When Sage comes in the game it is a light and day difference over Schaub. Sage is awesome, but I think at some point the Texans will have to give Morgan Keegan a look.
sorry, i'm getting to this late. ric, i have no intention of getting into this "discussion" with you again. you became the only person in all my time here i ever put on ignore. i'd rather not. i'll continue to poke fun at david carr. if you don't like it...sorry. actually i'm not really sorry, but that seemed like the right thing to say.
Pshaw. We all know David wasn't the only problem. We can all admit it's arguable whether he was the biggest problem. We can all see the replacing him has undeniably brought some visible and measurable improvement but has just as undeniably not fixed everything that was wrong. We can all see the other problems still here, and still bad. So, why can't we just laugh about it? That "dobermans" thing was freaking hilarious.
but, max - here's the problem: citing dobermans as an "excuse" for david carr... yeah, that's not making fun of david carr; maybe you think it is, but its not. it’s making fun of, and belittling, those of us (like me) who made "excuses" for carr ("excuses" that are looking less and less the exclusive domain of carr, btw). after all, carr wasn’t the one making the excuses, was he? so you think posting an exaggerated one is aimed in his direction? so please don't roll in here, take a cheap shot, and then when you get called on it, pull out your high horse and gallop off. we've all gotten caught up in the heat of the moment; i'm sure we've all posted things we've regretted; and i'm sure translation can sometimes be a b**** in these here parts. and for my role in that (past and present), i apologize, and have apologized. but i find this specific incident awfully petty on your part. so put me back on ignore, or don’t; in the immortal words of tommy lee jones: i don't care. but please don't pretend this is a one-way street. because otherwise, my questions were/are sincere – do you think the pass protection has improved? has the running game gotten better? have other playmakers emerged? i think, in discussing the 2007 texans, and especially in light of what they gave up to acquire matt schuab, that those are legitimate questions worth discussing. assuming, of course, you ever see this post…
I was one of Carr's biggest defenders. Max and I had more than one heated discussion and exchanged mea culpae more than once. I have no problem with anyone making light of those discussions. The "dobermans" comment did not make light of *me*, just my argument. I'm OK with that. It wasn't an ad hominem at all. And, it was genuinely funny.
The dobermans thing was part of a Top Ten List that David Letterman had years ago after the Oilers lost to the Bills. It was the Top Ten Excuses for the Houston Oilers. Somewhere on that list was: "you may not have seen dobermans on the field...but there were dobermans on the field." I can not prevent you from being offended by my quotation of David Letterman...but I won't pretend I understand why you would be. As for the 2007 Texans...you have me pigeon-holed as someone who said that simply improving the QB situation would change EVERYTHING. I never said that. I did say it changed my perception of the team as a fan...or potential fan...because I simply did not like David Carr. But I never suggested he was the only problem this team had. So there's an argument to be had with someone who believed that...it's just not with me. I do not mean to communicate a high horse mentality. I've just found discussing the Texans with you to be brutally frustrating...specifically the "leadership doesn't exist" and the "it's irresponsible to suggest that players may want someone else at QB" discussions. So my perception is colored by those experiences and I do not wish to rehash them. You may or may not notice but I think you'll find that I often do not reply to your responses to my posts on this subject. I don't like putting anyone on ignore frankly...I'd rather just roll right by it. Sometimes I do that...sometimes I don't.
I want to just clarify your position, because you seem to be arguing on both sides of the issue and I'm not sure what you're trying to say. In response to my statistics that show that the offense has improved dramatically both at moving the ball and scoring, you argue that while Schaub is better, that positions improved across the board explaining the improvement. However, when arguing that Carr wasn't the main problem, you post things like the above - which suggest that the running game and pass protection and playmakers haven't improved. My contention when I say that Carr was the single biggest problem is that the offense wasn't going to improve substantially until you replaced him - despite whatever other changes the team might make. That does not mean that the team is set in other areas. But it's much easier to change the QB than 8 other players on the offense, and it's a change that's going to need to be made, so it was worth trying to explore Sage Rosenfels last year to see just how bad Carr was and what impact having a different QB might have had. I would agree that the running game needs to improve and the O-Line needs work. I think the receiving core, when healthy, is actually good enough for an above-average offense. Obviously, more playmakers are always better. That said, despite these things *not* happening, the offense dramatically improved this year, and that's shown in the numbers - and since the running game and o-line haven't improved (and the receivers, without AJ, are worse than last year), that is attributable substantially to the change at QB. That said, it's clearly regressed these last few weeks, and we'll have to see what happens from here, but I think the offense is much better with either Schaub or Rosenfels this year than it was last year with Carr. This was part of the reason I wanted Rosenfels to get playing time last year.
By the way..here's that Top 10 List: http://www.totse.com/en/ego/no_laughing_matter/toptenc.html Top 10 Houston Oiler Excuses - January 5, 1993 10. Shouldn't have skipped breakfast - it's the most important meal of the day! 9. Started giving 109% instead of 110%. 8. Even though fans loved it, shouldn't have replaced Warren Moon with folk singer Suzanne Vega. 7. Busy making mental tally of football players with girls names: Fran Tarkenton... Rosey Grier.... 6. YOU try tackling those guys - some of them are huge! 5. Bills quarterback kept looking one way, then throwing the other. 4. Wanted to honor another Houstonian who let a big lead in the polls slip away. 3. "I'm telling you - maybe YOU didn't see Dobermans on the field, but there WERE Dobermans on the field!" 2. Preoccupied about getting home in time to see all the Amy Fisher movies. 1. Didn't want to go to Disney World.
first things first, i cited the TEAM as a whole being better. special teams is better; the defense is better -- those things can and have positively impacted the offense. i think schaub is an upgrade; i'm not sure he was worth what we paid for him (i'd rather have carr or rosenfels, frankly, and the two 2s. i think...)... but i've said repeatedly, he looks better than david carr did these past two years. the jury is out, however; he's certainly not as tough, and for all the leadership talk that was crammed down our throats... the team looks about as non-plussed by the hits he's absorbing as they did with carr. numbers-wise, carr at this point last year was outperforming schaub this year. i'm not sure how you can attribute marginal changes "substantially" to the change at QB in that light - the QB is worse, statistically, but is responsible for the team being better? so if carr was here, performing at the level he did last year (which, paper-wise, is better than schaub), would this be a WORSE team? i know it's become an easy shot/out, but, honestly, if you're not watching the games, you're not seeing what's plainly obvious: namely, that since the carolina game, this offense hasn't looked better, or produced more than last year's version. when the games were still in doubt, they scored 3 points in the first 3Qs against the colts (mathis had the lone TD). they scored 9 points in the first 3Qs against the jags (all FGs). they scored 0 points in the first 3Qs against the titans (ryans had the lone TD). atlanta and miami share a combined win, and held the texans to 16 and 22 points. they're giving up, respectfully, 22.8 and 31.7/game in all other contests. those are the last FIVE weeks. if you want to look at numbers and say they're "better" - have at it. it's simply not the case on the field - i mean, i'm a numbers guy. but they're aren't better.
sorry; i should have consulted my handy "letterman jokes that posters may randomly reference in a thread" card i keep in my wallet... it's laminated. max, fair enough, and it's a funny quote. but don't pretend i should have understood the 14-year old context of the joke, and that i didn't - it's on me. yeah, i have some colored perceptions of you, too. fair enough; i think you're moving down the dial here, a bit - you dug in as deeply as me or anyone else in your opinion of carr and the impact he was having yes, on you, but also the team. but, OK. so... what do you think of schaub's leadership thus far? did you see the way they all came to his defense sunday after the cheap shot? i KNOW that was because he called them all this summer on their cell phones... also, i bet andre johnson wishes david carr was still here; if carr was here, the play where he got hurt would have been a quick-hitting pass 3 yards across the line of scrimmage with a defender draped on him, rather than in open space where he could get hit and thus hurt. yep, andre would LOVE to have carr back... (sorry; i'm a cynical b*stard....)
1. i'm sure you have a colored perception of me. no doubt. 2. it's never what you say...it's how you say it.
Ric have you watched the Carolina Panthers this season? Jake was lights out until he blew up his elbow ~ then Carr came in... then Carr got benched for 43 year old Vinny T. Ric are you a point forward?
no, i haven't watched them this season other than the game against the texans (in which jake was anything BUT lights out). i'm a texan fan; i watch their games. as for being "benched," carr has a broken back - do you you not think that's relevant? is it just another one of his excuses? this is why i get sucked into the david carr mess so often: there's such a deep-level of hatred and/or anger toward him, that people can't seem to accurately comment on his situation. that same ire drove a lot of the talk here, and it frustrated me, especially as it spilled into esoteric nonsense like, "i bet his teammates hate playing with him" and what not, which i always found silly because there was PLENTY of hard evidence to mount a campaign against david carr without having to resort to making **** up. the guy is gone; it looks like we've upgraded the position. i'd just assume we stop worrying about david carr. what he does in carolina - good or bad - is irrelevant.
when i said that, i wasn't making anything up. you could see in kubiak that he was upset with carr. you could see that on the sideline. you could hear it under the surface in dunta's interviews...and then he confirmed as much at the close of the season. ''I've been with David Carr for three years, and it just hasn't gotten the job done for us,'' he said. ''We haven't been able to win games. We haven't been able to get over that hump, and that's the reason why he was drafted. It's one of those business situation where you hate to see a guy like that go but it's probably best for the team if it does happen.'' AJ gushed over Schaub as an alternative to Carr without throwing Carr under the bus. good for him. but i don't think it's "irresponsible" to suggest that AJ might would have liked to try another guy at QB to see if maybe that was hindering him. i think you can look at their comments now and see that a good number of the guys on the team felt like something was missing in DC. like so many of the rest of us did. Guys want to play with the most talented teammates...it's not At this point Carr is more the butt of a joke than anything else. The hair...the gloves...the comments he made about the Texans not being able to win a tough game on the road just days before they beat the crap out of the Panthers in Carolina....3rd string behind a 43 year old 3-week QB. Texans fans aren't alone in poking fun at him for that stuff. We just have history that makes it sound/look even goofier.
