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We're Running on Backup QB's

Discussion in 'Miami Dolphins Forum' started by Galant, Nov 20, 2017.

  1. Galant

    Galant Love - Unity - Sacrifice - Eternity

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    Some might see this as me being overly optimistic or trying to find excuses for a horrible team or coach. Maybe I am, and if any psychiatrists here want to book me in for a session and assess my mental state let me know, but whether or not I'm loopy what I do know is that I believe in trying to always get the widest, most complete picture I can of any scenario in trying to figure out. And that's the motivation behind this post, at least, I believe it is.

    So here's the question I've been asking - and it's an obvious - elephant in the room - type question. We've been running on backup QB's entire session. How much of the offensive struggles might be down to just that fact?

    Now, we can theorise but my mind took the following next step - what's the league average, or record, for backup QB's? If the average is high or no change then we might be doing horribly, or is the average is horrible then maybe this was to be expected?

    I've yet to look up any detailed stats but a quick Google search for articles that might have already analysed that question resulted in very few hits - I had a good rummage but found only one article somewhat addressing the question. Here the link:

    http://www.espn.co.uk/nfl/story/_/id/9329243/the-drop-starter-backup-qb-steep

    Here's a snippet:
    "While fans might call for the next guy to go in and show his skills, coaches worry. They should. The long-standing belief around the league is that a good backup quarterback can come off the bench and win three games, but if that quarterback plays six games, he'll lose three of them.

    Advanced statistics back up that theory. I'd have faith that Matt Hasselbeck, Matt Moore, Shaun Hill and a few other backups can do that and more. What I don't see is many other backup options to take a team 3-3 over a six-game span.

    Coaches who have mobile, read-option quarterbacks should take note. The drop-off from the starting quarterback to the backup is vast, and the fall can be dangerous...

    The numbers bear out the drop-off from starter to backup -- and why coaches should worry. Projected starters for this season averaged 24.2 points per game during their careers. Projected backups have a career average of 19.5 points per game.

    When you consider that, on average, it takes more than 21 points per game for a team to be the winner, the 4.7 point drop in scoring puts a team in position to lose.

    Analytical stats provide more support for the drop-off theory. ESPN Stats & Information evaluates every throw made by a quarterback and gives it a QBR rating. Pro Bowl quarterbacks score in the 70s. Average starting quarterbacks score around 50. Those quarterbacks who would project more losses than wins are below 50.

    A majority of the backups have ratings in the 20s, 30s and 40s."

    If this article gives an accurate picture of the drop off with a backup QB a crappy season offensively should well have been expected. Perhaps there was and is no way to avoid what has been and will be happening on offense.

    The defense is another question.
     
    Last edited: Nov 20, 2017
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  2. Dolphin Dundee

    Dolphin Dundee Well-Known Member

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    A lot can be said for that. Just look how bad Green bay is without Rogers.
     
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  3. Rickysabeast

    Rickysabeast Royale With Cheese

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    We have a very highly paid coach, Gm, and other tiers of leadership. We're one of the most leadership heavy teams in the NFL. This is the NFL. All those people are paid to make certain that they put a plan together when injuries happen even at the most important position. If everything always went according to plan, a lot of those people aren't needed. They are there to help come up with a winning plan to ensure consistency in the face of adversity. I say all this because why should it matter? We brought in Gase's guy. It's week 12. The backup has been here since Gase day one so he knows the program too. I think we are just making up reasons to have to be understanding which I do not agree with. We were understanding when Moore's fumbles and the run D sucked in the playoffs last year. We've been understanding all this year. At what point do we hold the team and leadership accountable? If any of us had our business operation turn into this ht of a mess under our watch we would have been fired 2 weeks ago...
     
  4. dirtylandry

    dirtylandry Well-Known Member

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    I think posters here waiting for Tannehill to be the next best thing to sliced bread are disillusion. Go look at the NFL, you need a star qb and a line. And you don't need to spend $50M on the line. The Pats don't
     
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  5. Dorfdad

    Dorfdad Well-Known Member

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    you have a point but that doesn’t explain the complete collapse of our defense as well.
     
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  6. Fin D

    Fin D Sigh

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    This is all rah-rah type bluster. You literally took a post that had actual facts in it and disregarded it in favor of a fantasy scenario.

    Apply logic to the situation.....there are 32 teams in the league...are there 32 good QBs? How about 33? I mean it simply comes down to numbers, there are not enough good QBs to fill out every starting spot let alone 2nd & 3rd backup spots. There is no such thing as loss-free contingency plans for everything.
     
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  7. Galant

    Galant Love - Unity - Sacrifice - Eternity

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    Being understanding means trying to understand. Holding to account means doing the sums and figuring out where things should have been up and where things should have been down.

    This thread is an attempt to consider and understand the realities involved in playing with a backup QB. It's an attempt to do the math relating to that scenario so that we can hold the team accountable for performance while running with a backup QB.

    Holding a team accountable doesn't mean criticising a team without regard for context, it literally requires visibility of context.

    There may well be (and are!) other problems with this team. There may well be other areas where the team in underperforming beyond what reasonable expectations. It may well be that even with our backup QB's our offense is still underperforming. The point of this thread is to consider the what should be a reasonable expectation of an offense running under a backup QB and then see how this season stacks up.

    So we should be understanding as far as a proper understanding permits. Beyond that one moves away from being understanding and enters realm of either blind hope, or sort of gracious forgiveness or unending patience usually reserved for close loved ones. I'm not asking for that or suggesting anyone head down that path. I'm just seeking clarity of what is a reasonable expectation for an offense under a backup QB.
     
    Fin D likes this.
  8. Galant

    Galant Love - Unity - Sacrifice - Eternity

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    Yeah, I think I said that myself.
     
  9. Galant

    Galant Love - Unity - Sacrifice - Eternity

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    Can you try to stay on topic please? At all?

    This isn't actually a Tannehill thread. You can hate him our love him, it's irrelevant. The question here is what any team, and in particular this Dolphins team, can realistically expect from backup QB's.

    Can you try to focus on that, please?

    If not I'd respectfully request you take any commentary on Tannehill to any one of a number of threads available.
     
    cuchulainn likes this.
  10. Galant

    Galant Love - Unity - Sacrifice - Eternity

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    Here's some more:

    "When NFL teams started their quarterbacks of choice last season, they won 53 percent of their games. Your starting quarterback — the best quarterback on your roster, your first option at that position _ gives you a chance for a success on any given Sunday.

    Not so the backups.

    So here’s what Garoppolo is up against as the starting quarterback of the Patriots for the opening four games of the 2015 season while Brady sits his “Deflategate” suspension: When NFL teams had to go to their bench last season to replace an injured or struggling starter, those backup quarterbacks managed to win only 37.5 percent of their starts.

    Sixteen teams had to go to the bench a year ago to replace their starting quarterback. Six teams even went three-deep at quarterback to start games. Of those six, only one made the playoffs — the Arizona Cardinals.

    Of the 16 teams that were able to keep their starting quarterbacks in good health and on the field for all 16 games of the regular season, nine made the playoffs...

    ...Let’s take a look at the numbers over a longer stretch. Since 2000, NFL starting quarterbacks — the first option of every team — have won 52.5 percent of their games. Second-stringer quarterbacks have won 44 percent of their starts, third-stringers have won 28.6 percent and fourth stringers 26.6 percent.

    The deeper you dip into your depth chart at quarterback, the less chance you have of winning."

    Source:
    http://www.talkoffamenetwork.com/backup-quarterbacks-under-a-microscope/
     
    Last edited: Nov 20, 2017
  11. dolphin25

    dolphin25 Well-Known Member

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    Moore is not your typical backup and neither was Cutler. I'm not buying that theory in regards to Moore.
     
  12. Galant

    Galant Love - Unity - Sacrifice - Eternity

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    What would you say is the reason for Moore and Cutler being excluded from the apparent reality that backup QB's give teams worse results?

    It could be that the drop off also applies to better than average QB's. There may be more reasons for the drop off than just skill or individually solid stats.
     
  13. Rickysabeast

    Rickysabeast Royale With Cheese

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    Ugh. Sounds like we're in 2017's pansified mindset. Everyone deserves the benefit of the doubt. Let's all make sure we're understanding nonsense crap. Is Cutler NOT getting paid $11 million? I mean we get that I watch football to get away from this stupid mindset not to have a new reason to embrace it.
     
  14. Fin D

    Fin D Sigh

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    Again your stance is like saying if your car won't start you throw it out and checking to see if it's out of gas is purified.
     
  15. Galant

    Galant Love - Unity - Sacrifice - Eternity

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    So money guarantees performance?
     
  16. KeyFin

    KeyFin Well-Known Member

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    I wouldn't group Moore and Cutler together. Cutler is roughly a .500 QB since we're two games below 500 and he's missed right at eight quarters games due to injury. And Moore's 1-2 in starting or relief this season, but I think you have to go past the numbers here since Moore played beautiful yesterday. He had a 102.9 rating against the Jets, a 47.2 against Baltimore and a 106.5 yesterday....which is an 85.5 on the year.

    Two thirds of his games have been well above the league average though, which certainly doesn't make him the typical backup in 2017. And from our conversations yesterday, we know that this has been a trend throughout his career in Miami.
     
  17. finsfandan

    finsfandan Well-Known Member

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    This team would be better with a healthy Tannehill but he wasn’t the biggest factor last year.

    He’s never been special. His ACL has been torn twice. He’s been given plenty of time. It’s time to draft his replacement and cut him when it makes sense cap-wise.
     
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  18. bigballa2102

    bigballa2102 Well-Known Member

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    Correct, there a reason teams draft qb's every year over and over, or it would be like Rb's if there was an abundance of qb's they wouldn't go so high in the draft.
     
  19. bigballa2102

    bigballa2102 Well-Known Member

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    So CAL

    I think cutler is 4 games under .500 for his career i could be wrong, i really give Moore a pass for the Baltimore game it was a short week and well i don't know why i guess i give backups a lot more leniency than starters, people have a hard time understanding how hard backup jobs are, you are given playbook which is probably 60% smaller than the starter and you play all your snaps with backup WR and TE. In today game its all about timing and when you have backups that are routinely slower and smaller than the starters coming and being on the same page is extremely hard hell its hard for starters to be on the same page it takes a lot of work. But I do agree Moore is probably the top backup in the league, i think he could be starting on another team if he wanted to and or his concussions weren't such a question.
     
  20. cbrad

    cbrad .

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    Those stats look right. One way to see the effect of using a backup QB is to simply plot win% as a function of games started. The great majority of QB's that started only a few games will have been backup QB's. From 2014-2016 where the passing game has been statistically similar you get this:

    [​IMG]
    The size of the dot corresponds to the number of QB's.

    That equation, Win% = GS*1.08 + 35.76, jibes with the stats you listed. For QB's that start let's say only 1 game that corresponds to about a 37% win% while those that start all 16 have a 53% win%.

    Moore started 3 games in 2016 and Cutler started 5, so if you only go by 2016 numbers (not sure one should do that, but you have to start somewhere) we should have expected around a 39-41% win%, which means between 6-7 games won. Maybe that's what ultimately happens.

    Either way.. this shouldn't be used to excuse being 31st in points scored (YAY!! we're now better than Cleveland!).
     
  21. Galant

    Galant Love - Unity - Sacrifice - Eternity

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    Here's a quick take on Cassel as a backup to Mariota:

    "Matt Cassel had his worst game with the Titans Sunday in Houston. He played the entire second half with Marcus Mariota sidelined with a hamstring injury. Cassel’s performance would’ve been better if he spiked the ball every time he dropped back to throw.

    Cassel had a respectable 71.0 rating in four games with the Titans going into Sunday. He finished the Texans game 4-10 for 21 yards and two interceptions. That’s good for an 8.3 rating. He would’ve had a 39.5 rating if he went 0-10 instead.

    It’s impossible to fault Cassel for playing as poorly as he did. He doesn’t get first-team reps in practice, and he got tossed into a 37-14 game against a tough defense that got to pin its ears back and go after the quarterback.

    This does highlight the need for the Titans to have a quarterback who can somewhat emulate Mariota’s skillset. Cassel is a fine backup in most offenses, but for the Titans, Cassel simply can’t do a lot of the things Mariota does. That adversely impacts what the Titans can do on that side of the football.

    Tennessee may aim to explore the backup quarterback market this offseason in an effort to better sustain an injury to Mariota."

    Source:
    http://titanswire.usatoday.com/2017/10/02/matt-cassel-marcus-mariota-injury/amp/


    This seems to support the notion that backups can win over a short run but not much longer, but the commentary also highlights an interesting point. Backup QBs who can't mirror the skillset of the starter ultimately limit the offense.

    If true this presents the consideration that, individual skill aside, offenses are built for individual quarterbacks and therefore you can't expect to separate the offense from the individual and see the same results.

    The additional, probably obvious factor, is that backups don't get the same practise reps and on-site field experience as their starting colleagues and thus are also challenged in that regard.
     
  22. Galant

    Galant Love - Unity - Sacrifice - Eternity

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    Hey look...



     
    Last edited: Dec 27, 2017
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  23. Fame

    Fame Well-Known Member

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    The Eagles/Raiders game was a nice reminder of just how important your starting QB is. Best team in football and they just scored 19 points against the Raiders.
     

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