I saw this coming a mile away. I'll say this, Henne adds a dynamic to the game which Penny does not and that is the deep ball (even though he didnt throw any today). No way Penny threads some of those passes like Henne did. That said, I'd like to see Henne sit on the bench a little longer and absorb the game. He appeared to face a pretty vanilla D at the end, but made some nice throws. He may indeed be our QB of the future.
I'm all for it. Much stronger arm than Pennington, and he can squeeze the ball in to tighter spots and hits the receivers. He has great poise and maturity for a rookie. On top of that, we having nothing to lose anyway.
at this point, so am I. Henne has a REALLY great arm, and he seems to be very calm in the face of pressure. The offense needs a spark.
Im all for it because he has a stronger arm. It may definately help us move the ball downfield more, he can simply make more throws than pennington. Im against it though, because i think its too early. I think he still needs to learn the game more.
Great to see Henne lead a TD drive. But let's face it. It was in the 4th quarter when the game was out of hand. Very impressed with the zip he was putting on that ball.
Two weeks ago I would have said no way let him set but if the way the rest of the team is playing shows any indication of the direction of the season the team could certainly use a spark. I think Pennington has been a great asset, but the fact is the offense is just not getting down the field. Could be the O/C, could be the youth and inexperience of the whole team - probably a combination of all of it.
who cares if the game was out of hand? This was the rookies first NFL action...and he leads an 18 play TD drive? That's a phenomenal start. Some of those passes he threaded were gorgeous.
I'd love it, but I don't want to see the kid ruined by being put in too soon. He's got one hell of an arm though.
If he were to start I wouldn't be against it. Personally I don't how many more 5 yard passes and losses I can take before I lose it. FYI with Henne in the game the receivers seemed to be open all of a sudden.
I think the brass is worried if they thrust Henne in too soon he'll take a beating like Beck did last year. One would assume they'd prefer an Aaron Rodgers type apprenticeship. Unfortunately we don't have a future HOF in front of him...
Arizona was still playing hard when he was in. They didn't want that terrible offense scoring on them.
It is an interesting correlation and somewhat predictable. He probably brought a unique energy to the game when he came in.
Start him. Why the hell not? We're one of the two or three worst teams in the league...what could it hurt?
IM all for it, he does not have the fragile psych that Beck has.. Wont happen but im horrified that we start each game trying to RUN the ball and when we get to the second half we start throwing it and move it better. Lets try passing to setup the run... opps we dont have any wideouts..
its obvious our offense just isnt good at all with pennington we scored what 17 points all year with pennington? come on..with our tools on offense, henne is the obviously the better choice. he is a lot more poised than beck imo, but im still not sure if i want to throw him in the fire
Exactly. I mentioned this same thing in the game thread. Pennington could well be part of the problem with our WRs lack of productivity.
Henne is no where near ready. he should sit this year out. We have no offense around him and putting him in now will only hurt his developement IMO
Who did Brady have around him when he came in for Bledsoe? That Pats certainly didn't have any receivers to brag about then, nor did they have a great running game. We do have two very good backs. Now we need a QB who poses a threat to go down field to give our two VERY good backs room to run. No one respects our passing game because they know Pennington can't throw anything further than 15 yards. Worse, Pennington seems to lack CONFIDENCE to throw it down field.
I'm not sure about that .... yet. But these last 2 games I have not seen the laser like accuracy we are used to seeing from Pennington. And without accuracy, watching Pennington float those passes is painful. To the original question, I am torn, but I think that I would play Pennington through the bye week. We are not going to win this season and I think that Henne can still learn some things from Pennington from the sidelines.
It is something I wouldn't be opposed to but I have no problem with Pennington starting as he has done well in my eyes. However I am beginning to see what you guys are saying as it appears teams are playing the run (our strength) and making Pennington beat them. So maybe if they had to respect the deep threat this would change. Plus not having any film against Henne could help us and who knows he could be the next Trent Edwards.
look im not saying penny played bad but he just doesnt have the spark that henne has. i think henne is the man for our team.
Really? Well he had some vets who knew the position at WR. They were not stars, But they were not bums. Plus he had a offensive line and a defense so he never had to win games right away. Big Difference
That's exactly how I feel, which is why I'm not pushing it. At this point, I'm OK with Henne starting or not starting; as long as he's soaking up all the information necessary on those sidelines.
Taking their licks early doesn't hurt the really good QBs, only the ones that were going to take a long time to develop. And there's really no evidence that QBs that would have developed faster didn't because of starting early. Marino, Bledsoe, Brady, Manning (both), Brees, Young (Steve), Aikman...they all started early.
If they're going to throw him out there I hope they do it while the team is healthy so we don't have a repeat of Beck's performances.
I know where a lot of you guys are coming from. There's a big part of me that wants Henne to start. But then I remember I felt the exact same way before Beck's start last year. I was excited to see the guy who we felt was the our QB of the future get his start. But we made it happen to early. The question is, did playing Beck early ruin him, or did he just never have it? Henne played well, but how much does it have to do with the Cards having a lead and it being late in the game? His arm looked amazing, but he's bound to make some mistakes right? If he does struggle this season, does he have the confidence to shake it off? All tough questions. I really don't know what to think anymore. I don't think I would be able to make an objective observation on this after such a tough loss. So I'll leave the speculating to you guys and trust Sparano and Co. to make the right decision in regards to Henne and Pennington.