some obvious points I'd like to offer up for discussion 1. Ronnie Brown is a stud and a half and in my opinion deserves a big FAT contact for 6 -8 years 2. Sean Smith is a very good back and will be great in the near future 3. Jason Allen........well is Jason Allen.....not impressed 4. We will definitely be bringing the heat to opposing offenses, they better be ready 5. Ginn has not seperated himself from the other receivers and Bess and Camirillo will outshine him again this year. 6. Pennington is GOD........106.7 QB rating 7. Ricky/Cobbs are great 2/3 punches after Ronnie tears them up. We can legitimately run our entire offense with any of those backs in the game so opposing defenses won't know what is coming 8. Finally it is just so refreshing and so exciting to see Sparano and Co. putting together a franchise that we as fans deserve to have. They are truely building somthing that will last for years to come ????: ThePHINS.com - Miami Dolphins Forums http://forums.thephins.com/showthread.php?p=821837 Cheers to the players and the coaches!!!!!!! Once again we will reclaim our distinction of the "Winningest sports team in pro sports history" WE are gonna be tuff to beat again this year
This will piss a few off but i gotta say this. Ginn can't maximize his speed with a QB who can't throw the bullets. I don't just mean deep passes. Ginn comes open so fast that you need to be able to chuck a rocket at him to make the best use of him. Penny has floaters that take time, now don't get me wrong, penny rocks. Ginn is not perfect himself either, he still has room to improve. But i feel the reason why he is targeted less, is simply because Penny feels more comfy with the safe pass. Look at the diving catch by Bess, right behind Bess, Ginn was open also. Not to mention he was 5 yards further down the field, but it would have taken a harder throw to fit it in there. Don't get me wrong, Penny is great, but he does limit us in some aspects, but at the same time. What he limits us in, Henne could do. But what Henne limits us in, Penny does extremely well. Hence why Penny is the starter.
Two things that i noticed that got me very excited, besides the sean smith stuff. Ricky and Ronnie showed some vilolence in their running. That stiff arm by ronnie is worthy of a Crunch Gif. I have not see Ricky in 2 years lower his head lower then every defender trying to tackle him..He ran violent in the saints game, there is something goin on with these two players, ricky is running differently, dare i say, he looks angry again. If you watch him in the saint game you will see what it is iam trying to say, there was a play where he turned the corner and 3 defenders came at him, each one that came at him, he used his head as a weapon upon contact and got lower then the defender, the 3rd and last defender came in super low, but i'll be damned, ricky got just as low, and finished him off, with his head.....when he does this it means hes into the game..very exciting stuff for me to see.
i think you bring up valid concerns, but i'll tell ya what i do to get over his weaknesses and how they affect our entire offense, i remember, when it comes to Chad Pennington, i take a deep breath, i stay somewhat patient, i see how the gameplan is looking and i remember, its all about winning the game the way he knows how. I think we saw the explosion and what happens when we iso tedd ginn..the first preseason game was enough for me to see the improvement in his game, they just didnt iso him again for the last three.
I hope they both run like this all year. That stiff arm by Ronnie was sweet, reminded me of what Ricky would do lol.
I did not post that to make any one mad. It is a fact. Show me where he has separated himself and I will eat crow. He had one good catch. If all Ginn is gonna be is a race to the goal line receiver, then isn't that on him.....not necessarily the QB. Been many race to the goal line receivers who end up by the way side because they never become a complete receiver. Ginn must be a threat from anywhere on the field and that involves the QB very little except that it is the QB's job to get him the ball when he is open. Although I acknowledge your comments I don't know if I necessarily agree because other receivers have the ability to be a threat from anywhere. Bess and Camirillo to name a few. Ginn must master these type of routes, short and middle. If all he's got are "go" routes he's in for a short career. I do see improvement. I just don't know if it is enough to maintain the #1 rooster spot he currently occupies. I hope I am proven wrong!!!!
I have always loved Ricky and it is really great to see him coming back close to his 2001 form. Man if he could do that coupled with Ronnie....we would have the best running attack in the NFL. Now all we need is to get Marino back...........
I think if he puts up top five numbers again ....he deserves top 5 pay. Not sure exactly how much that would be......but consider this.......one play is all it takes to end his career...... He deserves the coin!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I wasn't talking about you making people mad, reread what i said. I posted what i posted that would prob make people mad on what i said about Penny's arm limitations. You can only have so many underneath recievers on a team before the opposing defense stacks the line since there is no deep threat. That and bullet passes won't come from Penny's arm anytime soon, so that limits some throws also. As for other recievers being a threat, they are a threat to catch a ball yes, but they also run routes closer to penny most of the time. So he looks to them first. Like i said, both Bess and Ginn were open on the one pass, yet he chose Bess cause it was the easier throw for him, even though Ginn was 5 yards further. I never said Ginn seperated himself either btw. You took my post totally wrong.
I apoligize brother!!!!!. I understand where you are coming from and I respect your opinion 100%. I am okay with running the routes closer, although I don't think they do. Do we do some things different because Chad Pennington is our Qb.......I don't really think so. The offense is not any different then when Chad "when is it gonna be my turn" Henne is in there I just think we have a little more deep threat. What are we really talking about anyway.....the average pass play in the NFL is just under 10 yards and CPEP's 106.7 rating ought to tell us all we need to know.....the guy is a stud....top 5 QB to be exact. I am trying to be positive and not slam Tedd Ginn Jr. I love the guy, just not as a #1 receiver and in my opinion him not being a "complete" receiver hurts us more then Pennington being able to chuck the ball 65 yards. How often does that happen anyway......on any team. We have seen Penne send the ball 45+ on several plays.....just not sure how much more a guy needs to do. More or less I am recognizing every player is gonna have his limits. This seems to be Penne's ....which I am okay with. 106.7 is awesome....the great Dan Marino ( my hero) only averages 85.7 his career.
It's not about throwing 65 yards all the time, it is about how long it takes the ball to get from pt A to pt B, and whether or not you can throw it on a rope when you need to.
I was gonna consult my Einstein theory of Physics professor but, he is unavailable at the moment Penne puts air under the ball to gain distance no doubt there. But that air and distance makes him ultra effective with one of the best completion percentages in the NFL
when it comes to penny, that point that you speak of takes longer then most. Not only does Penny lack velocity and arm strength, hes also slow in his drop and slow in his release, and cant throw the ball on a rope if he tried.. However, all that being said, i see how he uses deception, play action, anticipation and accuracy to win ballgames.. Top that with a gameplan, and iam interested to see how far he can take the football team this year...This is his year imo, to show how far he can go with his skillset...There has been tremendous improvement on this team...we should know by the end, whether or not he gets an extension.
Did you see how open Ginn was standing right by the first down marker with no one around him on the 3rd & 7 that led to our FG? Pennington had all day but kept his reads on the right side of the field... completely. I still feel as though they have no type of trust / chemistry together.
I sure did, i am not sure why he is not targeting him, could be many reasons. The one you mentioned with trust/chemistry is probably the most current one. Could be he is not comfortable making certain throws also. His ball velocity really limits some throws, but Penny is good at working around it. We were so spoiled with Marino, he would love the offensive weapons we have now.
Special teams is my only real concern. the Offensive Line will be on target & worthy of the title Orca-5 by game four. Looks good to me.
Chad Pennington has said in an interview that he makes the throw that is most likely to be completed. So if Ginn's route is 70% chance of being compete for 20 yards and Bess' route is 85% chance of being complete for 10 yards.. he'd take Bess' route.
This is the first time I ever heard someone use the excuse for Ginn he is too fast for Pennington to throw it to him, wow that is classic. Maybe Camarillo and Bess are way to slow which is why they seem to catch more balls. I have no clue but will say Ginn must be matching up against the fastest defensive players in the NFl week after week because when he gets open like you say, they seem to cover the ground quickly. Maybe Ginn should slow down and allow Pennington to get it to him. I mean I get it Pennington has this really weak lame arm he throws floaters all day long but what is weird he usually throws less than 10 ints for a year, maybe more qb's in the league should adopt the really weak lame arm approach to the game.
The truth of the matter is he nearly always has to. I can only recall two long balls.. both in the end zone, that Ginn did not have to slow and wait for the ball. Ginn gets separation, Penny lofts the ball, the defender closes while Teddy waits... hell, even Fasano has to wait
Actually, Ginn has been open this preseason. In general the offense has been even more vanilla than usual and they haven't gone much to any of the top three WRs...they've held Cammy out a lot to get a better idea of Hartline. Bess has only had a few thrown his way, the same as Ginn. But in the NO game in particular, as hard as it is to follow a WR who isn't getting the ball thrown to him because of the camera angles, Ginn was open several times. And as dj said, some of those openings were quick that require a tighter pass, but they were there. The question is going to be whether the run game opens up. That will determine whether or not Ginn or any of the WRs can be hit in the deeper patterns...so far much of last year and in this preseason we've shown a propensity to not go that direction. Is that due to Penny's liabilities or to the OL's liabilities...I don't think we can degrade Penny until we get the run game going. If you notice our run plays, do you ever see Brown, Williams, Cobbs or Lexy ever have break thru the OL and into the LBer level clean ?? Not really very often...most all their runs are slugging it out for an extra yard after getting hit at the OL/DL level. That has to open up better for the passing game to begin to click better...I guess you could say this is OT, but I see it as one topic...
And yet we were 21st in scoring last year so obviously a little more risk is working out for other QB's.
Yes and the Super Bowl Winners were a whole ranking ahead of us... # 20 IN SCORING, to be exact... Ben had only 17 TDs... compare to Penny's 19...how did that work out better for Ben??? Ben was ranked # 24 in QBR compared to Chad's # 2 ranking...and let's take it to a little more detailed shall we... Penny threw over 31+ yards a total of 9 times, completing 6= 66%... Ben threw over 31+ yards a total of 24 times, completing 7= 29%... Where were the risks of the big arm Ben worth more??? He completed one more pass than Penny...and yet completed one more in almost 3 times as many attempts as Penny... I know that just everyone realizes that if it wasn't for the Defense, Pits would not have made it past the Regular Season... Now Ben did have a good sound Post Season, but he would not have been there if it was not for the D's play... but his Regular Season was almost Fiedleresque... and let us go on and continue in analyzing your statement above... In the 20 teams ahead of the Phins in scoring, 9 did not make the Post Season... In those 11 teams that did make the Post Season, with a higher ranking in scoring, only 5 of them had a QB with more TDs than Penny in the Season... Philip Rivers completed 4 more passes than Penny of over 31+ yards... completed 42% (10/24)... Warner completed 2 more passes than Chad of over 31+ yards... completed 47% (8/17)... Eli completed one less pass than Chad of over 31+ yards... completed 25% (5/20)... McNabb completed 4 less passes than Chad of over 31+ yards... completed 8 % (2/24)... Peyton completed 1 more pass than Chad of over 31+ yards...completed 25% (7/28)... So only 5 teams (and made the Post Season) out of 20 (ahead of us in scoring), had a QB who threw for more TDs than Penny... and the amazing thing was that the Super Bowl winner had a less than stellar season than Penny... So in the end, the analysis does not favor the risk... there are other things at work here that adds better odds than just QB that just throws deeps passes and throws for many TDs...
Take into account that we are not entirely talking about the deep ball. We are talking about routes that the QB needs to put zip on the ball to perform. As for Big Ben, he had an average season. The reason he got so much praise is simply because when they needed a score, he took them down the field and got one. The guy was the definition of clutch last year. We are not saying we need to go deep all the time, just saying a QB with some zip can open up the offense more, and spread the ball around since they can make all throws. Lets look at the NO preseason game, the quick out to Bess where he had to dive for it. Right behind Bess running another out was Ginn, 5 yards roughly farther back. Can Penny make that throw? I dont think he can, not without the defender jumping his floater. So he had to go to Bess. Those are some hidden yards that the coach loves to talk about. I classify them as hidden yards. Having a QB that can gun those throws in there, changes the way the defense has to play. Penny is great at what he does, and atm he is the best QB we got. Could be for a while. But he does have limits to what he can do with the ball in his hands is all we are saying. And that does hurt some of the things we can do on offense. One thing i love about Penny is, he forces our WR core to get better at routes. Ginn has become better because of Penny. All of the WR's are better because of Penny.
Other thing that might be noted to the ability of opponents to stack the LOS still attacking our strong points... Yes the RUN game, IMO... We really do not have a # 1 WR... would Defenses put 7-9 in the Box if we have Fitzgerald, Moss, Owens, Evans, or Boldin as our WR??? How many jump bals for TDs did Brady threw to Moss in 2007??? The answer will still probably be 50-50... Our Strength is still the run game, that is why they put so many near the LOS... but you would break a few big plays with any of those WR for points, thus telling the opponents to pick their poison... We really don't have a "Big Physical" legit # 1 WR... and Defenses know this and will still stack the LOS to stop our strong point...
How bout the TD in the Tampa game to Fazano... Acrros his body, with pressure into to his throwning lane... nice zip... would you not say??? I could not believe Penny did that...but he did... check @ around 2:14 http://www.nfl.com/gamecenter/2009082750/2009/PRE3/dolphins@buccaneers#tab:watchIn the area that Penny hurts the passing game would be if he has over 5 seconds to throw... yes he does not have the arm strength to go and zip a ball 50 yards downfield to get to the WR within 2 secs... that I can agree to... but what our coaches teach our QBs, is to throw it before 3 seconds... and that is the problem with our WR's getting opened before then...
I'll take what Pennington offers us with the production he gets rather than giving up that security and success for a stronger arm. We could put Henne or Pat White in there for their stronger arms but what would we have to sacrifice in order to get the stronger arms. Chad Pennington is an effecient field general who was a big reason why the Dolphins finished 11-5 last season and I would hate to lose him.
Nice post/thread. Agree with most of your points, I would extend Ronnie Brown too, but not for 5-6 years, more like 3-4 with options maybe. I think a lot of you guys are going to be pleasantly surprised by some long downfield passes Penny completes to Ginn this season. I think game 1 was a taste, and the coaches didn't want to call attention to it in the preseason, especially since we play all these teams again in regular season.
I wouldn't call Ginn a race to the goal line WR. I see him as a guy who can catch the ball anywhere on the field. Here are Sparano's comments after the first pre season game: (On if Ted Ginn's willingness to take on contact and go over the middle was a needed area of improvement) - "I have seen progress there with Teddy catching the ball over middle since I have gotten here. I thought last year he caught some balls over the middle and did a nice job in traffic, which I don't want to say was a surprise to me, because I knew Teddy in college - obviously at that time, I didn't study the position I study it now - I certainly knew about him in college and knew what some of his strengths were. I thought he did a nice job catching the ball over the middle his first year. I thought he has gotten better in the spring - and I mentioned this the other night - but to me, I really wanted to see if he could bring that to the game and he did bring that to the game on Monday."
No i wouldn't say, that was not zip, that was a pure touch pass. And touch passes are Penny's forte. It was a nice accurate throw though, but it wasn't a zip pass. By zip i mean thrown like a dart. He did show some nice strength on it, but i dont call that a zip pass.
