Orton's Arm

I didn't sign up for texts either, and I'm not included in the lawsuit. The case itself was ticky tack. I don't think anyone was seriously harmed by receiving five text messages when they'd only agreed to three. But there are more issues involved than just that. The law was violated. Violated by a large corporation which should have known better. If the Bills had been found not guilty, the next company to violate the law would point to the case as precedent. My favorite football team was punished for something ticky tack. I'm not happy about that. On the other hand, you have to draw the line somewhere. There is the school of thought that says if you give companies an inch, they'll take a mile. (Especially when it comes to something like spamming.) By sternly punishing minor infractions, you make more serious infractions less likely. It's being argued that the Bills are being punished at the rate of $75 a person. That's one way of looking at it. However, I'd be surprised if the Bills' wholesale cost for merchandise was much more than 10% of retail. So the actual harm to them is about $7.50 a person. That's less than you'd pay for a medium popcorn at the Ralph.

I'm glad you mentioned Kurt Warner. In his three Super Bowls, he threw for 414 yards against the Titans, 377 yards against the Steelers, and 365 yards against the Patriots. These represent the three highest passing yardage totals in Super Bowl history. He threw for 300 yards in 41.9% of his games played--the highest percentage of any quarterback ever. He tied Dan Marino's record of being the fastest QB to reach 30,000 career passing yards. The knock on Warner is longevity, or lack thereof. His career started late, ended a bit early, and had a fallow period in the middle. Despite all that, he was only about two years away from matching Joe Montana's career yardage total when he retired. If Joe Montana is in the conversation for best quarterback ever, I don't think Kurt Warner should be excluded based on those two years. Not that I'd put Warner best overall, but he's definitely in the conversation for top-5 best overall.

Paying Orton starter money is perfectly acceptable. When you have a starting-quality quarterback, you normally expect to have to pay him a starter-type salary. Orton-cailber free agent QBs are very rare. Having Orton on the roster gives the Bills the luxury of waiting until the right QB comes along before taking one in the draft. Without his presence, the Bills might feel pressured to use an early pick on a QB whether the right guy was there or not. They'd be repeating the same mistake they made with EJ.

To add to my previous post: I have the following mental image of what a Blacktips home game would be like. 48 hours before the game, a small freighter would appear, about 300 miles east of the North Carolina Atlantic coast. The crew would unpack an inflatable football field, and would begin inflating. Once it had some air in it, they'd toss it over the side, so that it would have the space to complete the inflation process in the water. The next step would be the lights. These lights would be mounted on tall poles, with flotation devices on the bottom. Ropes would be used to attach the poles to each other. (Help prevent them from falling down.) To prevent the poles from falling inward, each corner light pole would have a small motorboat tugging it outward. That outward pressure would be sufficient to keep tension on the ropes, thereby keeping the whole lighting system in place. A diesel generator on board the freighter would supply power for the lights. An hour or two before kickoff, a large cruise ship would arrive. It would stretch almost from end zone to end zone. Across the field from that, there would be bleachers--bleachers mounted on flotation devices. They'd rock back and forth in the waves. (The same would also be true of the lights, and of the floating football field itself.) Around each end zone, there would be a congregation of smaller vessels. Most of these would be larger than motorboats, but much smaller than that monster cruise ship. Food vendors would arrive on additional boats. There might even be a floating restaurant. Prior to the game, the Blacktips' coach would exhort his players to defend this particular patch of water against the invasion of the other team. "This is our 50 square mile patch of the North Atlantic! No one is taking it from us!" Around halftime, an overzealous Blacktips' fan would throw a large black tip shark onto the field. This fan had showed up early, and had immediately started fishing in hopes of catching exactly this kind of shark. After flopping around on the field for a while, the shark would make its way back into the water. The stadium would be rocking. Literally rocking, due to the action of the waves.

> BTW the "Blacktips" franchise is homeless, playing all games on the road. I went to this portion of their website, and saw what you mean. There is a map of the United States. The logo for their Boston team is in Massachusetts. The logo for their Brooklyn team is in New York State; and the logo for their Omaha team is in Nebraska. The Blacktips have a shark-themed logo; and that logo is located somewhere in the Atlantic.

> Orton may not be like Jim Kelly HOF great, but he may be Joe Ferguson good (much better than average). Orton is already better than Joe Ferguson, and it's not even close. Ferguson was not "much better than average." Even calling Ferguson average would be generous. The scary thing is that Orton is averaging 8.0 yards per pass attempt this season. I call that scary for two reasons: 1) Yards per attempt does not change across eras. If you look at the best few quarterbacks from the '50s, or '60s, or '70s, their career yards per attempt numbers are comparable to those of Brady, Manning, or Brees. Unlike quarterback rating, yards per attempt can be used to meaningfully compare quarterbacks across eras. 2) In Jim Kelly's best season (from a yards per attempt standpoint) he averaged 8.2 yards per attempt. Given that Kelly was throwing to guys like James Lofton and Andre Reed, and playing behind guys like Kent Hull and Jim Ritcher, it's not obvious that Orton's supporting cast is better than Kelly's. Granted, Orton's average yards per attempt will probably fall significantly below 8.0 by the end of the season. But even if it falls to, say, 7.6, that will still be higher than Kelly's career average of 7.4. Am I saying that Orton is Jim Kelly? No. What I am saying is that if Jim Kelly in the prime of his career had been the starting quarterback for the last four games, he wouldn't necessarily have put up better numbers than Orton's. Nor would his play necessarily have looked better from an eyeball test standpoint than Orton's looked.

> I'd like to see 2 full years of good play before committing and a playoff win. Orton is on a two year deal. However, he can void the second year if he so chooses. Which means he's on a one year deal. JC2002 wrote: > Of course but I think he will be expecting to be the man for the foreseeable future as opposed to simply breaking the bank. The kind of contract the Bills offer him will say a lot about how they see him. If they offer him backup money, that means they see him as a backup. If they offer him solid starter money, that's a very clear statement they envision him as the answer for the time being. Orton is not Fitzpatrick. Even when Fitz was "playing well," it's not like he was doing a particularly good job of accurately throwing the ball into tight coverage. Instead, Gailey had designed an offense designed to mask Fitz's lack of accuracy. The offense was designed to capitalize on Fitz's biggest strength (the ability to read the field quickly and accurately), and to make sure that the throws themselves were fairly simple, easy and straightforward. Defenses caught up to Gailey's offense shortly after Fitz signed that big contract extension. In contrast to the above, there's nothing gimmicky about Orton's production. He's getting his numbers by playing good, solid football. He's making good decisions, throwing the ball accurately. Far more accurately than Fitz. A quarterback who plays like that can succeed in just about any standard-issue NFL offense. You don't have to worry about whether some Fitzpatrick-specific offense cooked up by Gailey can stand the test of time.

> Orton has . . . a better arm.

Hackett needs Orton. Orton doesn't need Hackett.

When the Manuel pick was announced, I felt the same way I did after Music City Miracle, or any number of other Bills-related heartbreaks. Nothing that's happened since then has changed my perspective. That being said, I can't disagree with a single word you wrote about Hackett. Your description of his limitations is spot-on. The way he used Spiller is Exhibit A. We know Spiller can be successful in the right system. Gailey showed us that. But he isn't going to be successful if the only thing the offensive coordinator does is run him into a pile of bodies in the middle of the field. We spent the 9th overall pick on that guy, for crying out loud! He looked like he was on his way to a successful career under Gailey. Maybe not successful enough to justify his draft position, perhaps, but still a good, solid career. And now we're writing all that off because the offensive coordinator can't hack it? That's unacceptable! You also have to wonder how many of our offensive linemen's careers have taken a turn for the worse due to the blocking scheme or other aspects of coaching.

> 17 passes 4 TD's, coincidence or gameplan? If by "game plan" you mean "have the defense create more turnovers than a French bakery," then I'm going with "game plan." That said, many of the passing plays were well designed. The three completed passes to Watkins were well-designed pass plays, as was the one pass to Watkins that Orton missed. The 1 yard TD pass (which came after the defense gave the offense the ball at the Jets' one) was also a well-designed play. I'm not saying Hackett is totally inept. But on a day when the running backs averaged 2 yards a carry, and Orton averaged 14 yards per pass attempt, it's far from clear why Hackett would want to emphasize run, run, pass as strongly as he did. The Bills ran 13 third down plays--or 13 opportunities for Hackett to call run, run, pass. Of those, Hackett called run, run, pass eight times. That's 62%. There is also the minor matter of Hackett's run blocking scheme, or lack thereof. It seemed like whenever the Bills ran the ball, the attitude was, We can afford to write off this particular down. We don't have to worry about moving the chains until third and long. So for now, let's just try to avoid turnovers and keep the clock running. Orton had a good game. Not as good a game as the numbers would suggest, but a good game nonetheless. However, it's not like he was so perfect that the offensive coordinator could reasonably rely on him to always bail out the offense on third and long, after Hackett had done his very best to squander first and second down. Even if Orton had played perfectly, there are ways for third down pass plays to fail that don't involve errors on the quarterback's part. Missed blocks, dropped passes, penalties, etc. If your running backs are averaging 2 yards a carry, the only way you're moving the chains is through the air. If an offensive coordinator calls run, run, pass under circumstances like those, the very first time anything goes wrong with the passing game, they will have to kick the ball away. Play calling like that is simply unacceptable, unless the game is already so far out of the other team's reach that victory has already been assured.

Better to run Chan's high school offense than Hackett's middle school offense.

I only see two scenarios where it would make sense to draft a quarterback: Scenario 1: the Bills think the QB they're taking will have a significantly better career than Orton's. For a QB to achieve this, he'd have to become top 10. Scenario 2: The QB should offer a long-term serviceable backup. My concern with Hogan is that he might fall between two stools. Not good enough to be a top-10 quarterback in the NFL, but too high of a draft pick for a career backup. We don't need to use a 2nd round pick on a QB who will replicate Orton's talent level and career accomplishments. We have an Orton-like quarterback already, and he's in the prime of his career. To my mind, the biggest need is the offensive line: especially RG and RT. I'd like to see both those positions labeled P2, with no other positions receiving the P2 label.

> You should have probably looked at the stats for plays on first down before starting this thread There are two separate questions here: 1. Was the play calling against the Jets good or bad? 2. If bad, was it an isolated incident, or part of a larger pattern? The answer to the first question is almost painfully obvious. By calling run, run, pass, punt, Hackett allowed the Jets to hang around much longer than they should have. Thanks in part to the Bills' good defense, and also to their own self-destruction, they didn't use the opportunities to get back into the game that Hackett kept handing them. Had the Bills let a multi-win team (with a real quarterback) hang around like that, the result could easily have been disaster. The answer to the second question is more complex. As you pointed out, the run, run, pass Hackett excreted in the Jets game was not part of a season-long larger pattern of run, run, pass. But I'd argue it was part of a larger pattern of a lack of creativity and general ineptitude. The way he used Spiller (mindlessly running him up the middle) compared to Gailey's use of Spiller is exhibit A. The offensive line's blocking scheme is another very serious problem. (Although some of the blame for that may fall on the shoulders of Marrone or the OL coach.) The NCAA legalized the forward pass in 1906. Prior to that, if you wanted to score at all, you had to do so via your running game. Coaches couldn't just "mail it in" on running downs, choosing to bang their RBs uselessly up the middle into a pile of bodies. If running the ball is your only way of moving the chains, then that forces you to think a little more creatively about how to run the ball effectively than Hackett has done.

> "Run & stop the run" is one such axiom that can't be backed up statistically in the modern NFL. Correct. The New York Times performed a multiple linear regression analysis. The dependent variable was teams' winning percentages. The independent variables were yards per pass attempt, yards per running attempt, INT percentage, and the defensive equivalents thereof. A one SD improvement in yards per pass attempt was three times as effective as a one SD improvement in yards per rush attempt, or a one SD improvement in INT percentage. Given that interceptions are part of the passing game, the authors concluded that the passing game is four times as important as the running game. Of course, there will be exceptions to that rule of thumb. If your opponent has a great running game, and if your run defense is chopped liver, that team's running game may play a much greater role in the game's outcome than the above-described 4:1 ratio would suggest. But that logic can also be true of any other aspect of football. For example, if the other team is tremendously good at returning punts, and if your punt coverage team is lousy, punt returns might end up having a significantly greater impact than you'd usually expect.

This is a good point. Between them, Geno Smith and Michael Vick produced one of the worst quarterbacking performances I've ever seen. Vick did a good job hurting us with his legs, but that's not something which shows up in quarterback rating. His throwing was really bad--albeit not as bad as Geno Smith's! I think that Smith had a quarterback rating of zero. When you average a number like that into the defense's ranking, it's obviously going to make it look better than it had a week ago. On the other hand, Orton's perfect passer rating for the game came at the expense of what is widely recognized as a very weak Jets secondary. Orton is a better player than his reputation would suggest. But it's not like he'll be facing the Jets secondary every week. On the other hand, the Bills would undoubtedly have had a better offensive ranking if Orton had been with the team the whole offseason, and had been made the starter from the very first game. The fact that we look worse than we should due to Manuel's games may partially balance out the fact we look better than we should due to that Jets game.

Thank you. In answer to some people's questions, my screen name was once Edwards' Arm. (As indicated in my sig.) I fully expect Orton to be a better answer at quarterback than Edwards or Holcomb. In answer to those who argue that Hackett was "playing it safe" and "protecting the lead"--if a team that averages 2 yards a carry runs the ball every down, the typical result will be 4th and 4. That's fine if your goal is to run three plays, punt, and avoid turnovers. But if you only have a one or two score lead in the second or third quarter, hopefully the offensive coordinator will set his sights a little higher than that! If you get a 2 yard carry on first and ten, or 2nd and 8, you increase the odds of the team having to punt. Passing on third down represents a belated attempt at decreasing the odds of having to kick the ball away on fourth down. A strong preference for run, run, pass represents a multiple personality approach. On third down, the offensive coordinator acts like he cares about moving the chains. But on first and second downs, he acts like moving the chains is not a priority. He acts like his only objective is to avoid turnovers, and to keep the clock ticking until the punting unit arrives on the inevitable fourth down. It almost never makes sense for an offensive coordinator to adopt this multiple personality approach. He should choose one objective, and call plays which advance that objective. If his one objective is to punt the ball on 4th down (after having used clock on the first three downs), he should call run, run, run. If, on the other hand, his goal is to move the chains, he should emphasize the things which are working, while de-emphasizing the things that aren't. If you have a weak offensive line, and the other team's defense is known for the strength of its defensive line, running the ball up the middle into a massive pile of bodies may not be the best option available. I realize that a weak offensive line is a liability not just on running plays, but on passing plays. But it's possible to design pass plays which reduce emphasis on the OL's protection. Three step drop/quick passes are a good idea. As are screens. The Jets had a weak secondary. The Bills have a good quarterback and a good WR corps. Any reasonable set of pass play calls would likely have been successful, as long as the play design didn't call for the OL to block for very long periods of time.

> One plus of not having a big time QB is that there should be $ Orton is having a very good year. This season he's averaging 8.0 yards per pass attempt. That's higher than the career average of either Manning or Brady. Granted, that one stat doesn't tell the whole story. But I'm sure it will be mentioned in contract negotiations. What contract negotiations, you ask? Orton is on a two year deal. But that second year is voidable, I believe by him. The better he plays, the more likely he is to conclude that it's in his interest to void that second year. The Bills simply can't afford to lose Orton, because they have no Plan B if he leaves.

> But Orton's not the long-term answer. Is EJ? Of the two, Orton is much more likely to be the long-term answer than EJ. Manuel isn't a more accurate passer than Losman. He isn't better at processing information quickly than Losman. His physical tools are not much different than Losman's. Losman can't make an NFL roster as a backup, let alone provide a team with a long-term answer as a starter. Why will Manuel's career be any different? On the other hand, Orton's pre-draft scouting reports indicated he was good at processing information quickly; and that he had the polish of a ten year vet. He also throws the ball accurately, at least the vast majority of the time. He's only 31. Orton is far more likely to be a late bloomer--in the vein of Rich Gannon--than Manuel is to suddenly become something he is not, and never has been. If Manuel starts throwing the ball very accurately in practice, and does so consistently, then maybe you revisit the above logic. But there's no reason to give him more snaps in games than his performance in practice has earned. The first round pick squandered on him is a sunk cost. The hope invested in him was based on wishful thinking; not on a disciplined, realistic assessment of the strengths and limitations he'd displayed as a college player.

> I'm no expert on grading linemen, but isn't allowing pressure on 12% of pass plays a bad thing? I'm no expert either. But I've read that if an OL wins his battles on 90% of running plays, that's considered good. I'm not sure how that applies to passing plays. > If all five OL gave up pressure 12% of the time (assuming no overlap for the sake of argument), Orton would have guys on him 60% of the time. There's a better way to do this. Each OL allowing pressure 12% of the time is the same as each OL providing good pass protection 88% of the time. 0.88^5 = 0.53. Which would mean Orton would have good protection 53% of the time. 53% isn't good, but at least it's better than 40%.

Hackett called running plays on 65% of his first downs, and 68% of his second downs. The vast majority of these running plays were runs up the middle. He called pass plays on 84% of third downs. The Bills ran 13 third down plays, or 13 opportunities for Hackett to call run, run, pass. Of those 13 opportunities, Hackett called for run, run pass eight times, or 62% of the total. Another of those opportunities was used to call run, run, run. Booby Dixon averaged 2 yards a carry, and Bryce Brown averaged 2.1 yards a carry. Kyle Orton averaged 14 yards per pass attempt. Granted, that average was inflated by some long passes to Watkins. Prior to the Jets game, Orton's season average was over 7 yards per pass attempt. That's more than triple what the running backs averaged as they uselessly banged the ball up the middle into a pile of bodies. The Bills' passing game can typically be relied upon to produce over 7 yards per play. It was doing even better than that against the Jets. On the other hand, the running game wasn't doing anything. Especially not with the kinds of running plays Hackett called! So why would he use 2/3 of his first downs, and 2/3 of his second downs, on a running game that wasn't working? The Bills had ten conversions the whole game. (A conversion is defined as a play which resulted in either a first down or a touchdown.) Three of those conversions were off of Jets penalties. That meant the offense created seven non-penalty conversions on fifteen possessions. That's a little less than one non-penalty conversion every two possessions! That lack of conversions is what you'd expect from so much run, run pass. On a day when the Jets didn't have a quarterback, and when the Bills' defense created more turnovers than a French bakery, it was easy for the Bills to hide their weaknesses. Hackett's playcalling is a very serious weakness indeed!

> I honestly believe teams don't try to run up our middle like they would if we did not have him. The above statement is true of many teams the Bills have faced. However, not all offensive coordinators are cut from the same cloth. Some offensive coordinators will use virtually all their first downs on runs up the middle. Plenty of their second downs as well. They'll keep doing this with almost brutal disregard for the results those runs produce. Even if the running game is averaging about 2 yards a carry, even if the quarterback is playing excellent football, even if practically every drive is resulting in a three-and-out, the offensive coordinators will still maintain that 2:1 ratio of running plays to passing plays. I have seen this myself.

> QB has never been more important. As such the highest value in the game on either side of the ball is now passers and pass rushers. I agree with the above, with one exception. On defense, a good pass rush is probably a necessary condition for stopping a guy like Tom Brady. But it may not be a sufficient condition. If your pass rush is working well, Brady will respond by emphasizing short passing routes intended to get rid of the ball quickly. Too quickly for your pass rushers to have much of a chance of sacking him. Your secondary will be much better at defending against that particular kind of attack than your pass rush. On the other hand, if you don't have a good pass rush, he'll have all day to throw. That will give him a lot more options; and that's never a good thing! > The reason to not use a couple of your 7 picks on a QB each year are considerably more vague and certainly outdated. If the above strategy is followed, your roster will typically have the following look: QB A: a rookie QB B: a second year player QB C: a third year player (to be jettisoned at the end of the season) The system will function like a conveyor belt, moving QBs off the roster at the end of three years. But let's say a particular QB is good enough to step off the conveyor belt, and remain on the roster beyond that three year period. His success will shorten the conveyor belt for the other QBs. They'll only have two years on the team before being discarded. The plan you've described would use up a considerable number of draft picks. If its ultimate result is a franchise QB, the sacrifice of those picks will have been justified many times over. The biggest obstacle I see to your plan working as intended is NFL teams' ability to evaluate the QBs on their own rosters. The Chargers gave up on Brees, which is why they drafted Rivers. The Packers were feeling nervous about Aaron Rodgers, which is why they used a second round pick on Craig Nall. The conveyor belt approach only works if the really good QBs can be identified and taken off the belt before it deposits them in the garbage pit. If you have a way that problem can be overcome--or at least mitigated--it would significantly increase the viability of the strategy you've proposed.

> That is 100% wrong. . . . Concussions aren't caused by heading the ball. From Scientific American: **************** The study imaged the brains of 37 amateur soccer players, 21 to 44 years old, and found that players who reported “heading the ball” more frequently had microstructural changes in the white matter of their brains similar to those observed in patients with traumatic brain injury. These players also performed poorly on cognitive tests, compared with players who reported heading the ball less. The study, published online in June in Radiology, found evidence of a threshold—1,800 headings—above which the effects on memory begin to manifest. *************** A nearly identical conclusion was reported by WebMD and National Geographic. GunnerBill stated that his soccer-related concussions were the result of a collision of heads, when he and another player were challenging for the opportunity to headbutt the ball. If you make a rule against touching the ball with your head, you'd eliminate the reason for those challenges. You'd be eliminating the cause of the brain damage in the above-described articles, and the reason for concussions like the ones GunnerBill experienced. Soccer is a fun game to play. (But not all that fun to watch.) I played organized soccer for a couple years myself, back when I was in middle school. Later, I would play non-organized soccer with my friends, or occasionally would participate in adult league soccer. But I never headbutted the ball, and that didn't seem to matter. Soccer was a good opportunity to run around, to get exercise, and to compete. The absence of headbutting didn't change any of that.

> I play twice a week and this makes me think it's time to ban soccer. That's the only rational response when anyone has any possibility of getting hurt. Ban soccer? No. But they do need to change the rules. It should be illegal to touch the ball with your head, the same way it's illegal to touch the ball with your hands. Not even goalies should be allowed to touch the ball with their heads. While that rule change won't eliminate soccer-related concussions, it would dramatically reduce the number. The whole headbutting the ball thing doesn't add that much to the game. Certainly not enough to justify the concussions/brain damage that goes with it.