford b/c despite gaudy stats he hasn't been able to get a team stacked with talent over the hump. Sam Bradford is a big ?, Tannyhill looks promising but I don't think anyone's ready to annoint him the next big star. RG3 looked great as a rookie but since hurting his knee (sound familiar) he's a shell of his former self and may or may not ever regain that form. Locker's starting to show some promise but has trouble staying healthy. The rest of the guys on that list are disappointments at best. To recap, there are only 2-3 guys on that list that fans can look at right now and definitively say we've got our guy. That being the case, it seems prudent to pluck a new guy from the pack and get him in the system rather than waiting 2-3 years to find out whether you got Newton or Ponder.

To be fair, Aaron Murray scored the would be winning TD against Auburn in the closing seconds of the game. If not for a flukey bomb that bounced out of the defenders hands and into the receiver's hands, GA wins that game and Auburn's watching the National Championship game from home.

We are, but not all catches are created equal. That's all I'm saying.

What's a better one? I usually think points allowed is a better stat, but do you just take raw points scored by opposing teams or do you look at it within the context of the games? For example, if the team turns the ball over inside it's own 30 and the defense holds to a FG do you count those 3 points against the D? Or if the D makes a big play to turn the ball over or sack the QB for a loss moving them out of FG range do you subtract the points that would have been scored? Do tell.

The real question is what's his challenge %. I've learned from these boards that this is the best barometer of a coach's competence.

I don't think that's a fair assessment of his performance. He had one very impressive game changing catch where he came down with the ball despite good coverage and another where the defender broke it up. It's not like he caught a 12 yard slant and had an easy pass bounce off his hands, which is what I'd infer from this post had I not watched the game. So big plays from receivers couldn't have been the difference in 1 or 2 of our 10 losses? And you're really going to put those losses on a defense that gave up the fewest yards per drive of any defense in the league this year? Seriously?

I figured this thread would get some traffic after last night. I don't suppose any of us has enough info to make a fully informed assessment of Marrone's decision to cut Rogers, but there's certainly reason at this point to question his judgment. If Rogers truly was a malcontent showing up the coaches and undermining their authority, it's hard to argue with the decision. If, however, it was merely a case of immaturity, it's hard to defend the decision not to at least sign him to the practice squad (which if a little humbling was all he needed, playing second fiddle to Hogan might have been just as humbling as getting cut). The wisdom of this decision, or lack thereof, remains to be seen. If this time next year we're cracking cold beers waiting for the Bills game to start then I for one won't be questioning anything Marrone has done. If, on the other hand, we're talking about who to take with the number 9 pick and Da'Rick is coming of a pro-bowl season, then it's going to be real damn hard to defend Marrone.

I think they should do away with the whole compensatory pick system. Try as I might I can't think of a rational defense for it. As far as I can see it's just a system to help good teams stay good and prevent struggling teams from catching up.

I showed him this post and gave him your address so he could go over there and kick your ass. Lucky for you he just chuckled that someone would call a man of his size a midget.