From a QB guru. He's discussing Eli Manning, but it's still relevant to RT, I think. I tend to buy whatever this guy has to say about QBs and offense in general.
Although RT has been with Sherman all these years per se, he's still young and wet behind the ears. As we saw last game he's very trainable and I feel he'll continue progressing throughout the season.
And this is, IMHO, what we should realistically hope for, even expect. It's going to be rough going early on...we all said that in the off-season when Lazor came on...but by midway through the season, he should be looking a lot more loose out there. From the first half to the second half of the NE game he showed drastic improvement. If he can start off better and play with some consistency, this offense will be scary.
He's still trying to find his comfort level within the offense. I don't think he made very many bad decisions on Sunday at all. His problem was that a few throws suffered from bad ball placement. I think that will improve with time in an offense where he throws passes that aren't comebacks.
Ya he was slightly off on like 3 or 4, way off on 1 or 2, and I think it's because he's not fully processing/making the decision and letting it fly on autopilot yet. He's still relatively new to this system...he'll get there.
Of course there is an adjustment. Preseason is worthless because the team only opens up 10-15% of its playbook, with various starters. Practice is now limited... Tannehill is a smart guy. Im sure he'll adapt fine. Im more concerned about him physically. He's got heavy feet and bad footwork. Even on Sunday I noticed 5-6 times that he didn't keep his feet/ lower body aligned. Honestly, Im kind of surprised starters don't play more on the preseason given the new practice rules. Would seem a great way to side step them.
I think he should use a bit more of his athleticism. He is a mobile QB, used to play wide receiver in College and he did post a 4.58s in the Combine's 40 dash, but hasn't used that for as long as he has been a Dolphin. He shouldn't play like a scrambling QB, but sometimes it can be good, to make the linebackers think about it. Andrew Luck runs with the ball more often than Tanny, but he isn't as fast, I remember he was about 0.10 slower or about that much. He wasn't very good last sunday, but I think his reads were not bad, he didn't had the accuracy, he still can improve that a little, but the most important thing is that the Dolphins won even though Tannehill wasn't great and that is what is most important.
Ryan will likely never be a Brees or Manning or Favre or Marino. At least not unless he has some wild superstar season and does everything from throwing TDs, running TDs, making 3rd down conversions out of nothing, becoming a field general and still finding the time to perfect his cartwheel for the halftime show. Assuming none of that happens, I think we can get a very effective Rivers/Flacco/Romo level career QB out of our guy...which is amazing compared to what we've been dealing with since Dan. Those kinds of guys can take you to the SB and win. Sure you can't lean on them like they are a Brady or a Manning but remember that Dan, the man, Marino, a guy who's easily a All-time top 5 QB even according to his harshest critics...never won the big one because he didn't have a running game or a consistent defense. Ryan doesn't have to be Marino, Moreno doesn't need to be Lynch, but together they need to be consistent.
The problem is money. Every starting QB wants $20 million per year now. While all three of those guys you mention are talented enough to win a SB, they're not talented enough to carry a team (I like Rivers though and think highly of him). They're not guys you can "lean on" as you put it. Despite that, they're being paid a significant portion of their teams salary cap. It's a total contradiction which creates imbalance and personnel inadequacy, preventing the team from ever winning. I feel very confident that Joe Flacco will never win another SB with his current deal. Same with Eli. And the window of teams like SF may be closing faster than anyone anticipates. Same goes for all the 100 million dollar QB club members, tbh. The only saving grace for any of these teams is a fluctuating salary cap, which is speculated to increase to $150 million by 2016. Otherwise, they're all in trouble.
