Some people aren't ready to can him yet b/c we truly wouldn't know who the bad apples are or what Ireland's true worth is if we throw out the entire bunch at the same time. There was a reason that Ireland was thought so highly of that Parcells wanted to mentor him for our future GM role. Sparano & Henning were obviously a hindrance, and I can't imagine that trying to stock players for their team & offensive system could make even the best of GMs look good. Parcells, Sparano, and Henning have been removed from the equation, allowing us to actually isolate the last variable [Ireland] for true assessment, which hadn't been made possible in years past. IMO, Ireland may or may not have it in him to be a great GM, but we won't know for certain unless we first removed the obviously flawed variables and gave it a chance to isolate Ireland. Parcells put Jeff into a crappy, unfavorable situation that could damage his career goals for a while, so I'd personally like to see if the guy has what it takes to dig us out of this mess and make something of this team and himself, and there's probably not a guy on the planet right now who'd work harder and be more dedicated to seeing this happen than Ireland.
Honestly, could you imagine a worse situation to stick a rookie, mentoring GM into than with Sparano, an ancient Dan Henning, and Parcells outdated blue print, only to have his trainer [Parcells] prematurely ditch his team, leaving the young GM immediately responsible for mess clean-up duty rather than him inheriting a successful team that Parcells was paid $12 million to establish?
You hear coaches make "gut decisions" every day. I am sure owners do too. I think it was a mistake to keep Ireland from the old regime. I think Philbin should have had a fresh start with a gm that is more in tune with what he wants to do. Now I agree that Ireland has been very accommodating given his different views of personnel in the past (fast, big) to Philbin's views of a guy being a "football player" first (e.g., Lane vs. Gates).
One think Hard Knocks did was give me perspective on Ireland and how he treats others. He did better than expected in that category, but I actually lost confidence in him as a personnel guy.
It's one of the worst because we didn't help our team in any single way. We didn't even manage to sign solid backups. Awful free agency period.
Keeping a horrible GM just for stability. Yea, that stability will surely bring in the wins I'm sure. Much more important than talent.
You know who else was highly thought of by Parcells? Sparano and Henning. So obviously, Ireland was just another horrible decision by that douche Parcells. Ireland is bad, very bad at his job. He's the only hindrance I know. Hindering us from actually getting talent on this team. Just a funny post all around. Everyone but Ireland was the problem. Defending this complete loser of a GM as if he actually had some track record to go on beforehand, when the Cowboys were consistently mediocre as well. Mediocrity, that's what you get when Ireland is working for your team. Any GM in the league would probably be more dedicated than Ireland. He's just trying to buy time at this point. He knows he's awful at his job. It's too obvious not to know. Now he just has to keep those paychecks rolling until he's inevitably fired for being so damn bad at his job.
His take on things is precisely what I was talking about in the HardKnocks thread with the "pus" post.
It's sad when posters can't even make a generalized statement about Ireland w/o being attacked or insulted for it. The guy obviously isn't a total moron and has to have some redeeming qualities for Parcells to want to mold him in the first place and for a successful billionaire to entrust him with his billion dollar purchase, but heaven forbid anyone mentions stuff like that.
He's obviously a total moron when it comes to being a GM. He might not be a total moron outside of football. Who knows. But I don't really care either. Our successful billionaire is quite the moron as well when it comes to football. The sooner he sells the team and sticks to real estate the better off we'll be.
I stated that as a prediction. One that I'm about 100% sure on since Matt Ryan is a franchise QB, and Ryan Tannehill was never a good prospect to begin with.
It's just too bad I'm not a complete homer and choose to turn a blind eye to the reality of this team. Like you. Oh well.
By what measure? If its W/L, then thats inherently flawed, because the game dictates that successful billionaires will lose a lot of games.
Obviously? You can tell all of this by your day to day workings with the guy? Let me ask you something. How many Super Bowl winning teams have there been since the first NFL game?
Tannehill wasn't a good prospect? Fooled me. I thought he was the 8th pick in the first round in the 2012 NFL Draft. That's pretty ****ing good for not being a good prospect. Most draft boards had him going top 10 overall. So I'm not sure what you're talking about. As for Ryan being a "franchise" QB. Why? Is it because he's their starter? Is that your criteria to be labeled as "franchise"? I see nothing that tells me that Ryan would have succeed here. I see a pretty average QB that, as of yet, hasn't lived up to his hype. And Tannehill has yet to play in his first NFL game. I'm not sure why you're even comparing the two.
I don't care where he was drafted. I seen nothing on the field that warranted him being drafted that high. As for Matt Ryan being average, 4200 yards, 29/12 TD/INT ratio, 92.2 QB rating, 61.3 completion percentage. Yea average. It might be of your opinion that Tannehill might be able to put up those types of numbers eventually, that's fine. But don't sit here and troll by saying Matt Ryan is average.
By what measure? All of the dumb **** this guy has done. From celebrating the opposing teams starting QB, to courting Harbaugh while he still had a coach under center, to extending said terrible coach as a result of such a disaster, among other things. There's a reason he's consistently the butt of jokes in the national media. Because he is a joke. The way he conducts football business is clown shoes. Does that mean he doesn't try or doesn't want what's best? No. Huizenga tried and wanted the best too. But just like Huizenga, he really has no idea what he's doing.
I wouldn't say Tannehill wasn't a good prospect, but I didn't think he was worthy of where he went. Matt Ryan's pretty good.
Why do we have to denigrate Ryan to justify our selection of Long instead of him? Matt Ryan is a really good, borderline great qB. I posted it earlier in this thread but Ryan's numbers through his first four season rival Peyton Mannings. In a way his numbers are better than Manning as he has thrown far fewer interceptions. I'm sure if these boards had existed in Manning's fourth year, when he was 0-3 in the playoffs, that many would have said that he's average, can't win a big game, not a franchise QB, etc. And all of them would have been proven wrong.
When it comes to Ireland there seems to be enough weaknesses and misses for me to be concerned, and enough positive things to let it play out this year..I've got to see if this class and last years was everything some thought it would be so I can see if there is talent there in evaluating, if not, then we gotta let Philbin get his guy just so we can see what we have in Philbin, interesting thing would be if Philbin endorses Ireland as the guy he wants picking his players if the future...Ireland sure seems to be doing everything Philbin wants.
I'm sorry but you can't compare the 2 based on stats. The game is significantly more QB friendly now than it was when Manning was a rookie. Heck, the average QBR last year was over 84 IIRC. Not to mention Ryan wasn't asked to be the focal piece of Atlanta's offense like Manning was in Indy b/c Ryan had Atlanta's successful ground game to lean on during his first 3.5 years, not to mention their defense hasn't been terrible either. For 3.5 years, Atlanta used the run to set up the pass, whereas Indy used Peyton Manning to set up the run.
I don't think it matters at this point if we drafted Ryan or Long. We would still have Ireland running things.
There's no rule that says that. I listed 9 QBs who were taken in the 2nd round by teams that passed on the 1st round QBs and came out smelling like roses. That was just the 2nd round. It didn't include all of the great QBs who went later than that or were undrafted. On the other hand, there is the very long list of first round QB busts. Not just late first rounders, but No. 1 and 2 overall picks. But there is really no need to further argue this tangential point to a tangential argument.
What other choice does Ireland have? Ireland's choice for HC last year was Mike McCoy. Stephen Ross' dog in the race was Joe Philbin. Philbin's here and McCoy isn't. I think that's an indirect direct message from Stephen Ross to Jeff Ireland. By that I mean that Ireland was probably (and still could be) on thinner ice than what the public (media) perception of him seems to be, ThePhins.com message board notwithstanding. Even at the beginning of the first episode of Hard Knocks when they showed a snippet from Stephen Ross' beginning of the year press conference, one of the reporters asked something along the lines of "What's Jeff Ireland's job security like? Does the team need to make the playoffs for him to be around?" Ross answered that he's got faith in Jeff, but that he'd be looking at the team this season. Ross said that he thought the team was shaping up to be pretty good this year. His expectations may be inflated as I think we can call agree, he's no football guru (Chad Henne, Super Bowl, same sentence, remember that one?). On top of that, you've got coaches, for example Mike Sherman saying the receiving corps is a "problem", in essence, voicing concern about a lack of talent at that position on the roster. That can't be a good reflection on Jeff Ireland. Thus, I think you'd have to assume that Ireland's got to defer to Philbin on a lot of roster decisions. After all, it's a new type of player Miami's looking for. Some of Jeff's picks have been traded, cut, moved on. There's a new "makeup" that Philbin and his staff want on the roster. Given Ireland's background and who he's come up in the NFL under, i.e. Bill Parcells, and who he's worked with, i.e. Tony Sparano, I'd think he's sort of learning on-the-job in terms of this roster transformation. That's one of my chief concerns moving past the 2012 season with Ireland in charge. Can he self-diffuse what he's learned and teach himself differently to maximize the roster for Philbin? I'm not so sure he can. But for his sake in 2012, he'd better learn and glean as much as he can from Philbin to make a case to still be GM of the Miami Dolphins after this year. Especially if this year ends up like most of us think it's going to end up - not too good.
I'm not saying they were slouches, but I don't recall Indy's offensive philosophy revolving around using a ground attack to establish the tone of the game and set up the pass the way Atlanta did. During Peyton's first 3 years, Indy's ground game ranked 20th on avg...... Indy's scoring D ranked 21st on avg. Ryan's first 3 years featured a ground game ranked 9.3 on avg... and a scoring D ranked 10th on avg.
That was a recent statement by Ross.Either he is being delusional or he is throwing down the gauntlet .In sounds to me as though he will not be happy with another mediocre season and the most likely fall guy will be Jeff Ireland IMO.
Didn't even see that one. Even if I hadn't, and was going solely off the quote he had from the beginning of TC that aired on Hard Knocks, I'd have thought Ross wouldn't be too pleased with another sub .500 season. I think the hiring of of Philbin over McCoy might have been the first not-so-subtle shot across the bow of Jeff Ireland so to speak. Sort of made me think about the scene in the movie 13 Days where Robert McNamara gets irate over the Admiral for firing star shells at the Russian ships crossing the quarantine line.
One thought that keeps rattling around in my brain. We are taking a subjective standard as the measure of value and then applying it objectively. Does the fact alone of applying it equally to all make it objective? Maybe I am incorrect in what I think the word "objective" means. Regardless, I think the OP has created and interesting and thought provoking post, that has some depth to it. Hopefully I will get to dive into it later. :P
Identifying a reason (i.e., not drafting Matt Ryan) that the stats you posted originally don't translate to a better record is hardly tangential.
i think we just need to have the same GM and Head Coach for several years or else we will rebuild forever!! both Ireland and Philbin inherited a mess that can't be fixed over a couple of seasons.
It is tangential because: (1) no GM should be judged on a single pick over a 4 yr. span. (2) numerous other teams in similar situations have passed on the 1st round QB to take one in the 2nd or 3rd to great success. (3) this isn't actually a Matt Ryan thread. (4) there was no general consensus at the time that Ryan was the right pick -- he was far less popular than either Long or Dorsey among fans (at least at FH at the time). An ESPN poll at the time had Ryan as the top 5 pick mostly likely to be a bust, by a wide margin. (5) we really don't know that the team's record would have been better with Ryan or that Ryan would have been as productive here.
Yes, hence Peyton threw more and threw alot more interceptions. Matt Ryan has thrown less, buthas 95 TDs to Peyton's 111 in the same time frame. Pretty close. But Ryan ahs thrown almost half as many INTS. 46 to 81 specifically. Matt Ryan is a damn good player and there is absolutely no question that we would better right now had we drafted him. This doesn't mean that Long isn't great or that he was a bad pick, just that the long term vision for how to build a franchise was wrong, and it's still wrong. That's why Ireland needs to go
In my opinion, no it does not make it truly "objective". It's just third party, not objective. And furthermore the treatment of the data was misguided and contained some grave oversights, as I outlined HERE. In short, the study's designer failed to disclose that the construction of the study quadruple-weights 2008 relative to 2011, with 2009 triple-weighted relative to 2011, and 2010 double-weighted relative to 2011. I'm not accusing anyone of rigging the study or intentionally withholding information, however it is a fact that if you're going to publish a study of this nature then it is very important to disclose fully up front that kind drastic bias in the study's design. A great example of how that bias in the study's design distorts things is that Jeff Ireland gets more credit for drafting Chad Henne (whose Career AV is 18) than Jerry Reese gets for drafting Jason Pierre-Paul (whose Career AV is 16). That in itself is questionable, but the part that makes the whole design invalid is where the designer divides the results by draft Chart Value. As I stated above, the numerator in that equation would be subject to the time deterioration, however the denominator is not (a point of Chart Value is worth a point in 2008 and it's worth a point in 2011). What that means is the study is going to automatically bias toward teams that executed more Chart Value in the early years of the study than the later years. Miami not only benefited from that, they are the team that benefited from it most, as they executed something like 4300 points of Chart Value right away in 2008, versus I believe 1700, then 1500, then 1400 in the subsequent years. Essentially with all that Chart Value used right away in 2008, the guys you picked with all that advantage (#1 overall pick, etc), get a full 4 years to accumulate Career AV. Whereas, a team that executed a lot of Chart Value in 2010 for example, may have picked players with the same talent level as Miami picked in 2008, but they're not getting the credit for them because they've now only had 2 years to accumulate Career AV. This is a serious oversight and it makes the study essentially useless until/unless it is adjusted. As for your original suggestion that this is not necessarily "objective", I agree with you. As I said, it's not "objective" at all, but instead a misguided treatment of a third party's subjective work. If I wanted to, I could cite all of the various Polls and Power Rankings out there that rank Miami either dead last or close to it, and hypothesize that since we've not played any real games and nobody knows anything about Miami's level of coaching, those last place rankings are based on the "on paper" view of the Miami Dolphins' roster...which essentially means all those other third parties don't believe Jeff Ireland has done a very good job in putting together a winning roster. Those third party opinions may not be as expansive or thorough as the Career AV numbers on PFR, but they're no less "objective" either.
Those are reasons why it may be an invalid reason the team's record hasn't been better despite the stats you posted, but that doesn't make it tangential. Do you have a theory of why the team's record hasn't been better despite Ireland's performance as measured by the stats in the original post? If you stated that theory, would it be tangential?
Your argument, however, implies that Ireland/Parcells knew something they couldn't have possibly known: namely how good Matt Ryan actually became. They didn't draft an All Pro LT over a borderline great QB; they drafted a top notch left tackle prospect over a quarterback that was generally considered a boom or bust pick. Maybe they look like dorks in hindsight but as far as decision making evaluations go, hindsight is about as valuable as reading tea leaves. I still have no problem with the selection of Jake Long because I would never draft a boom or bust quarterback that early. For every Matt Ryan, you get a JaMarcus Russell and a Vince Young to boot. With a top 5 selection I want a sure fire, bona fide All Pro prospect. Jake Long was that kind of player. Matt Ryan is now, but he sure as hell wasn't back in April of 2008 when the decision was actually made. They absolutely, positively picked the right choice at the moment they had to make that choice; the problem is that they didn't follow it up with too many right choices afterwards.
