SI.com has been featuring articles from Cold Hard Football Facts (it appears that a number of guys post with CHFF, not just that author) for the past year or two. Generally, I have enjoyed their analyses (it’s sort of a sabermetric view of football), but I agree, this one does seem to be slanted in a way to put Tebow in the best possible light.
As a Viking’s fan, I’m kind of excited to see that they host the Broncos this weekend. Side note: Eric Decker returns to Minnesota.
How many games is that 225?
18, going back to last season.
This year, which is probably more representative of the number of passes he could be expected to attempt, he has attempted 143 in 9 games.
That’s more representative, I agree. I used Tebow’s 2010 and 2011 combined stats since that’s what the writer did - to misleading effect, as Jimmy Chitwood showed. Using 2011 alone gives Tebow more passes per game but fewer passes. It takes Manning and Brady and Rodgers four or five typical games to throw 143 passes.
It’s an average of roughly 15.9 passes per game. So, many, if not most, NFL QBs will often get as many pass attempts in a single half as Tebow averages for an entire game.
As a point of comparison, TJ Yates, in an extremely limited, rush heavy, and deliberately protective game plan for a 3rd string QB with no other real QB backup in the Texans/Jags game, had 15 pass attempts in just over a half of play. Even Matt Leinart was 10 of 13 before getting injured.
I have to interrupt you here. You cannot compare QB’s from the 70’s and 80’s to QB’s of today. The game is ***much ***different. Bradshaw was a QB who didn’t **have **to use his arm to win every game. But make no mistake about it… he had a cannon for an arm. One of the strongest, if not the strongest arm in the league for 10 years. But he had Franco Harris and one of the best O-lines in history to move the ball forward.
So, follow the logic. A strong rushing game means you are chewing up the game clock. This means you are not only keeping the ball out of the hands of the opponent, but you are also permitting the defense to rest. And the Steelers defense of the 70’s is arguably the greatest defense ever. So, giving a defense time to rest was invaluable for the Steelers success. But if Bradshaw had to win with his arm, he could do it. See Super Bowl XIV if you need proof.
Hell, the positions are not even the same name anymore. I think many people would find it surprising that Franco Harris was listed as a fullback for the Steelers. Rocky Bleier was the halfback. That has flipped completely around today, as a fullback looks more like someone like Mike Alstott, and a halfback is usually the feature running back in the backfield. Fullbacks now mostly block, whereas in the 70’s, fullbacks ran the ball.
But I digress. Here’s the point of my post. Tebow, by maintaining possession of the football and grinding minutes off the clock, keeps the ball out of the hands of the opposing offense while permitting the defense to rest. That is a huge benefit, especially in Denver, where the air is thin. Visiting teams aren’t used to playing in altitude. But even on the road, defenses play better when they are rested. Especially in the 4th quarter, where Tebow’s ability to come from behind as been seen.
A real test for Tebow will be if the Broncos are down by 2 scores late in the game. If the Broncos are put in a position where they **HAVE **to pass, I suspect the mystique of Tebow will disappear quickly.
John Fox may hate Tebow, but Fox is judged on wins. So, wins by Tebow make Fox look like a genius… and if he loses, no one would be surprised.
It’s boring football, but if the Broncos keep winning, I doubt anyone in Denver will have a problem with it.
One other thing about defenses playing better for an offense because they “have to”. This is not uncommon, and in fact plays into the psychology of the team concept. The defense didn’t seem to play harder for Orton because of past history… Orton wasn’t winning many games, and the defense wasn’t feeling like they were getting rewarded for their effort. This isn’t a conscious thing. Those 11 guys are working/playing as hard as they can to get the win. But when Tebow comes in, those same 11 guys know they have to work harder for the team to have any chance at winning. So they find another gear. Again, it’s a subconscious thing. Add to that, the defense gets healthy around the same time and Tebow gets a couple of wins. All of a sudden there is a different feeling in the locker room. Guys are amped up. Tebow is viewed as one of the important pieces of the puzzle that has changed their fortunes around. The defense begins to believe. It snowballs.
This is very similar to hockey. The goaltender is the single most important position on the team. Often, when a rookie goaltender is thrust into the lineup, you will see the team in front of him playing better defense to minimize the shots the new goalie will face, the offensive players will come back into their defensive zone to play a tighter defense… and often, that goaltender will look like a world beater for a while. He’s usually not, it’s just the team in front of him is playing with much more focus and urgency. That’s what I think is happening with Tebow and the Broncos.
Doing statistical comparisons between the Tebow Broncos and any other NFL team of the last 50 years is silly. Even teams that ran the ball frequently (e.g. the '85 Bears, '72 Dolphins) did it from in the context of a conventional offense. The Broncos are not lining up in an 2 back formation and pounding it off tackle 35 times a game as those teams did; they are, increasingly, running a variant of the shotgun spread. Option teams routinely run the ball 70, 80, even 90% of the time, and with success.
In a conventional NFL offense, the pass is the way you keep the defense honest – if the safeties and linebackers are overcommitting to the run, you throw it over them to make them pay. In an option offense, one of the main constraint plays to keep the defense from stopping the RB is the QB run – the threat of the QB keeping the ball keeps the backside LB out of the play, in the same way that the fear of a play-action fake keeps the safety from charging up. Thus, saying that nobody wins in the NFL by running the ball 70% misses the point; what the Broncos are doing is not just quantitatively different, it’s qualitatively different. Nobody has really tried anything like this 60 years or more, so there is no basis for comparison.
If you want to say an option offense this is unlikely to work in the NFL, that’s one thing. But saying it *can’t *work is sheer pigheadedness.
When the Run-and-Shoot came to the NFL in the 80s, there were an awful lot of people who insisted that it couldn’t possibly work, that you couldn’t line up in the shotgun all the time and have success. 25 years later, NFL teams line up in the shotgun about half the time; last time I checked, the Packers were running 55% of their plays from the gun – well more than any NFL champion ever has before (and really, if you eliminate late-game situations where they’re running out the clock, it’s more like 70%). I don’t think that will prevent them from winning a title.
I’m skeptical that it will last, but as someone not deeply invested in the success or failure of the Broncos, I hope to God they bring in some people with a background in option offense this offseason, and go ahead and give the thing a whirl; it’s always fun to see someone try something different. I can’t understand thinking otherwise.
Is the offense that the Broncos are running more likely to be like the Run and Shoot or the Wildcat? Personally, I think it will end up like the Wildcat, successful for a bit, and then teams adjust and learn how to play defense against it, and it will slowly disappear. Or like the spread that the Chiefs changed to to help Thigpen as a QB. Maybe they do incorporate parts of it, or plays, but I think (note: I don’t know) that, in the long run, it will end up being ultimately unsuccessful. I agree wholeheartedly that it would be interesting to shake things up in the NFL and have a team totally embrace the read option or whatever you want to call what the Broncos are doing. I just don’t think it would work for long.
The Broncos have scored 18, 10, 38, 17, 17, and 16 points with Tebow as QB. That’s an average of 19.3 points a game. Good enough for 24th place with the mighty offensive juggernaut Miami Dolphins. The only reason it “works” is because the defense has been the second best scoring defense in the NFL. Now someone could, if they were so inclined and some have, give most of the credit for the defensive play to the QB of the 24th ranked offense, rather than the men who actually play defense, the second ranked defense. But I think that’s simply wrong.
Ah, the 110% argument. It’s also total bullshit.
Speaking as a Packer fan, I’m happy to see Tebow and the Broncos get all of this media attention, since it seems to be sucking away a lot of the attention that might otherwise be focused on the Packers, and debate over whether or not they can stay undefeated – not that there’s none of that, but Tebow definitely seems to be the hot topic right now, and I am absolutely fine with that. 
(That, and the fact that the Packers played the Broncos earlier this season, when Orton was still quarterbacking.)
It would be a hell of a coincidence as the defense got better when Tebow started playing. And, by that, I mean almost immediately. They gave up 23 points in the first half against SD, and only 6 in the second when Tebow was playing. People are really reaching. The guys they say were out came back 2 or 3 games before Tebow started. And no one, absolutely no one, was predicting a defensive turnaround for the Broncos. It’s searching for reasons not to give Tebow credit.
Is it really that hard to believe that Tebow had a big part in the defensive turnaround by firing them up, controlling the ball, and not making turn overs?
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It would be a hell of a coincidence as the defense got better when Tebow started playing.
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Why do people keep saying this? It’s not a huge coincidence. If it were totally random, it’d be a 1 out of 16 chance that any particular player got healthy the same time Tebow got the starting QB job. Those aren’t really very long odds. The fact that a presaeason injury took about 6 weeks to heal from, AND it takes about 6 games for rookie defensive players to come into their own are coincidental as they pertain to Tebow coming back at that time - but it’s not “a hell of a coincidence” by any stretch.
Yes. Yes it is. And your constant repetition does nothing to change that.
As I’ve conceded numerous times, Tebow’s ability to protect the ball is part of the reason, but the “firing up” is de minimus, and the Broncos have lost time of possession in 40% of Broncos wins.
Tebow isn’t out there getting three interceptions off Carson Palmer. Tebow isn’t out there tackling for loss to move a guy out of field goal range. Tebow isn’t out there getting sacks, forcing fumbles, or taking away half the field. Tebow isn’t the likely defensive rookie of the year, going to another Pro Bowl, or calling the defense. He isn’t chasing down players, holding backup QB’s to less than 200 yard passing, or kicking game winning field goals.
I understand that you’re stuck. The fact that the defense has become the #2 scoring defense since their bye (while the offense is 24th) makes it really tough to give credit for the wins to Tebow. Or the fact that if the defense was playing just average for the NFL, the Broncos with Tebow would be 1-5. So you have to try this convoluted argument that somehow he’s the reason the defense is playing better. Not injuries, not finally gelling under a new coach and new defensive coordinator. Not the rookie’s improvement, playing against bad teams, or iffy QB play by the opponents. Because it’s the defense that is winning the games, you have to create this fantasy where the QB is the biggest reason the defense plays better. That kind of thinking is really that hard to believe. No matter how many times you say it.
I asked OMG, I’ll ask you, do you have any interest in a wager on Tebow’s long term success? Or his success if the defense doesn’t play well?
Why would you assume any of that is attributable to Tebow in the first place? Unless I missed something I don’t think anyone’s included that in the stats for the defense’s performance while he’s been at QB, and I’m not sure why the defense would magically start playing better because of a QB change. Why wouldn’t it be attributable to something like changing their strategy at halftime?
Speaking of things that sound crazy, perhaps the Broncos’ defense has been playing better over time as the players have gotten back up to speed. Dumervil missed 18 or 18 1/2 games for example.
People have agreed over and over again that the ball control and lack of turnovers helped both the offense and defense. How could they not? No, I don’t think he “fired up the defense,” whatever that’s supposed to mean in the real world.
Well, the fact is that injuries aren’t on/off things. Players are eager to get back onto the field (so they can keep their jobs), so they are rarely 100% when they do come back and need extra time.
Unfortunately, I’ve had the displeasure of watching several Houston players come back from injury over the last couple years.
It really does usually take 2 or 3 games for a player to really shake off the last, lingering bits of injury, rust, or what have you. Offense or defense, you see this happen. With some injuries, you don’t see a full recovery until the next season.
Notable examples: Tom Brady injured in '08, played so-so (for him) in '09 and really came back in '10. Peyton Manning and his knee injury in '07 didn’t really get going until 3 or 4 games into the season. How often do you hear the word “rust” when a big name starter comes off an injury?
Not so notable examples (Texans edition): Owen Daniels coming off an ACL in 2010. Andre Johnson and his ankle sprain in the 2010 season. Arian Foster’s hamstring issue this year. Andre Johnson again and HIS hamstring issue this year. Matt Schaub and a number of minor injuries (that he often played with). DeMeco Ryans this season after his Achilles injury last season. Cushing in 2010 with a lingering knee issue.
Can individual players (or just simply a change) provide a spark? I’ll say yes, but it happens less often than we think.
NFL fans (and writers/commentators) enjoy mythic storylines of lone figures rising to obscurity to lead their forces to victory much more than they enjoy boring stories about how the defense got healthy.
Tebow’s not a bad QB, but it’s a stretch to attribute a significant portion of the defensive improvement to him.
The Chargers also haven’t won another game since Tebow fired up that defense against them in the second half.
Another one of your coincidences, Tebow haters?
Here we go with this again. Tebow inspired the team with a great speech Saturday - based on a Bible quote, of course - which helped will them to victory in San Diego. Von Miller says they came out fired up. Not mentioned in this is that the fired-up team was shut out until a minute before halftime and trailed for essentially the entire game.
Yeah, I too wonder what the hell he has to do with the defense playing well. Everyone does know that he plays on offense?
The latter two points (which are really the same point) make some sense, but the first point is the one on which you’re getting the argument.
Also, regarding “controlling the ball”…he’s actually not doing a particularly good job of that. I was listening to NFL Radio on Sirius last night as I was driving home from work, and Pat Kirwin was talking about all the flak that John Elway is getting for some of his observations about Tebow. One of the big observations is that the Broncos’ third-down conversion rate under Tebow is something like 35%…whereas every recent Super Bowl team (both winners and losers) has averaged something like 55% on third down conversion.
From what I’ve seen, the Broncos offense does seem to be suffering a lot of three-and-outs, especially early in games. It’s not a recipe for long-term success.