With the exception of Andrew Luck's draft year, the draft for a qb is insanely underwhelming.. It's understandable to see why Bill would pass on 3 qbs in the first when you look at the odds of them panning out.. You need to draft your QB but you need to be very selective, because unlike any other position, if you are starting a qb, you are committed to him, and hope that if he gets in a slump, he can get out of it.. There was 11 QB's drafted last season, none look like they are going to be a top 10 QB.. Spoiler Manuel, Smith, Glennon, Barkley, Nassib, Tyler Wilson, Landry Jones, Sorensen, Dysert, BJ Daniels, Sean Renfree 2011 is Trash besides Cam, and Kap.. Jury still seems to be out on Kap. if you look at the 2010 class there are none that seem to be a top 10 QB. Spoiler Bradford, Tebow, Clausen, McCoy, 2009 Matt Stafford, was the only one.. 2006 and 2007 are dumpster fires with the exception of Jay Cutler in 06..
Which may turn out to be something they regret. Maybe because Julio Jones was out practically all of the season... And Roddy White missed games as well and was unhealthy when he did play. Their offensive line was bad as well. Most quarterbacks in the NFL can not operate behind a bad offensive line.
I'm not saying that QB play is totally unimportant, you need at least someone who will protect the ball (or at least get insanely lucky during the playoffs) but people greatly overstate the importance of the QB position and pretend like teams can't win without top notch QB's and that obviously isn't the case. The Texans winning the SB with Fitz or Keenum would be no different IMO than the Ravens winning with Flacco, the Seahawks winning with Wilson, the Giants winning with Eli the first time, or the Steelers winning with Roethlisburger the first time. Now that said, I don't think the Texans have the team to do it this year because they are too reliant on rookies, but I'm just saying it wouldn't be impossible.
You realize Flacco was on fire when he won that Super Bowl leading to an outrageous contract he doesn't deserve? Russell Wilson is considered a top 5 QB. Ben's Super Bowl was 10 years ago.. When running backs dominated the league. I got nothing for Eli that was a hell of a game..
Even with Flacco "being on fire" it took a ton of luck and his defense holding the hottest offense the league has ever seen to 13 points in order to get to the SB, it wasn't just a great QB performance. Anyone who considers Russell Wilson a top 5 QB is just making a laughable knee-jerk reaction to the Seahawks winning the SB with an amazing defense. Ben's first SB was right after Brady's Pats won 3 of 4 and right before Indy won the SB....the league was already pass-happy. The Giants first SB with Eli was pretty awesome.
Well the players voted Russell Wilson the 5th best quarterback on Nfl.com .. I don't think there are better evaluators then the guys who play with and against every quarterback..
I disagree. First of all, I question how much effort they put into it so it makes sense to me that there would be "knee-jerk" types of answers. They'd have probably put Joe Flacco in the top 5 the year before too. Maybe Colin Kaepernick in the top 10.
What teams routinely win with subpar QB play during the regular season? Baltimore/Flacco, I'll give you as I agree, he's fairly mediocre… Who else? Three quick thoughts: 1) all of those QBs are significantly better than Ryan Fitzpatrick and Case Keenum; even if we just extrapolate those four years. Significantly. 2) Fitz and Keenum are certainly capable of a three-week hot streak (or, in their , a three-week not-suck stretch) – but I would say the same thing about *any* NFL QB. My contention is that neither Fitz nor Keenum are good enough QBs to lead (or get out of the way of) a 10+-win* team. 3) The other Super Bowl-winning QBs sandwiched around your four outliers, BTW: Brady (twice), Manning, Brees, Rodgers. And Brady/Manning have lost four additional ones. (* I don’t put too many eggs in a QB’s W/L basket; but I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Fitz/Keenum are a combined 27-56-1 in their careers. They are both terrible QBs, and terrible QBs don’t routinely make the playoffs.)
Other factors to consider: 1. Who else is on the D-Line? Maybe if Antonio Smith was still a Texan. But if they trade Watt, that line immediately becomes ultra-weak 2. What weapons are available for the QB? Some QBs do better with 3 WR sets than with multiple TE sets. Some QBs need a good running game to be able to function effectively. 3. Contract and Salary cap situation. Is the QB going to come here and be gone in a year or two after that? Does his cap number make it difficult to keep the players they already have? 4. Injuries/depth. Can you survive better with your backup QB than with your backup DE?
interesting Grantland article which kind of covers this. while i do agree QBs are more valuable, I wouldn't trade JJ for every one of the top 15 QBs. NFL trade value per the article, which takes contracts and age among other things into consideration: 1. Russell Wilson 2. Andrew Luck 3. Aaron Rodgers 4. J.J. Watt 5. Colin Kaepernick 6. Cam Newton 7. Robert Quinn 8. Peyton manning 9. Matty Ryan 10. Drew Brees 11. Tom Brady http://grantland.com/features/nfl-trade-value-assets-part-2/
A super bowl run that was one of the most impressive runs in the modern era. His #'s were better than Rodgers and Brees during that run. But Flacco was good the two previous years in the playoffs as well... That was not the 1st time he outplayed Brady in the playoffs (Brady got lucky when they last went to the super bowl like with the tuck incident). Flacco has only thrown 2 interceptions in his last 8 playoff games and that's why he got paid. And as Herman Edwards said _ the last guy in the group to get paid usually gets paid the most. The hottest offense the league has ever seen without a Gronk. That wasn't the same regular season offense. It's possible things would have played out differently if Gronk wasn't hurt/out... Which makes the 41 points that the Patriots hung on the Texans even more embarrassing. J.J. had 1 solo tackle, 3 assist, and a .05 sack that game (2 solo tackles 2 assist, 0 sacks against NE in the regular season)... But this discussion isn't about quarterback vs. team defense. It's about QB vs. DE.
Lol... I see what you did there... But yes, offensive line and receivers are important for a prototypical drop back passer. He still had a good year by the numbers though. Top 5 in yards and top 10 in TD's. It's not about one player doing it by himself but which player is more important.
Why do people continue to believe this despite all the defensive teams that have won over the years? QBs are great for winning games...but championships? Defense wins you those fellas.
Whens the last time either Brady or Peyton Manning won a Super Bowl? The consensus top two QBs. Yes QB is a relatively more important position, but its not like the NBA where one player can dominate.
Better player _ yes... No argument there. But J.J.'s position doesn't effect the game like a quarterback. And it's been proven time and time again that you don't need a HOF caliber DE to have a defense good enough to win a super bowl. Seattle is the latest example of that with Bennett who came in the league undrafted and they got him off the free agent scrap heap. Green Bay and Pittsburgh had the #1 & #2 ranked defenses when they meet up in the super bowl and neither one of those teams had a DE close to being as good as J.J. Same with San Francisco vs Baltimore who both had top 10 defenses when they meet in the super bowl. I'm not a fan of Ryan... But more than likely with the receiving core the Texans have it's not outside the realm of possibility that they would do better if they had Ryan and had just a good DE instead of a great one like J.J. It's about 8 quarterbacks not named Matt Ryan that I wouldn't be upset if the Texans could trade J.J. to get one of them.
I'm glad to see more and more people seeing things for the way they are. Defense is what almost always wins championships, but even then it's still a team game.
