...to slide or not to slide ? ? ?

[kelly]

-- Todd Bowles wants his quarterbacks to be smarter when they're running with the ball. That request sounds weird, considering Ryan Fitzpatrick -- Harvard, Class of '05 -- is one of the smartest players in the NFL.But the New York Jets' starter also is fiercely competitive and he doesn't like to slide to avoid contact. He paid the price Sunday, tearing a ligament in his left thumb while trying to gain a few extra yards. Surely, he learned a hard lesson.

Then again, maybe not.

"Yeah, I’ll believe it when I see it," offensive coordinator Chan Gailey said Thursday.

Gailey doesn't think Fitzpatrick is a lost cause; he believes quarterbacks can learn to adopt a slide-first mentality."We all have a level, a point, where we say, 'OK, enough is enough,'" he said. "Ryan just hasn’t gotten to that point yet, but maybe he will. Maybe this will be the one. Broken leg didn’t do it, I don’t know if a hurt thumb will do it or not."

Fitzpatrick has rushed for 124 yards, ninth among quarterbacks. One of the highlights of the season was his 18-yard touchdown run against the Washington Redskins, a great play that provided an emotional spark to the team. The players feed off his aggressive style. There has to be a balance."There’s times where I’ve gotten into a little bit of trouble, this kind of being a fluke deal, but I could have slid three yards before and it wouldn’t have been an issue," Fitzpatrick said. "I’ve got to try to be a little bit smarter, probably."

Easier said than done, especially in the heat of the moment.

"Yep, there’s a fine line," Gailey said. "There's a fine line and I haven't found out where that is yet."

>      http://espn.go.com/blog/newyork-jets/post/_/id/55786/to-slide-or-not-to-slide-tough-question-for-jets-qb-ryan-fitzpatrick

[kelly]

Who’s Teaching These NFL Quarterbacks to Slide, Anyway  ?

Ryan Fitzpatrick and Geno Smith were both injured last week when they failed to slide after runs. Eli Manning says he has never practiced the maneuver. What’s going on?

.—Two preventable injuries nearly upended the Jets’ promising season last Sunday. In the first quarter, starting quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick tore a ligament in the thumb of his left, non-throwing hand. Then in the fourth, backup passer Geno Smith suffered a bruise to his left, non-throwing shoulder.Both were the results of needless mistakes, with the quarterbacks taking unnecessary hits because they neglected to surrender themselves by making a baseball-style slide to the turf.

“I could have slid 3 yards before and it wouldn’t have been an issue,” said Fitzpatrick, who exited the game after the hit from Oakland’s Charles Woodson. Despite the torn ligament, Fitzpatrick will start this Sunday against Jacksonville with a protective glove on his left hand. “I’ve got to try to be a little bit smarter.”

Smith was singing the same tune after the loss to the Raiders: “The smart thing to do is always to slide, protect yourself. That’s what I should’ve done.”

‘I don’t think I’ve done a sliding drill. Maybe in college once.’

—Eli Manning

Quarterbacks are almost always an NFL team’s most important player. Yet in spite of their multiyear, nine-figure contracts, their teams often neglect to have them practice the simple technique of sliding feet-first to the turf to avoid collisions and protect their bodies—and the ball.

Smith, who said he would be available to play despite his shoulder injury, said he hasn’t practiced sliding since the Jets drafted him in 2013.

Longtime Giants quarterback Eli Manning, who is known to avoid sacks at all costs, admitted, “I don’t think I’ve done a sliding drill. Maybe in college once.”

The NFL rule book states that any ball-carrier can declare himself down by sliding to the ground, and that “a defender must pull up when a runner begins a feet-first slide.” The downside is that game officials often mark the spot of the ball where the quarterback began his slide, rather than where he actually landed.

There are a couple reasons why today’s NFL quarterbacks, many of whom have been training for their jobs since they were teenagers, can’t execute a seemingly simple slide.

“I didn’t have to do it a whole lot in high school,” Manning said. “I was bigger than a lot of guys I was going up against. But in college, all of a sudden, you realize there are some big boys up there.” Manning said his family doesn’t teach the high-school quarterbacks who attend the annual Manning Passing Academy how to slide.

It’s also difficult to practice sliding safely, especially when the weather gets colder and teams practice indoors on artificial turf. During a slide, a quarterback risks getting a cleat caught in the turf, or at least a nasty rug burn.

“It’s hard to think of a nice drill to figure out that,” said Giants backup quarterback Ryan Nassib, who pointed to a two-inch stretch of gnarled skin just to the right of his right shin. “If you look at this right here, this is just from years of sliding.”

Nassib said it’s also tough to remember the proper sliding technique while dodging ferocious linemen in the midst of a game. After all, defenders aren’t allowed to hit quarterbacks during practice. “If you’re in the heat of the moment, it’s not something you’ve been training,” Nassib said.

Smith said it also goes against basic instinct: “You’re not used to running full speed and hitting the ground.”

When they do slide, quarterbacks say the best way to do it is to cover the football with both arms while mimicking a baseball slide—extending the dominant leg straight ahead while tucking the other leg. “Pretend like you’re sliding into second base,” Manning said. It’s no coincidence that one of the NFL’s best sliding quarterbacks, the Seattle Seahawks’ Russell Wilson, was drafted by the Texas Rangers as an infielder.

Former Eagles backup quarterback GJ Kinne said his coaches there emphasized sliding because his two fellow passers, Nick Foles and Michael Vick—the latter of whom actually took lessons from the Atlanta Braves when he played for the crosstown Falcons—found it hard to do. Kinne said quarterbacks coach Bill Musgrave found a fun way to do so, setting up a Slip ‘N Slide, the kind children play on every summer.

“After practice we had pads on and then they got a little Slip ‘N Slide to work on it,” said Kinne, who now plays safety on the Giants’ practice squad.

There appear to be no imminent sliding drills planned at 1 Jets Drive. Fitzpatrick said his left thumb still hurts enough that he can’t change diapers at home, but that he’ll be able to play without any hindrance, even with the protective glove.

Still, he called his injury a fluke and questioned whether sliding is the panacea that it’s made out to be. “I could have slid and hit my thumb on the ground,” he said.

Sometimes it’s a matter of who—that is, how valuable—the quarterback is. Some coaches want their quarterbacks to fight for an extra yard or two rather than perform a pre-emptive glide to the turf. Kinne said he ran into that scenario while in college at Tulsa. “My coach got kind of mad at me,” he said. “One time I slid, he told me I wasn’t Troy Aikman. I needed to keep running.”

>     http://www.wsj.com/articles/whos-teaching-these-nfl-quarterbacks-to-slide-anyway-1446757976