So I’m here, watching the Rose Bowl. Now I’m not much of a college guy. Sure I root for Michigan, but I only watch a half dozen college games a year. The NFL is more my speed. Anyway…
For those folks out there who follow football, how does Vince Young compare to Mike Vick when he was in college? They both seem to have exception ability to run, but is Vince capable of sitting back and throwing to win a game? Is he a better QB prospect than Vick was? Even after years in the pros Vick still hasn’t quite got the whole pass first, run thing down. Can we expect any better from Young?
vick has a better throwing motion. vick also has an “nfl arm”
vince is a good runner, and (upon completion of the game) you can see that mr. youg is in the same class of rushing quarterback as vince. remnermber what he did to our wolverines last year?
lemme rephrase that…remember what he did to loloyd (not a typo, his defense is wretched) carr’s shitty defense last year?
yeah, it’s no different for usc. usc is good offensively and wins by outscoring opponents, not beating them on toth sides of the ball.
back to the original question, vick had more hype. vick was a more polished product. because of the motion of his throwing. if vince youg were picked up by an nfl team right now, the FIRST thing thed change are his mechanics. they’d make him more over the top as opposed to his modified girl throw.
Young also plays almost all of his plays at Texas in the shotgun. No NFL does that. Playing under center is very different, so there will be an adjustment period.
Vick actually was a pretty good passer in college. He was 2nd in the nation in passing efficiency in the year VTech went to the national championship game and, IIRC, he holds the Freshman record for passing efficiency.
I think Young is probably a better passer, but he’s gotta learn to play QB under center, and most of his running seems to be to break tackles. In the NFL, he’ll get hurt if he tries to do that. He has to be more like Vick running the ball and try to avoid contact far more than he does in college.
I disagree with a lot that has been said above. Young does have an NFL arm. He has great arm strength, and throws a very nice ball. He has had over a 60% completion percentage this year.
His running abilities aren’t only breaking tackles. In his first run of the game last night, and his last, he either juked people out of thier shoes–or used his great speed. Even when he takes hits, he won’t be injured easily–not even in the NFL. This guy is huge! 6’5" and around 235 lbs. That’s bigger than many NFL running backs.
Two qualities that I think give him an edge over Vick are his field vision and his calm under pressure. He doesn’t force the issue as much as Vick. If you watched last night’s game, you saw many examples of how quickly he sees the plays developing before him.
I predict great success for Mr. Young in the NFL. I was completely convinced several months ago, after The Longhorns defeated my beloved Buckeyes.
I agree with much of this, and think Young (even though I attended Virginia Tech) is a better college player and probably a better pro prospect. One thing though - from what I’ve seen and read, Texas does not run an NFL-style offense, and have heard people say it’s a very basic one at that (which, of course, is what Vick ran at VT).
So, Young’s gonna have some learning to do and change some of his habits, which only time will tell how well he does at that.
Alternatively, the team that picks him could run the Texas-style offense. And lose 16 games per year.
One thing I will say for Vick over Young is in the following category: The WOW! factor.
Now, watching Young last night or in some other games you can tell he’s an amazing athlete, at times looks like a man among boys. But that’s been seen before (not to take anything away from him).
But Vick in college was like something no one had ever seen before. The pure elusiveness and speed, the escapability - it was sick. I will take watching the '99 game against FSU over any of Young’s games for the WOW! factor.
Steve McNair is about that size… and we know about his history with injuries. Donovan McNabb is also about that size, and he’s been injured more than a few times as well.
It remains to be seen, but it definetly isn’t a slam dunk. Young has a lot of adjusting to do. First, he’ll have to adjust to an NFL style offense, and play under center. Second, I’m sure a team is going to try to change his throwing motion… or at least contemplate it. Third, the NFL is a much faster game and the defenses usually get pressure far quicker than in college. Every QB has to try to adjust to that speed, and we’ll have to see if Young can do that.
Remember, college success isn’t always indicative of pro-success. I think Young will eventually be a good pro QB, but I’m not handing him the NFL MVP award for the next 10 years as people seem to be doing.
McNair and McNabb’s injuries don’t mean that Vince will have the same problems, but I would concede that most QB’s, regardless of size, take a beating in the NFL and are bound to get injured.
I hope you don’t think I’m saying Young will be an instant success in the pro’s. I am saying that I think he will be better than Vick at the same points in their careers. I definitely agree that college QB sucess doesn’t neccessitate NFL success, and we have seen more than enough examples of this. However, Vince Young does seem to have that something about him that makes you believe he will be able to do very well at the next level.
I’ll be bold enough right now to say that I think he will have a better NFL career than Leinart.
Mack Brown’s brief interview during the broadcast last night made it pretty clear that he thinks the key to VY’s passing success in the last two years has been his [MB’s] decision to leave him alone about his wierd throwing motion.
Anyone who’s ever struggled with golf will tell you that a wierd motion with good results is better than a “textbook” action with mediocre or poor results.
If he can throw hard and on the mark - and it seems he can - why bother him?
re: adjusting to the NFL
I agree that’s an issue for any college prospect. Faster, more complex game, etc.
But what struck me watching last night was the maturity of VY’s play execution and decision-making. It didn’t seem like a raw display of freakish athleticism, the way it often did (to me, anyway) with Michael Vick. He seemed to be picking his spots, both passing and running, and executing with real deliberateness.
Well, I wasn’t pointing to McNair and McNabb as what will happen to Young. My point was that McNair and McNabb are both BIG guys, big as running backs, but they still get hurt. And Young will take a lot of hits, because, quite frankly, the team he’s going to won’t be all that good. And running will leave him open to more hits. If he’s smart, and runs out of bounds a lot and slides a lot, he may be ok.
I do think he’ll be a good QB, but I realize that this predicting stuff can be very inaccurate (as anyone who was evaluating Ryan Leaf right after the Chargers drafted him can tell you). Young does have to adjust to a new style of offense and perhaps some hands on coach will try to tinker with his throwing motion. Young has a higher ceiling than Leinhart, but I’d say Leinhart is more predictable to be good now (he’s played in an NFL-like system for years and has a very nice throwing motion). The chances of bust are higher with Young basically.
but that’s the thing. he ISN’T accurate and i wasn’t amazed by his arm strength last night during the rose bowl. also, i realize that texas runs most of their offense out of the shotgun, but he better not run that much in the pros or else he’s going to have a very short career. the throwing motion gets changed IMMEDIATELY when he hits the pros. now, i know that it’s more money and careers at stake, but why in the hell can’t an nfl offense run the option with an athletic quarterback?
for the record, i’m not sold on bush either. he leaves his feet too much. he seems quick and shifty and fast, and all that is good, but i think his best asset is he has an amazing knack for finding a blocker. i’m not talking about offensive line blocks either, but downfield blocks. his head is always on a swivel, and that COULD end up being a slight negative early in his career, trying to look everywhere.
i grew up watching barry sanders. mr. bush is no barry sanders. but i do think bush can be a pretty decent pro. i can’t wait to hear people slurp him at the combine, though.
I don’t know if it was Young or his receivers, but three of four times last night, open Texas receivers caught the ball with one knee already on the ground. I didn’t think that spoke well for his accuracy, although he didn’t miss a lot of open passes.
It has to do with the speed of the defense, which is also the reason you’re seeing less and less of the option in the college ranks. When the entire linebacking corps (along with the D-line, at the NFL level at least) beats both the QB and the RB to the outside and already has all of those gaps filled on a consistent basis, you lose your recipe for success with the option.
As for Young, he strikes me as having the accuracy/strength that is enough for the college game but not quite enough for the NFL, at least not yet. As Marley23 mentioned, he seemed just a little bit off with many of his completions. Additionally, I noticed a number of throws that were completed where I thought “hmmm, that one is probably an interception if that’s a NFL DB out there”. I liked his accuracy in that he hit most of his spots, it just seemed that he lacked the zip on the ball that would have made the throws a lot safer.
Omni will enjoy this one: for me, it’s like watching Kyle Orton and Rex Grossman for the Bears. I wasn’t sold at first on the change - I mean, why fix what’s broken? But then I watched Grossman for a bit. When he throws the ball, you think, “that’s a NFL-quality-throw”. Orton’s ball just sort of floats in comparison. That’s how I feel when I see Young: the ball gets where it’s going, but it just sort of floats on the way there, compared to what I think of as a “NFL-quality throw”. Vick, of course, doesn’t have this problem - his arm is a cannon. He has plenty of other issues, though.
Athletically, I think Young would make a good WR, but I think it would probably be a waste. More than anything, I think this is why:
If nothing else, Young seems to have a grasp of the mental side of being a quarterback, something that is extremely hard to teach (see Mr. Vick, for example). He made very few bad throws, always knew to run at the right time, and was as much of a presence in the pocket as he was out of it.
I don’t think Young will ever reach the level of Brady or Manning (or even Palmer) as a passer, but I think as a complete quarterback he will be better than Vick and possibly as good as McNabb or McNair in their primes - which, as we have seen, is more than enough to lead a team to success at the Next Level.
Well I’d also say that it’s a bit early to write off Vick (as everyone seems to be doing). He was a very, very raw passer when was drafted and he’s been the starter in Atlanta for 3 seasons (he didn’t play much in his rookie year and was injured for most of the 2003 season). The West Coast offense takes some time to learn, and Vick still can thrive in it when everything ‘clicks’. He still is only 25 (Carson Palmer is actually one year OLDER than Vick). He’s got time.
Actually the Falcons were BETTER in points allowed and yards allowed than last year, by 10 more points and 100 more yards than last season, which isn’t much, but an improvement nonetheless.
Watching the post-game with my son, and when the pundits said that there’s never been anyone like Vince Young, we both brought up Michael Vick simultaneously.
I think Young steps out of tackles; Vick made people miss. Vick was a more dazzling runner, and just flat-out faster 99% of the defenders he faced in college (and Vince Young).
Neither is a particularly good passer. I don’t think Young’s sidearm delivery is going to go over well in the NFL.
