PFF: Dolphins v Cowboys/MMoore Bombs Away

yeah, despite the loss, I was pretty happy with our overall play. Romo made some extraordinary plays on those last two drives that included quite a bit of luck. anyone of those crazy passes hits the ground and we might have won that game.

 

Good point. Hard to feel good about any loss, but IMO, clearly an example of another team beating us by making great plays rather than us beating ourselves.

 

That deep touchdown to Marshall was really not a very good throw.

 

I thought it was a mistake getting rid of Gus and never really understood why we did that. I wanted us to do what Denver did that year and use the pick we used for Culpepper to move up in the draft to get Cutler and keep ferotte till Cutler was ready to play. IMO that was a move Saban botched in a big way.

 

I give him credit for taking the shot, but Matt Moore made the throw harder than it should have been.

Brandon Marshall gave Moore tons of sideline cushion to work with. Moore should have led Marshall, possibly to the outside where both the safety and corner would have been in jail. Instead he underthrew it to the inside which could have given the safety the opportunity to get back into the mix, and it definitely did allow the corner to get back into the picture and mug Marshall.

Now, if that were a 55 yard throw then I'd give Moore a break, chalk it up to a timing issue. But this throw was closer to 46 yards and Moore's timing on the throw seemed very quick. Any NFL thrower should have the arm to get that ball the extra 4-5 yards of outside shoulder leading ball placement that it needed.

I once made the point that Matt Moore has really, in my opinion, only had 2 good games out of the 7 that he's played. Well, I still think that's true. He did well executing the game plan of challenging the Cowboys secondary deep, but his one long touchdown on the day was really a terrible throw that should have gone incomplete and been called for pass interference. Without it, he's 18 of 31 for 253 yard, 0 TD, 0 INT, which is an 84.5 passer rating...with 4 sacks for 25 yards in losses, 3 fumbles, 1 of them lost...in a 19 point outing that you lost because the other team scored 20.

I don't consider that impressive.

 

From what I recall Brandon had a step on his defender but that ball was so late and inside. A better DB may have picked it off. watching the replay as soon as BM gets that step he already is slowing down due to the trajectory of the pass.

I won't say Moore didn't have the arm for it. He just threw it to the wrong place with the wrong trajectory. Maybe he doesn't have the arm for it I don't know enough to say.

 

I wouldn't say the ball was late because you look at Moore's drop and he released the ball right away with no hesitation.

I don't have too much problem with the trajectory although you're right a 46 yard ball should be able to be thrown by an NFL quarterback with a lower, faster trajectory. I don't mind him putting the ball up a little bit, but what he needed to do with get the ball about 5 yards further up and to the outside than where he did put it. Newman started with outside leverage but Brandon got to his outside shoulder and dusted him easily. If that ball is placed more toward the sidelines, Brandon runs under it and Newman can't recover...and the safety of course would have been nowhere near the play.

Instead, he throws an up ball, underthrown and to the inside where two defenders could have gotten involved instead of just the one. If he throws the 46 yard ball with a lower, faster trajectory, then none of this matters. If he throws the 52 yard ball with high trajectory but better placement, none of this matters.

I don't know if it was an arm strength issue or just him not seeing Marshall before he threw it. Either way it was a bad throw that Marshall bailed him out on.

 

Yes seriously. It was an awful throw. Marshall had Newman beat by a good 4-5 yards on a go route and noodle arm Moore underthrew it badly. Luckily, we have Brandon Marshall as our #1 and not a bum like Ted Ginn. Only in Miami Dolphins fandom can a journeyman, backup QB have 2 good games out of 7 and have some people talking franchise QB. SMH.

 

I take it you're implying that we're just supposed to accept the notion that Matt Moore is playing well even if a detailed accounting of his play shows that he's very inconsistent and not truly playing well.

Bottom line to me is he's had two really, really good games this year...and six other games that were anywhere from mediocre to bad to very bad.

The reason we're taking a closer look at that throw to Marshall in the Cowboys game is because some, probably yourself included, would like to take the 100 passer rating and use it as evidence that he had yet another good game. But that 100 passer rating is based in large part on a throw he made that was actually a bad throw and he got bailed out on it by one of the very best in the business, and that passer rating doesn't account for the sacks he took or the fumbles he had.

You can say oh well none of that matters, but we lost the game 19-20. We only scored 19 points, couldn't come away with touchdowns from the red area (again), and lost because we couldn't put the game away before the Cowboys had a chance to do it at the end. It matters. Details matter.

Anyway, the reason we even talk about something like this is because, as you've brought up before, Matt Moore's passer rating for the month of November is second only to Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers, right? You say something like that and you're going to get a lot of people convinced that Matt Moore is our guy, that he's the guy we should be building around. I think it matters though that out of 8 games this year he's really only played well in 2 of them.

 

PS Dolphins-Cowboys was the highest rated program this season, and the biggest NFL Thanksgiving audience ever with around 30.9 million viewers. Thankfully it was exciting and close and not a blow out, too bad they couldn't win.

Maybe Ross should fly some Dolphins fans from around the country to Miami for free to fill the stadium. (Or, you know, nail it on the next staff he hires to create a winner.)

 

I'm glad it was a competitive game, given the audience size. You always like to see the Dolphins play well in front of such a big audience. It raises the respect level for the franchise and lord knows this franchise has done plenty of things to lower the respect level people have for it.

 

Thats not a tough throw for an NFL quarterback. Routine throw for them actually.

 

The pass to Hartline was a terrible pass too.

 

I agree. I don't think of it as totally bad pass. Moore threw it out there to where his playmaker at WR could make a play on it. To be so strongly interfered with and still make the catch, has to make it one of the best catches in the league this season. IMO.

 

I didn't see any pressure. He released the ball right off his drop.

 

He had inside pressure right in his face when he released the ball. I just went back and watched it.

 

He could still step up in the throw I watched it too.

 

Moore is definitely not the QB we need long term, he may become just good enough to start next season while our draftee rookie QB rides a clipboard for 1 season and learns to play at NFL speed & complexity of defenses he'll have to read.

 

Just my opinion but I don't see a QB picked top 10 sitting the entire year, specially with a new staff. IF Moore wins the starting job next year it will take two, maybe three bad games before Barkely or whoever is in to start.

The throw could have been better by Moore, but lets all get a little real here, not every throw is going to be dead on accurate, its just not. It is the NFL WRs JOB to make adjustments to the ball in the air when needed. And some time it IS on the reciever when it appears the ball was over or under thrown and they didnt run the route right or track the ball and adjust. It's their job to have that ability to track the deep throw and adjust.

In this case its not on Marshall, he made that adjustment on a bad throw like a reciever is supposed to when the ball is not on target. Infact it was an incredible catch. And as much as i dog him out about the dropped TDs I give credit for the great adjustments he has made to catch the ball.

Yes some of the dropped TDs were not great throws, but guess what? Alot of QBs (elite or not) throw bad balls into the endzone and the reciever still comes down with it. So this bad ball excuse to me is just that, and excuse. If it hit him in the hands its on him as well as the QB.

Again great catch BM.

 

is this another henne - fasano INT debate that we had in preseason....