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I was wrong about Josh Allen, and it sucks.


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12 minutes ago, Waka Flocka Flacco said:

And you're still passing and feeling pretty good about it if his clone shows up in next year's draft class. Longshots come in sometimes. This thread is embarrassing.

I never said that the lesson we are learning is you should take a QB with Allen's profile in the draft.  I agree that what he is doing is historically unprecedented, which also makes it highly difficult to repeat.  

QBASE nails their bust picks about 75 % of the time.  A score as low as Allen's had over a 95 % failure rate.  I think Tannehill, Josh McCown and Brian Griese were the only QB's in the last 25 years with a negative score who went on to have a successful (relatively speaking) NFL career as a passer. 

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The thing about Allen is this time last year, you were right.  The initial returns on Allen were exactly what most people thought.  Good runner, pretty poor thrower, questionable decision maker.  Last October (hell through last January) those things were all still true.

He has made such an enormous leap it's astounding.  I can't recall anyone making such a similar leap.  Allen was on a similar trajectory as Trubisky, and in one off-season he turned into an MVP candidate.  Hard to predict that.

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1 minute ago, Jetsfan80 said:

I never said that the lesson we are learning is you should take a QB with Allen's profile in the draft.  I agree that what he is doing is historically unprecedented, which also makes it highly difficult to repeat.  

QBASE nails their bust picks about 75 % of the time.  A score as low as Allen's had over a 95 % failure rate.  I think Tannehill was the only QB with a negative score who went on to have a successful (relatively speaking) NFL career.

Okay, what's the lesson then? The take on Allen might have been wrong but the decision not to be all that invested in having a take on Allen was right.

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3 minutes ago, Losmeister said:

interesting.most JNers are so inanely happy to make fun of Buffalo in any way shape or form. actually showing respect for THAT fan base, good on ya...

United Love GIF by INTO ACTION

 

I'm biased, because their GM (Brandon Beane) went to my alma mater, UNCW.  I even had a lot of the same professors as he did, 7-8 years later.

I've also never really had a reason to hate the Bills.  I wasn't old enough to be around for the early 90s/Jim Kelly years when they were hated by Jets fans.  

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2 minutes ago, Waka Flocka Flacco said:

Okay, what's the lesson then? The take on Allen might have been wrong but the decision not to be all that invested in having a take on Allen was right.

There is no lesson.  Sometimes the Universe is cruel and we just need to accept that as part of the deal.  

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22 minutes ago, T0mShane said:

The scouting community—especially those who do the media-aligned “scouting”—have basically missed on every QB in the past five years. They elevated guys like Darnold, Haskins, Rosen, and Trubisky, while downgrading Lamar, Mahomes, Watson, Allen, etc. There’s a real bias toward “every good QB plays exactly like Tom Brady and anyone who doesn’t can’t actually win in this league.” The model hasn’t exactly changed—you still have to do the majority of your damage from the pocket—but these fake scouts are at the point where they denigrate prospects who have the ability to move a little bit, presuming it’s because they’re too stupid to make a third read from the pocket. 

BINGO. 

This is what worries me about the Tank for Trevor stuff. 

If Trevor is such a no-brainer 1st overall pick, why wasn't Mahomes the no-brainer 1st overall pick?  

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9 minutes ago, HawkeyeJet said:

The thing about Allen is this time last year, you were right.  The initial returns on Allen were exactly what most people thought.  Good runner, pretty poor thrower, questionable decision maker.  Last October (hell through last January) those things were all still true.

He has made such an enormous leap it's astounding.  I can't recall anyone making such a similar leap.  Allen was on a similar trajectory as Trubisky, and in one off-season he turned into an MVP candidate.  Hard to predict that.

By the numbers, he was WORSE than Trubisky, and it wasn't particularly close, either.

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46 minutes ago, Jetsfan80 said:

-83 QBASE score.  56 % career completion % at Wyoming.  2 underwhelming seasons to start his career, loaded with turnovers and poor accuracy.  I called him a Running Back.  There was zero evidence available to suggest Josh Allen would put together 4 games like he has to start 2020, yet he has.

2020 sucks, and that's extended to the NFL season.  

FML.  

I'm with you. Although I did also say that Lamar Jackson was a better QB than Allen. 

BTW, Rosen's complete inability to function in an NFL offense still puzzles me.

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#1- Did any of you watch the game the whole game or just snippets? He could have made himself a grilled ham & cheese back there for 85% of his snaps. 

#2- Right now his WORST WR would be the starting WR for the Jets right now.

#3- His defense actually gets off the field on 3rd down so the offense can find a rhythm. 

#4- Every single WR made at least 1 amazing grab! Beasley has 2, one was a grab on the sidelines, 1 a TD grab while getting flipped on his head in the endzone. Diggs was just snagging balls out of the air the entire game, no  matter where they were, out front, behind, or slightly above his head. 
#5- Raiders defense SUCKS and both of their starting safeties were out & they lost a starting CB. 
#6- Comparing these 2 QBs based on the myriad of different variables the both face right now is just stupid. 
#7- McDermott vs Gase

Allen is a good QB, he’s also getting a lot of help from his teammates, unlike Sam who as soon as he takes a snap looks like he’s running for his life in a sandlot game playing with a bunch of slow fat kids. 

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5 minutes ago, slimjasi said:

BINGO. 

This is what worries me about the Tank for Trevor stuff. 

If Trevor is such a no-brainer 1st overall pick, why wasn't Mahomes the no-brainer 1st overall pick?  

Biases against Air Raid system QB's.  Which weren't exactly unfounded.  You had to really separate out the system when evaluating Mahomes, which is not easy to do.  Reid did, and saw what many others couldn't because they ruled Mahomes out from the outset. 

I don't think he could have possibly seen Mahomes becoming THIS good, but he saw enough to move up in the draft for him and then dump Alex Smith, who was coming off a career year at the time.

Having said that, Mahomes had a solid 656 QBASE score, best from that draft class.  And people wonder why QBASE gets referenced so often here.

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46 minutes ago, Jetsfan80 said:

2nd best QB in the class when I had him 5th, below Josh Rosen, entering the 2020 season.  

Is it fair to completely write off Josh Rosen yet?  He started his rookie year on a horrific team with no OL, although he did have much better weapons than Darnold has ever had and his one year in Miami he was on a team equivalent to the talent that Darnold has had.  Let's see what Bruce Arians and Tom Brady can do with him, he may become a very successful successor to Brady.

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1 minute ago, deucebag said:

Is it fair to completely write off Josh Rosen yet?  He started his rookie year on a horrific team with no OL, although he did have much better weapons than Darnold has ever had and his one year in Miami he was on a team equivalent to the talent that Darnold has had.  Let's see what Bruce Arians and Tom Brady can do with him, he may become a very successful successor to Brady.

Not completely, no.  Hence why I had Rosen ahead of Allen entering the season.  I felt Allen was guaranteed to be a bust, while Rosen at least had some hope of making it.  Sort of a "devil you don't know vs the devil you know" kind of thinking.

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9 minutes ago, T0mShane said:

It’s because Trevor is a tall white guy and Mahomes is a 6’1” black dude. 

Perhaps that factored in considering the past African American air raid QBs.  Think about this - Graham Harrell put up better stat than Pat Mahomes did and look what became of him.  I think the scouts discounted Mahomes' stats and therefore did not properly evaluate his intangibles.

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18 minutes ago, Jetsfan80 said:

 

I'm biased, because their GM (Brandon Beane) went to my alma mater, UNCW.  I even had a lot of the same professors as he did, 7-8 years later.

I've also never really had a reason to hate the Bills.  I wasn't old enough to be around for the early 90s/Jim Kelly years when they were hated by Jets fans.  

I'll take itthat you didnt mean Officially known as University College of North Wales (UCNW), and later University of Wales, Bangor

I never hated those Bills teams just cos WE sucked. I gotto watch that Bills team BECOME that team... 

was at THIS game...https://www.pro-football-reference.com/boxscores/199010210buf.htm

funback n forth game....   they came back at the end...   probably the mostfun game i ever attended....beaut of a fall day...

great game, good buddy rooting for the Bills nextto me...    the fans treated me ok. the beer cans and cigarette packs thrown at me were all empty...

 

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4 minutes ago, Losmeister said:

I'll take itthat you didnt mean Officially known as University College of North Wales (UCNW), and later University of Wales, Bangor

Haha nope.  UNCW, not UCNW.  University of North Carolina Wilmington in Wilmington, NC (southeastern NC). 

The irony is that UNCW doesn't have a football program.  We're a Basketball-Baseball school.  Yet we helped produce one of the NFL's best GM's!

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3 minutes ago, Losmeister said:

cool factoid

Definitely proud of it as an alum!

Meanwhile, the guy in my avatar is Devontae Cacok, a UNCW forward (2015-19) who made his debut for the Lakers in the Bubble (in the final game of the regular season), becoming just the 3rd player in program history to play in an NBA game.

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24 minutes ago, Jetsfan80 said:

Biases against Air Raid system QB's.  Which weren't exactly unfounded.  You had to really separate out the system when evaluating Mahomes, which is not easy to do.  Reid did, and saw what many others couldn't because they ruled Mahomes out from the outset. 

I don't think he could have possibly seen Mahomes becoming THIS good, but he saw enough to move up in the draft for him and then dump Alex Smith, who was coming off a career year at the time.

Having said that, Mahomes had a solid 656 QBASE score, best from that draft class.  And people wonder why QBASE gets referenced so often here.

My larger point is that we have to be very careful with conventional wisdom. 

I don't think NFL scouts and GMs are particularly good at predicting which college QBs will be good in the NFL and which ones won't. 

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11 minutes ago, slimjasi said:

My larger point is that we have to be very careful with conventional wisdom. 

I don't think NFL scouts and GMs are particularly good at predicting which college QBs will be good in the NFL and which ones won't. 

Few are, because there a lot of things that can't be accurately accounted for when it comes to projecting how a college skillset will translate to the pros.  You have to look at SO many things:  Accuracy, mechanics, footwork, production, how quickly a player processes reads, etc etc.

A good bit of it comes down to personality, too, which is FAR more important for the QB position than any other.  And that can be tough to judge.  A 22-year old kid is going to be very different when he's a 28-year old pro, but how do you accurately project out which guys will confidently be slinging it around the field AND managing other guys in the huddle? 

And what happens when adversity inevitably strikes?  Many of these college players went undefeated in High School and only lost a handful of games in their collegiate career.  What happens when they're playing well but the team is headed for a 5-11 season?  What happens when they realize the NFL is a completely different beast and is so much faster than the college game?  How will they be able to "slow the game down"?

Certainly, the more talented and skilled the QB is, the easier it is for them to be "leaders", since players will always gravitate to a winner.  But even a super talented guy like Jay Cutler, who had an excellent resume when entering the league, can't be saved by that if he's a total a$$hole.  Especially when it turned out he wasn't really all that good.  

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46 minutes ago, HawkeyeJet said:

The thing about Allen is this time last year, you were right.  The initial returns on Allen were exactly what most people thought.  Good runner, pretty poor thrower, questionable decision maker.  Last October (hell through last January) those things were all still true.

They weren't as true as people think in January. Allen led the league in intermediate passing routes (10-20 yards). He had a deep ball problem and it was atrocious, but it wasn't like he couldn't make any throws. It was easy to overlook because anytime he threw deep it was like 5 yards away from the receiver and he played a lot of hero ball. 

I will say, I'm impressed that he learned how to reset his feet. I didn't expect that from him. He tended to roll out and heave the ball with his arm which his athletic talents let him get away with, but this year, he moves...resets and throws which is why his ball placement is so much better. 

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5 minutes ago, T0mShane said:

The scouting community—especially those who do the media-aligned “scouting”—have basically missed on every QB in the past five years. They elevated guys like Darnold, Haskins, Rosen, and Trubisky, while downgrading Lamar, Mahomes, Watson, Allen, etc. There’s a real bias toward “every good QB plays exactly like Tom Brady and anyone who doesn’t can’t actually win in this league.” The model hasn’t exactly changed—you still have to do the majority of your damage from the pocket—but these fake scouts are at the point where they denigrate prospects who have the ability to move a little bit, presuming it’s because they’re too stupid to make a third read from the pocket. 

 

Predicting the future is not easy, but i imagine the good scouts as ones that think about where the game is going, rather than where it's been. Scouts that cite 'historical comps' as the most important criteria are the first ones to miss out on prospects like Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson. These dinosaurs asked Lamar jackson to play receiver, how f*cked up is that?

 

All the criticism over concussions has forced the NFL to do everything it can to limit collisions, and they've put more restrictions on defense. The rules have changed to criminalize hits on 'defenseless' receivers and runners. The 'hard hitting safety' - personified by the likes of Polamalu, Rodney harrison, Sean taylor in recent years - is now practically extinct (which is why trading Adams made sense).

In consideration of rule changes, the running QB has a lease of life he wouldn't have had earlier. My biggest concern with Josh allen was the risk of injury, he'd always make a target of himself. But in today's NFL, the risk is now mitigated by DBs developing a fear of fouling out. This effectively allows athletic QBs to run guys over, they in turn, become more fearless. 

Like in business or politics, the good scouts; the few that aren't elevated by nepotism, are able to recognize where the game is going, and think creatively. If you're waiting for that 'good looking' prospect, you'll be waiting a long time...but some - like many in the Jets organization - were doing exactly that. 

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10 minutes ago, predator_05 said:

All the criticism over concussions has forced the NFL to do everything it can to limit collisions, and they've put more restrictions on defense. The rules have changed to criminalize hits on 'defenseless' receivers and runners. The 'hard hitting safety' - personified by the likes of Polamalu, Rodney harrison, Sean taylor in recent years - is now practically extinct (which is why trading Adams made sense).

In consideration of rule changes, the running QB has a lease of life he wouldn't have had earlier.

Yep.  Meanwhile:  Follow the money.  There's a reason these great athletes, who ordinarily would been moved to RB, WR or Linebacker at the lower levels, are being being encouraged to stick with playing QB:  It's never been more lucrative to be a QB than it is now, especially when juxtaposed to the other positions on the field.  Remember when Bill Polian said that Lamar Jackson needed to move to WR?  That's dinosaur thinking now.  

With better athletes comes more and more running QB's.  It used to be there was only 1-2 in the league at any given time, and the RG3 cautionary tale briefly gave teams pause about drafting the dual threat guys and handing them a lot of money.  Those days are gone now that we're seeing fewer and fewer "statues" in the league. 

MOST guys in the league now can run when needed, and are finding a ton of success.  So even if 1 or 2 of the current star QB's crushes his knee at some point while on the move, that won't stop the train from moving.  Even then, these guys are getting smarter about avoiding big hits and making sure they slide.  That has especially helped Kyler Murray, who comes from a baseball background.  

The market economy has spoken:  Mamas, let your kids grow up to be Quarterbacks.  And if they're dual threat QB's, even better.

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28 minutes ago, Losmeister said:

Yes. Same team was competitive once they put Fitz in. 

Nah, Fitz is defined as plug and play mediocrity.  Rosen came off one awful team with poor coaching to a new offense in his 2nd season with an even worse supporting cast.

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27 minutes ago, slimjasi said:

My larger point is that we have to be very careful with conventional wisdom. 

I don't think NFL scouts and GMs are particularly good at predicting which college QBs will be good in the NFL and which ones won't. 

 

I disagree, i think today's generation has a better hit rate than previous ones. Even the flawed prospects go first round. There's no chance of a good college QB dropping to the 2nd or 3rd. 

GMs and scouts are increasingly becoming more risk-tolerant. I wouldn't have touched Jordan Love in the 1st, Daniel Jones the year before...these guys weren't good prospects. But look where they went. 

You can't predict anything in life with 100% certainty, but today's front offices - at least the good ones - are more willing to think creatively. Organizations like the Jets (and a few others) belong to a minority that hasn't caught up with the times.

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