How Do NFL Teams Know When a Young QB is Worth Building Around? (good article)

[GoBills808]

If you buy ANY/A as a general guideline for QB quality (I do fwiw), this is a great article-

 

http://www.footballperspective.com/quarterback-cap-dollars-vs-team-any-a-through-9-weeks-of-2019/

 

[GunnerBill]

5 minutes ago, GoBills808 said:

If you buy ANY/A as a general guideline for QB quality (I do fwiw), this is a great article-

 

http://www.footballperspective.com/quarterback-cap-dollars-vs-team-any-a-through-9-weeks-of-2019/

 

 

I think ANY/A is decent indicator but it isn't the definitive stat. It is just one stat. 

[Shaw66]

1 hour ago, Hapless Bills Fan said:

 

I don't want to get sidelined with debating Fitz as an NFL QB, so I'll note we have some areas of disagreement wrt Fitz.  And of course in general the point is inarguable that what a QB can do against a D, depends upon his ability to interpret and decode what the D is doing and take what they give him.

 

Jordan Palmer was on one of the shows talking about the young QBs in the NFL.  I forget which, but there's another similar clip here.  One of the topics was Josh Rosen, "Right Josh".   Palmer expressed that he believes Rosen can play QB in the NFL and so far has now had 2 teams where he simply hasn't had what any young QB needs to achieve success.  Then he sounded really heartfelt, and said something like "As a QB, Ryan Fitzpatrick is one of the hardest QB in the league to compete against, because he's so LIKEABLE.  He's witty, he's really smart (implication: about football, too), he's hysterically funny.  Everyone in the locker room loves him."  Palmer, you see, came into Cinncinnati to compete as a backup when Fitzy was there, and Fitzy won out.  So he ought to know.

That's really interesting. Thanks.

[LABILLBACKER]

On 11/6/2019 at 1:54 AM, GunnerBill said:

 

I agree. The Bills are good at avoiding games where they need their QB to throw for 300 yards because they have a good defense. But the one time this year they actually got into a game that was starting to get away from them defensively Josh was sub 50%, and threw for 169 yards. That won't get it done. I suspect there will be at least two more games this season that get away from the defense. In one of those Josh needs to put the team on his arm and sling it.

Dallas, Baltimore and maybe Pittsburgh?

[Don Otreply]

They don’t know, they make “educated “ guesses, that’s as good as it gets. Just look at the 2018 class of QBs if you don’t believe this. Guessing what potential new QB is gonna be the one is a exercise in futility the majority of the time. We can only hope the Buffalo Bills got it right this Go round, at present it is trending that way. Imo it takes up to three years to know if you got the right guy.

 

Go Bills!!!

 

 

[TwistofFate]

On 11/5/2019 at 3:59 PM, Logic said:

#1 is such a complex question. I would argue that there have been games where the Bills won in spite of Josh AND games where they've won because of him. I could easily point to his 4 game-winning drives this season as games that they won because of him, but it could just as easily be countered that a game-winning drive was only necessary in the first place because of his poor play in the previous quarters.

I do think the three benchmarks laid out in the article make sense, though. Clearly, the jury's still out on Allen.

1 is not complex.   We've won in spite of him for the majority of the season.   Fumbles, ints, and stretches during the game where he was non existent.  4th quarter comebacks arent necessary when you dont have multiple turnovers in a game. 

 

2 depends on how much value you place on his strengths.  Big arm, good runner, prototypical body size, etc.  But do they outweigh lack of consistency, accuracy and being prone to turnovers? 

 

3 is no doubt in my mind they are coached and prepared well.  Lack of execution seems to be the biggest problem. 

[Big Turk]

They win games regularly and come from behind in the 4th quarter? 

 

Granted if they played better in quarters 1-3 they might not need to but that's kind of the nature of the NFL...

[SoTier]

I think you know what kind of QB you have when he stops improving his play and keeps making the same kind of plays -- good or bad -- over and over.   I think that sometime between the start of his second and the end of his third season as a starter, he hits his ceiling and any improvements from then on are probably only minimal.  It's why so many QBs who look so good as first or second year starters derail -- they hit the limits of their abilities and those limits aren't high enough to justify that QB being a competent NFL starting QB  

 

AFAIK, there haven't been any cases of a QB who's been mediocre to poor for his first three seasons as a starter suddenly metamorphisizing into a great QB.   I think the hard part for teams is deciding to cut ties with a young starting QB who's not improving.  They know he's not getting better but they keep hoping.   The Bucs handling of Jameis Winston is the classic example of this.   Rarely, a poor team or an injury obscures a QB's progress, which is what happened with Drew Brees in SD and Derek Carr in Oakland early in their careers as well as with Carson Wentz.  However, sometimes a poor team or injuries simply obscures the fact that the QB just isn't that good, which seems to be the case with Marcus Mariota.

 

OTOH, some young QBs are so good coming out of the gate that even minimal improvement later doesn't affect their status as NFL starters.  I think that both Patrick Mahomes and DeShaun Watson fit this category.

 

Back before the season started, there were a number of threads on "what do you need to see from Josh Allen", to which I responded that I needed to see him on a continual arc of improvement (meaning that while there might be setbacks, he was still improving as a QB and hadn't hit his ceiling).  Allen made a big jump between last season and this one.  He's continued to improve as the season has gone on.  Unfortunately, he was so far behind the other QBs in his class -- and most other first round QBs in recent years -- in his passing skills that he remains very much a question mark as to whether he'll ever be good enough to be considered a franchise QB.  At this point in time, he certainly seems to be on track, a young QB still on the upswing, unlike the 2 QBs taken ahead of him in 2019: Mayfield and Darnold.  Hopefully, by this time next year, the Bills will have figured out if he's truly a keeper of not.

[Shaw66]

3 hours ago, SoTier said:

I think you know what kind of QB you have when he stops improving his play and keeps making the same kind of plays -- good or bad -- over and over.   I think that sometime between the start of his second and the end of his third season as a starter, he hits his ceiling and any improvements from then on are probably only minimal.  It's why so many QBs who look so good as first or second year starters derail -- they hit the limits of their abilities and those limits aren't high enough to justify that QB being a competent NFL starting QB  

 

AFAIK, there haven't been any cases of a QB who's been mediocre to poor for his first three seasons as a starter suddenly metamorphisizing into a great QB.   I think the hard part for teams is deciding to cut ties with a young starting QB who's not improving.  They know he's not getting better but they keep hoping.   The Bucs handling of Jameis Winston is the classic example of this.   Rarely, a poor team or an injury obscures a QB's progress, which is what happened with Drew Brees in SD and Derek Carr in Oakland early in their careers as well as with Carson Wentz.  However, sometimes a poor team or injuries simply obscures the fact that the QB just isn't that good, which seems to be the case with Marcus Mariota.

 

OTOH, some young QBs are so good coming out of the gate that even minimal improvement later doesn't affect their status as NFL starters.  I think that both Patrick Mahomes and DeShaun Watson fit this category.

 

Back before the season started, there were a number of threads on "what do you need to see from Josh Allen", to which I responded that I needed to see him on a continual arc of improvement (meaning that while there might be setbacks, he was still improving as a QB and hadn't hit his ceiling).  Allen made a big jump between last season and this one.  He's continued to improve as the season has gone on.  Unfortunately, he was so far behind the other QBs in his class -- and most other first round QBs in recent years -- in his passing skills that he remains very much a question mark as to whether he'll ever be good enough to be considered a franchise QB.  At this point in time, he certainly seems to be on track, a young QB still on the upswing, unlike the 2 QBs taken ahead of him in 2019: Mayfield and Darnold.  Hopefully, by this time next year, the Bills will have figured out if he's truly a keeper of not.

This is well said.  As I've said, I want to see Mahomes and Watson continue.  I'll give Flacco as an example.  He wasn't a star like Mahomes, but he looked like a long time winning starting QB when he was young. He nevergrew, the league changed, and he became a castoff.  I just don't  trust short bodies of work as absolute evidence of greatness. 

 

Continual arc of improvement was what I was talking about.  That's what you need to see.  And I agree that if the guy hasn't shown consistent improvement and isn't looking like a keeper by the end of three seasons, hardas it is, you probably have to move on.  Problem is when you have a coaching change in the middle. That's what complicates the Mariota decision.  

[GunnerBill]

2 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

This is well said.  As I've said, I want to see Mahomes and Watson continue.  I'll give Flacco as an example.  He wasn't a star like Mahomes, but he looked like a long time winning starting QB when he was young. He nevergrew, the league changed, and he became a castoff.  I just don't  trust short bodies of work as absolute evidence of greatness. 

 

Continual arc of improvement was what I was talking about.  That's what you need to see.  And I agree that if the guy hasn't shown consistent improvement and isn't looking like a keeper by the end of three seasons, hardas it is, you probably have to move on.  Problem is when you have a coaching change in the middle. That's what complicates the Mariota decision.  

 

I was a Flacco fan. But he was never close to what Watson and Mahomes have been. 

[SoTier]

3 hours ago, Shaw66 said:

This is well said.  As I've said, I want to see Mahomes and Watson continue.  I'll give Flacco as an example.  He wasn't a star like Mahomes, but he looked like a long time winning starting QB when he was young. He nevergrew, the league changed, and he became a castoff.  I just don't  trust short bodies of work as absolute evidence of greatness. 

 

Continual arc of improvement was what I was talking about.  That's what you need to see.  And I agree that if the guy hasn't shown consistent improvement and isn't looking like a keeper by the end of three seasons, hardas it is, you probably have to move on.  Problem is when you have a coaching change in the middle. That's what complicates the Mariota decision.  

 

I was very skeptical about Watson' based on his performance as a rookie and about Mahomes early on last year, but in their third and second year as starters respectively, they are so good that even if they don't improve, they are great as they are.   Joe Flacco was good but never in the same area code as Watson and Mahomes. 

 

Mariota always seemed to me to be a very uninspiring game manager.   I think he lacks leadership for want of a better word.  Technically, he's probably a better passer than Tannehill, but Tannehill just gets more out of his teammates despite his shortcomings.