Quarterbacks can absolutely win and lose games all by themselves. Yes, there are other factors, but the QB position is THE most important one on the field, especially in the current era.
Teams can win without an elite QB, but the rest of the team has to be dominating, not just good or great. Exchange JaMarcus Russsel with, say, Brett Farve, and the Viking don’t even make the playoffs, and the Raiders challenge for the AFC West.
I don’t think we’re quite on the same wavelength, furt. Comparing Reid’s drafts to random teams won’t get us anywhere for two reasons: one, because I didn’t and wouldn’t say Reid isn’t a better drafter than a random NFL franchise, which isn’t that high of a standard after all, and two, because I’m not talking about drafting at all. (Although we can if you like; I don’t think he’s been very good, and if you really believe in that “just about everyone” comment we can take a look).
What I’m talking about is this scenario: you’ve drafted a guy (or picked him up off a scrap heap) and he’s played a couple of seasons. You have to either commit to him for a longer term or you have to move on. That process requires you to take a hard look at how good the guy is as an NFL player compared to the guys you can get elsewhere, and that’s the evaluation I’m talking about with Kolb. What I’m saying is that, no matter how good the guy actually is, I think Reid has a consistent history of thinking he’s better than that. Wide receiver is the giant glaring example, and linebacker, too, but that’s not the whole of it. He thinks he knows something that other teams don’t know, except it actually hasn’t worked that well, even though he obviously has multiple strengths that make up for the deficiency and make him a very successful coach.
The couple examples I gave weren’t supposed to be an exhaustive list; I kind of thought you’d know what I was talking about. I’m not complaining just about backup QBs and punt returners – although those are real NFL positions and a head coach with personnel powers ought to be responsible for addressing them at some point over 10 years. The list is more like nearly every skill position player other than Westbrook prior to a couple years ago, and a few others here and there. Just sticking with Reid drafts, you’ve got your Todd Pinkston, Billy MacMullen, LJ Smith, Jerome McDougle, Reggie Brown, Sean Considine, Matt McCoy, old Fred-X. Mostly very high picks, mostly guys whose careers as Eagles were seasons longer than they deserved; those are the guys who didn’t wash out entirely – but how many have done anything once they left Philadelphia, and what does that say about the fact that they all suited up for multiple seasons here?
Sure, there’s explanations for some of them, and it does happen to some extent with every coach, but with Reid I really feel like there’s a definite blind spot, if you want to be charitable, and arrogance if you don’t. Add to that his little pet guys like Mahe, Dameane Douglas, Na Brown, Detmer, Mike McMahon etc. who he didn’t necessarily invest heavily in but still used far more than they deserved, and it seems like a trend to me. He uses high draft picks on guys and sticks with them even though they’re bad, and he picks up guys nobody wants and starts them even though they’re bad.
All of which is to say, I could have told you he was going to think Kolb was a very good player from day one, and that’s almost entirely irrespective of whether he is.
Child, please. The only receiver he had that had the balls to stand up to him was TO, and we saw how that went. Power struggle, McNabb wins. Would you rather have McNabb passing to whoever or say Jeff Garcia throwing to TO.
I understand that the list of wide receivers going to the hall of fame is small for Philadelphia, but that street runs both ways. The QB is supposed to raise the play of the receivers as well. If McNabb was in Arizona, I’d bet he would still suck, because he has to get the ball to those weapons. Warner was a success because he hit people in stride.
Payton is a stud because he does the same thing. Did anyone notice Marvin Harrison retired? No, and that’s not because Reggie Wayne is just as good. Manning makes everyone on the field better.
I hear your complaints about surrounding McNabb with talent, but he still has to hit the receivers. Take a look at those 2 Dallas games last year. He was awful.
Football outsiders breaks down the value as 3/7 offense, 3/7 defense, 1/7 special teams, which seems reasonable to me. Even if the qb was 100% responsible for the offense, it would still be less than half the reason why a team wins or loses. Obviously the other 10 offensive players have an impact too. Let’s be generous to the qb and say the qb = all five linemen combined = all other skill positions combined. Thus, we could conclude that the qb is 1/7 or around 14% of why a team wins or loses. Play with the numbers anyway you like, the results will be similar. Clearly the qb is the most important individual contribution. However, the rest of the team combined is many times more important.
Of course if 14% of your team goes from the worse in the league to very good, you are going to have a drastic improvement. Just like if you went from the worst special teams to a very good one, or vastly improved your defensive line. I don’t know if the Raiders would have made the playoffs with Farve, but they would have competitive. They would have been competitive if they had Mcnabb too. We aren’t talking about whether the Eagles can win with a terrible qb. We are arguing whether they can win with a very good one.
Mcnabb to whoever. Was that supposed to be difficult? Besides I would think Owens contract complaints to be a bit higher on the driving him out of town meter than Mcnabb.
Warner got to play with great receivers in domes. Makes it a bit easier to look good. I’d like to see what he would do when it was 20 degrees and snowing in Philly.
Yeah, Mcnabb isn’t as good as Peyton. Just like everyone else. The options aren’t Mcnabb and Manning. They are Mcnabb and Kolb.
This is true as far as it goes, but of course, when you cherry pick to make your point you can often manage a technically true statement. Donovan McNabb played poorly in two regular season games against the Cowboys last year. OK.
Against the San Diego Chargers, who finished 13-3, he completed 35 of 55 passes for 450 yards. He obliterated the Giants, twice, the first time throwing only six incomplete passes vs. three touchdowns, and the second time playing a little less well but well enough to win very big. Or is the only measure of a quarterback how he performs in two games against the Cowboys?
What, really?
Jeff Garcia’s numbers while throwing to TO:
Two very good years, one good one and two okay ones.
And now McNabb’s numbers passing to “whoever” (that is, not TO):
Look at the last four years. His numbers have been as good with who-dats as Garcia’s were with TO. His completion percentage was slightly lower, but if you factor in yards per attempt, which were much higher, that’s not a factor.
25 TD’s is the most McNabb has thrown (outside the TO years) in a season? I thought it would be more, but then the Eagles have traditionally had a good run game and defense too.
It’s the most he’s thrown without TO. He threw 31 in 2004, with 14 games’ worth of Owens.
It’s true that he’s never been a lots-of-touchdown guy, but what really sets him apart is the number of interceptions he doesn’t throw. He does also rush for two or three scores every year.
He also, as has been noted, has missed at least one game in 5 out of 6 years, so that brings the numbers down. He’s actually 4th among active quarterbacks in career touchdowns, but has only been in the top 5 in a single season that one TO year.
In terms of TDs as a percentage of passes thrown he’s been in the top 5 a few times and led the league in '06.
Quarterback TD numbers in general are just weird. If I asked you off of the top of your head what Troy Aikman, Drew Bledsoe, Joe Montana, or John Elway’s career highs in TD passes were, I bet you’d overshoot each one. At least, I would, except maybe Elway: 23, 28, 31, 27. But then Steve Beuerlein threw 36 and Scott Mitchell 32.
Not really cherry picking, although I see your point. I picked those two games as the final straw on the back of Eagles management to move on from McNabb.
The one thing that is worthy to note from the two games I picked was that they counted for something. And McNabb has not been seen performing well in games that matter. Games at the beginning of the season have a lot less riding on them, even though they count the same at the end of the year. When the chips are down, I don’t want McNabb as the QB I’m relying on to win the big game, or drive the team to the winning score with less than 2 minutes to go in the game.
As for Kolb, I have no idea. I did see him play well in the two games he played last year, so I think there is some hope there. The west coast offense does not require a great arm, it requires an accurate one. Kolb seems to have an accurate arm, so with this offense, he has great potential. That doesn’t mean he will succeed. But IMO, the Eagles are a better team today without McNabb. I think the harder person to replace will be Westbrook.
The Redskins are notorious for overpaying or over-estimating the players they signed. Are they better with McNabb than with Campbell? Probably. But Campbell is an enigma to me because he’s never had the same offensive coordinator. I don’t think that’s helped his career. With Shanahan, McNabb has a coach who may be able to work well with what he has. But what I think he has is an overweight, over-rated, 33 year old QB who already has his built-in excuses (mediocre wide receivers, average offensive line and questionable RB’s (I will always root for Fast Willie Parker, but he isn’t very fast any more… and Larry Johnson? - both great backs who have seen their better days in the league)).
McNabb will be gone in 2 years in Washington… if that. And if he sticks around for 3, it’s because any extension he signs will force the Redskins to keep him on the roster.
If I had the energy, (or if I cared), I’d go through all of McNabb’s games and see how well he did against teams with winning records vs. teams with losing records. I suspect you’ll find he fed well on poor teams but didn’t raise his game against the better teams.
Of course, I could be wrong. And trust me when I say this, I hate the Eagles. But I think Eagle fans will be happier without McNabb. And I think the Eagles could be better. Time will tell.
Oh, and unless McNabb wins a Super Bowl in Washington, he’s not going to sniff the HOF.
This is the kind of nonsense that people rely on when they want to justify their own biases. “Not been seen performing well in games that matter,” I’ve found, is just another way of saying hasn’t won a Super Bowl. Because, of course, the playoff games you win lead to more games. And if you play well in the first game, that game doesn’t matter anymore. Or if you play well in the first two, and win both, those two don’t matter because then there’s another one. The ones he’s played well in don’t matter, because that’s the way you want to interpret it.
It isn’t all that hard to look up. Playoff games matter, can we agree on that? Here’s every single one of them. Can you find any he played well in?
Year Cmp Att Cmp% Yds TD Int Rate
2000 24 33 72.70% 161 2 1 90.6
2000 20 41 48.80% 181 1 1 59.1
2001 16 25 64.00% 194 2 1 97.7
2001 26 40 65.00% 262 2 1 89.8
2001 18 30 60.00% 171 1 1 73.1
2002 20 30 66.70% 247 1 0 103.1
2002 26 49 53.10% 243 0 1 58.5
2003 21 39 53.80% 248 2 0 90.5
2003 10 22 45.50% 100 0 3 19.3
2004 21 33 63.60% 286 2 0 111.4
2004 17 26 65.40% 180 2 0 111.1
2004 30 51 58.80% 357 3 3 75.4
2008 23 34 67.60% 300 1 1 92.8
2008 22 40 55.00% 217 1 2 58
2008 28 47 59.60% 375 3 1 97.4
2009 19 37 51.40% 230 1 1 68.5
You don’t get all the way to 5 NFC championship games and 1 Superbowl without winning some big games…right?
Just for goofs, Peyton Manning:
Rk Year Cmp Att Cmp% Yds TD Int Rate
1 1999 19 42 45.20% 227 0 0 62.3
2 2000 17 32 53.10% 194 1 0 82
3 2002 14 31 45.20% 137 0 2 31.2
4 2003 22 26 84.60% 377 5 0 158.3
5 2003 22 30 73.30% 304 3 0 138.7
6 2003 23 47 48.90% 237 1 4 35.5
7 2004 27 33 81.80% 458 4 1 145.7
8 2004 27 42 64.30% 238 0 1 69.3
9 2005 22 38 57.90% 290 1 0 90.9
10 2006 30 38 78.90% 268 1 3 71.9
11 2006 15 30 50.00% 170 0 2 39.6
12 2006 27 47 57.40% 349 1 1 79.1
13 2006 25 38 65.80% 247 1 1 81.8
14 2007 33 48 68.80% 402 3 2 97.7
15 2008 25 42 59.50% 310 1 0 90.4
16 2009 30 44 68.20% 246 2 1 87.9
17 2009 26 39 66.70% 377 3 0 123.6
18 2009 31 45 68.90% 333 1 1 88.5
Look at that 2006, when he finally transformed from a choker who would never win the big one to a proven winner. Maybe playing football in the playoffs is hard, and there’s more to it than who has the clutchest quarterback.
I heard his team-mates are excepting him pretty good today
QB stats are misleading, and everyone knows it. If the Eagles were playing from behind, McNabb is throwing more. He’s completing short passes and the YAC are going to be higher.
Bottom Line is he had a great team behind him and he won zero super bowls. You can’t argue that.
I don’t look at QB’s that have 1 QB especially great either. Favre, and both Mannings fit into this category. Trent Dilfer has a ring. Brad Johnson has a ring. One.
I guess I’m just a hater. I am glad you have good feelings for McNabb. Maybe that’s because the Eagles haven’t won since 1960 and he brought you the best football you’ve seen. I don’t know. But I can’t argue blind loyalty. If Kolb wins a Super Bowl, will your mind change? If McNabb falls on his face in Washington, will your mind change? I didn’t think so.
I will say this for McNabb… you either love him or hate him. Everyone has an opinion.
The idea that he was surrounded by great teams is certainly debatable.
Yeah, you are right. Without Donovan McNabb carrying the weight of the defense and special teams, they would have never made it to all of those championship games. And one super bowl. And lost. I guess he just got tired.
So, um, is there anything about a quarterback that does matter other than your personal feelings?
If his teams were so great, why didn’t they win in spite of him? Trent Dilfer won a Super Bowl. Is he better than McNabb? Brad Johnson’s got a ring. I know which of those two I’d take.