Two quarterback systems....in the NFL's future?

[BADOLBILZ]

My guess is that because the franchise QB system has been wildly successful and has dominated the NFL for decades, teams have not been sufficiently tempted to throw that all away to embrace the Flutie-Johnson Model.

 

The franchise QB system is only successful for teams that have a franchise QB. In the last decade, the disparity between those that have one and those that do not has only grown. For those that don't.....like the Buffalo Bills.....there really is no chance at winning a SB until they do find one. It's not really about throwing away the system that works but rather not just being resigned to your fate as an also-ran when you don't have one.

[Mr. WEO]

> Two QB systems do not work in real life period. This has been said at least a billion times throughout the life of football.

 

I agree it's been said quite frequently. Said so often, in fact, that the kind of system the OP has described hasn't been attempted since Shula did it back in the '70s. (Obtaining good results, by the way.)

 

Conventional wisdom in football is sometimes wrong. According to conventional wisdom, winning football games comes down to running the ball and stopping the run. A regression analysis performed by the New York Times proved that wrong. Passing offense is four times as important as rushing offense, and pass defense is four times as important as run defense.

 

If conventional wisdom can be wrong about one thing (run and stop the run), it can be wrong about other things (such as the OP's idea). When a coach isn't fully confident of his own ability, he will tend to rely on conventional wisdom.

 

For the OP's idea to come to fruition, you'd need four things to come together. 1) A team with a highly intelligent, creative, self-confident head coach. 2) A team with two QBs who are roughly equal to each other overall, but each of whom is strong in places where the other is weak. 3) The head coach must recognize that the two QBs are about equal overall, rather than trying to figure out which one is better. 4) The head coach would have to feel confident enough in his own job security to be willing to try unconventional things.

 

It's been said that no one's ever been fired for buying from IBM. This, despite the fact there are times when a non-IBM solution would have been less expensive or better (or both). By the same token, NFL coaches may believe they can increase their job security by acting conventionally, even when an unconventional solution had the potential to work better. This is why there is less experimentation in the NFL than should be the case.

 

I don't see the logic to this. What great, confident HC finds himself with 2 equivalently (and obviously only modestly) talented QBs with different skill sets? There has never been any evidence that this scheme would work. Even intuitively, it makes little sense. His path to job security would be much better served by finding a franchise QB. Carroll and the Seahawks method of doing this (aquiring QBs in bulk any way possible, trying them on and discarding for the next one) is pretty uncoventional.

 

Anyway, it seems the QB postion has seen more experimentation in the past year or two than in an long time. But it will always be a one man job at QB--at no time in the history of the game has this been more true than now. Going in the opposite direction is inconceivable.

[BADOLBILZ]

> Two QB systems do not work in real life period. This has been said at least a billion times throughout the life of football.

 

I agree it's been said quite frequently. Said so often, in fact, that the kind of system the OP has described hasn't been attempted since Shula did it back in the '70s. (Obtaining good results, by the way.)

 

Conventional wisdom in football is sometimes wrong. According to conventional wisdom, winning football games comes down to running the ball and stopping the run. A regression analysis performed by the New York Times proved that wrong. Passing offense is four times as important as rushing offense, and pass defense is four times as important as run defense.

 

If conventional wisdom can be wrong about one thing (run and stop the run), it can be wrong about other things (such as the OP's idea). When a coach isn't fully confident of his own ability, he will tend to rely on conventional wisdom.

 

For the OP's idea to come to fruition, you'd need four things to come together. 1) A team with a highly intelligent, creative, self-confident head coach. 2) A team with two QBs who are roughly equal to each other overall, but each of whom is strong in places where the other is weak. 3) The head coach must recognize that the two QBs are about equal overall, rather than trying to figure out which one is better. 4) The head coach would have to feel confident enough in his own job security to be willing to try unconventional things.

 

It's been said that no one's ever been fired for buying from IBM. This, despite the fact there are times when a non-IBM solution would have been less expensive or better (or both). By the same token, NFL coaches may believe they can increase their job security by acting conventionally, even when an unconventional solution had the potential to work better. This is why there is less experimentation in the NFL than should be the case.

 

You've put it far more eloquently than I could have. To me, just marching out the 27th best QB in the league and taking your lumps 10 weeks per year in the name of "the way it is done" is not the essence of competition.

[San Jose Bills Fan]

Conventional wisdom in football is sometimes wrong. According to conventional wisdom, winning football games comes down to running the ball and stopping the run. A regression analysis performed by the New York Times proved that wrong. Passing offense is four times as important as rushing offense, and pass defense is four times as important as run defense.

 

So we don't have to draft Manti T'eo and pursue Rey Maualuga?

[Orton's Arm]

I don't see the logic to this. What great, confident HC finds himself with 2 equivalently (and obviously only modestly) talented QBs with different skill sets? There has never been any evidence that this scheme would work. Even intuitively, it makes little sense. His path to job security would be much better served by finding a franchise QB. Carroll and the Seahawks method of doing this (aquiring QBs in bulk any way possible, trying them on and discarding for the next one) is pretty uncoventional.

 

Anyway, it seems the QB postion has seen more experimentation in the past year or two than in an long time. But it will always be a one man job at QB--at no time in the history of the game has this been more true than now. Going in the opposite direction is inconceivable.

 

> There has never been any evidence that this scheme would work.

 

It's been over 30 years since the last time something like this has been tried. If a particular experiment isn't attempted, there isn't going to be any empirical evidence either to prove or disprove the validity of the premise being tested.

 

> His path to job security would be much better served by finding a franchise QB.

 

Obviously. The problem being that typically, there are only about eight franchise QBs in the league at any one time. Even if the best QB on your roster isn't quite franchise level--let's say he's the 12th best or 15th best QB in the league--odds are he's going to be considerably better than the second-best QB on your roster. The OP's suggestion only makes sense if the two best QBs on your roster are of about equal caliber.

 

> But it will always be a one man job at QB--at no time in the history of the game has this been more true than now.

 

Why? What changes to the game have occurred to make the OP's suggestion less applicable now than in the past?

 

> Going in the opposite direction is inconceivable.

 

Suppose you have two roughly equal QBs, each of whom is a one trick pony. But each QB's trick differs from the other. Why not prepare both QBs for game day? Then, if it turns out the defense has prepared against Trent Edwards and his short passing game, you bring Losman and his long bomb to the field. Conversely, if the defense is focused on taking away the long bomb to Lee Evans, you bring on Trent Edwards and his short passing game.

 

Edwards and Losman each had a good year before defenses figured out how to stop them. You could say the same about Flutie. Rob Johnson also had some initial success before defenses figured out how to deal with him. The thinking here is that if a defense has figured out the solution to one of your quarterbacks, you emphasize the play of your other QB.

 

Sooner or later, odds are that defensive coordinators will figure out the solutions to both your QBs, and will adapt on the fly to your in-game substitutions. But you could probably squeeze several years of good play out of that QB duo before that happened.

[Orton's Arm]

So we don't have to draft Manti T'eo and pursue Rey Maualuga?

 

I'm against drafting T'eo, because a top-10 pick is a very scarce resource for a team like the Bills; and that resource should be used to improve the pass offense or pass defense. I don't see T'eo making the kind of impact on the pass defense which would justify the 8th overall pick.

 

As far as Rey Manaluga: I would have no objection if he was signed to a contract commensurate with his value. But that value may not be particularly high.