Tom Savage - Texans' fourth round (#135 overall) pick

Life is really easy for the secondary if you have a good front 7, even more so if you have a 4 man rush that can generate pressure on the QB by themselves without a blitz. While secondary players are flashier and as a result generally get more credit, the 4 man rush was Seattle's greatest weapon honestly.

 

Nothing beats a good 4 man rush...you really limit the offense and make it difficult for them, not only because you are applying pressure on the QB, but also because there are 7 defenders guarding a maximum of 5 people. Or, in some cases, 7 defenders guarding 4 offensive players.

Im hoping Watt, Nix, Clowney, Pagan/Crick can apply that kind of pressure...that would be awesome.

 

If Trent Dilfer can win a title...Fitzpatrick can...the 2000 Ravens even had a misseason QB change from Banks to Dilfer. The have the NFL record for the fewest point allowed: 165 for 16 games.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trent_Dilfer

I surely dont know what to expect with our defense or the front 7. If they translate the way they look on paper, they will be a formidable bunch. If they can go 4-2 in their division and get to 5-5 for non divisional games, that is a huge success without a legit QB and might be able to sneak into the playoffs as a Wildcard. On paper, the schedule looks much easier than last year. On paper, the Texans front 7 looks as dominant as the other top defensive teams in the NFL. On paper, Bill OBrien is thought to be a better head coach than Kubiak. Great things are possible with hard work and determination. And if this bunch can embrace this, who knows...weirder things happen in the NFL. No one expected a 2-14 result last year, and no one expects them to be in contention this year. Perhaps when we count out our team is when they decide to show up and play.

 

Get back to us when the NFL rolls back the rule changes from 2005-06.

 

I watched about an hour and a half of film on Savage. What I came away with:

Positives

- He can throw the ball flat footed, and still get it on target. This is a huge asset, as he can step away from pressure or be on the move and still use his arm to get the ball out.
- He threw a ton of flat routes and got the ball out there quick and leading his receiver. It goes along with him being able to use his arm to get the ball to the sidelines and not having to use a ton of footwork (ala schaub) just to throw a quick route.
- He is actually pretty elusive for his speed, and seems to know when to run and when to throw. He reminds me of Andrew Luck when he runs, just a little slower.
- I watched him play Florida State, and the D-Line was not jumping his snap counts. He usually had the ball in his hands with his first step before the D-Line even started their rush. This shows that he knows how to work his cadence (Philip Rivers).

NEGATIVES

- He definitely needs to work on his accuracy on his deep ball and middle of the field. I saw too many missed throws for my liking, but when he did connect he hit his receivers in stride. Still, I estimate he only completed about 20% of the attempts that I saw.
- His senior receiver Street was his main focus. The guy seemed to get open ALL DAY. Savage did not really seem to process the coverage well, and seemed to lock into targets at times (mostly Street). He looked very slow going through his progressions, and he stared down his receivers before he threw.
- He hunches over a little bit in the pocket. This makes him play shorter than his 6'4 frame.
- He seemed to get rattled against better defenses. He held his poise for a while when he played FSU, but once they started to fall behind a little, he tried to do too much and threw some pretty bad/late throws for interceptions.

 

The Ravens that won the title that year were arguably the best defense of all time. They played in a very different era than the one we're dealing with now...but they were unreal on defense.

I have no doubt the Texans will be improved...but they're not going to be the best defense that ever graced a football field. And even if they are, I'm not sure that Ravens team wins a championship in today's NFL.

 

That's the exact opposite you are expecting from Fitz.

Trent Dilfer is a game manager, not a playmaker, he just doesn't commit dumb mistakes but good at keeping the drive alive to just eat the sacks.

Fitz is just and could be more erratic than Tony Romo - the bad version.

If you think the reason for Matt Schaub left H town is because of his turnover problem last year, embrace yourself for Fitz.

 

I think people throw Trent Dilfer's name around when they don't actually know anything about him.

Trent Dilfer threw an interception on a (slightly) higher % of his passes than Ryan Fitzpatrick does. The year the Ravens won the Superbowl, Dilfer was 12 TD/11 Int in only 8 starts, throwing an interception on 5% of all passes he threw.

The worst year Fitzpatrick ever had in 2009, he only threw an interception on 4.4% of his passes.

 

He's a SB winner, that means he's awesome.

 

Trent Dilfer is probably the single worst quarterback in history to win a superbowl. Fitzgerald is better than him at everything, including being a game manager. They are both bad at that. Dilfer has wrongly been labeled a "game manager" that "didn't make mistakes" simple because he was so bad at making any plays at all that people THINK he was a game manager. Truth is he wasn't even good at that!

 

If Fitzpatrick can be 2012 Buffalo Ryan Fitzpatrick where his interception % is in the low 3s, the Texans can certainly make the playoffs, but that would among the highest to win a superbowl if they were to pull that off. I think it's reasonable to expect Fitz to have a low turnover number when he will be playing with potentially the best team he's ever been on with a coach that will rely on the tight ends a lot. I wouldn't be shocked to see Fitz sub 3% on interceptions, the Texans to win 10 games and make the playoffs.

 

Definitely agree that Fitz is a much better option than he gets credit for...he's a decent NFL QB. If we can give him a good running game and the defense lives up to its potential on paper, then I see 10 wins. If out of the 10 wins, one of them is against the Colts, then my guess is we've taken the division title back.

 

First of all, when someone will be labeled as a football manager, that basically mean he sucks as a QB.

To say Trent Dilfer is at least decent to be a football manager, its not because of he won a SB ring, but you also need to consider his development, including how bad he looked the first 3 years in TB and how he at least improved on his game to control the mistake. No one said he was great or even close to a good QB, but if you put him on a team which is great at D, his style of play will actually work. That's the whole point.

As for Fitz, I am not sure if people are just with short memory or not, there are couple games when he played in Buf, he absolutely had those Romo moment late in the game to gave away the victory with his TOV. If we ran Matt Schaub out of H town the last season because of his TOV problem, you can ask any Buf fans and you will find the same view they have on Fitz.

 

Except his style of play isn't what you think it is, nor is the narrative you laid out about him getting better at limiting turnovers true.

His first year as a rookie was obviously his worst year in terms of interception %. Then it went down and then it got worse again. His year in Baltimore was actually one of the worst years of his career for interception rate. The only reason the total number is low is because he didn't play the whole year. If he had played the full year he'd have close to 25 interceptions.

You THINK his style of play was to not make mistakes, but that simply wasn't true. He made mistakes at a higher rate than Ryan Fitzpatrick does.

 

The story of the Ravens was a historically monumentally awesome defense. Best of all time discussion defense.

If you think the Texans have that sort of defense, THEN we can have a discussion about how that relates to Fitzpatrick vs. Dilfer.

I'll believe it when I see it when the Texans roll out "arguably the greatest defense of all time."

 

Don't really believe what experts say. I think he is better than what experts say. He could be a steal.

 

i agree but i still feel you need an anchor at safety to cleanup the other dbs mistakes.. we dont have that right now. thought manning could fill that role.. swearinger is still unproven.. i think jjo and kareem will have good years with their faces to the qb nt chasing receivers in man and assuming the pass rush is effective. im hoping the addition of clowney and nix can open some things up for mercilus/reed. if clowney is playing outside than we should have some depth rotating merci, reed, and clowney outside....

 

Well our front 4 will make life easier for them, but yeah, they can't do it all. I think Swearinger will eventually be that guy at safety and we have two very solid corners.

 

Game manager doesn't mean sucks. Russell Wilson is an example of a fantastic game manager. It basically means the QB is not asked to carry the offense - he's not a guy you want throwing 40 times a game or needing to score 40 pts every week. But put him in a situation where his primary job is to make smart decisions and make big plays here and there when needed most, and he excels.

 

Look, I really don't think any of this matters at the end. Fitz is not a long term starter, neither is Keenum or Yates. QB's drafted in the 4th round rarely make it on the field so say no to Savage. The Texans long term starter at QB is in the 2015 draft - Winston, Marcus, Petty, Hogan, Hundley, the guy from Alabama. Looks like a decent list. Assuming Texans pick in the top 10 and most of the QB needing teams drafting one in either round 1-2 this year, Texans should be in a good spot to land their QB of choice in 2015.