GhostOfDocAnderson

You said 35 yard line, not 35-36 yard line. It's not my fault that you were imprecise, but I suppose when you are trying hard to hype a perfectly ordinary throw, you need to stretch it as far as you can, going so far to dig up old Alabama tape. Who gives a fug about what he did in Alabama? What has he done in the NFL? What will he do in the Arena Football League?

No, he didn't. If you want to give Bryce a participation trophy, be my guest. By the way, were you even alive back in 03? I bet you were but a glint in the milkman's eye back in 2003.

No he didn't throw it from the 35 yard line. I don't know how you all measure distance in Alabama, but for the rest of the country, that ball traveled less than 60 yards in the air. Any NFL starting QB and backups and most any third-stringers and UDFAs can make that throw without looking like he's about to tear off his rotator cuff in the process. Did you just start following the NFL this year because Bryce is your favorite QB at Alabama? Bryce may be the best thing to have ever happened in Tuscaloosa to you, but the NFL is a grown men's league, son!

Bruh, that's less than 60 yards in the air, and just look at how much effort he had to put into that throw, it was almost as if he was an Olympic javelin thrower and had to heave his entire body to throw the ball less than 60 yards. Bryce doesn't have an NFL arm, and thank you for proving that.

A ridiculous take. Mechanics FIRST, SECOND, THIRD, followed by eating and sleep. If he had even a bare minimum level of sound mechanics to being with, our receivers wouldn't have been blanketed in the first place because he would have been able to deliver the ball on time.

Did you make up that statistic or did you actually watch the tape with a clipboard in hand to count the number of plays where our receivers were open vs not open? Don't answer it, that was a rhetorical question. And what offensive line struggles are you referring to? The line has been average. In fact, it was above NFL average for the 1st half of the season, during which our receivers were getting NFL average separation per PFF, and yet Bryce was among the absolute worst at finding open receivers. These are facts beyond dispute. I thought Bryce was heralded as a super processing savant who was the most NFL-ready QB in the draft, which was why we sold the farm to draft him. Well? How did that work out?

Our receivers would improve significantly if paired with a competent QB who can deliver the ball on time and make accurate throws longer than 20 yards. As of right now, it's hard to judge how much of this putrid ranking is due to Bryce and how much is due to the receivers themselves. I suspect it's mostly on Bryce, because our play calling was likely limited by his abilities, so that our receivers aren't being schemed open as often as other teams. I also suspect our receivers became discouraged and stopped trying as hard to get open because they knew Bryce was hopelessly out of his depth. According to PFF, our receivers were actually close to NFL average in getting separation during the 1st half of the season, but Bryce simply failed to get them the ball. After Reich's firing, the performance of our receivers nosedived, which tells me that this was a morale problem due to poor QB play and organizational turmoil. I don't blame the receivers, because why bust your ass running routes when your QB simply isn't capable of making the necessary throws and making them on time?

Or try the Marge Simpson solution.

Bruh, did you miss the part where I said Stroud was making 60+ yard throws accurately when Bryce was maxing out at 55 yards with putrid accuracy? My observation is that not only Stroud can throw further than Bryce, but also he can make those throws accurately and make them look easy.

Stroud's longest throw (without pads) at the combine was around 67 yards. Since the release point was between the hashes and the ball landed near the sideline, the actual air distance travelled by the ball was around 71 or 72 yards. Moreover, the throw was very accurate and was made without visible difficulty (he simply planted his feet and just slung it), so who knows how far Stroud could really throw if he didn't have to aim for a receiver whom he had never worked with prior to the combine. Now compare that to Bryce's performance at the combine. Oh wait, never mind... Judging from game day footage, Bryce is capable of throwing the ball around 55 yards, max. You can forget about accuracy at that distance though, because Bryce has to heave his entire body (with both feet actually leaving the ground) in order to throw it that far. So yeah, we passed on Stroud for him. Not great, Bob! Not great.

His footwork has always been non-existent, going back to his Alabama days. He doesn't or doesn't know how to do standard drops, so I don't know how his footwork could have gotten "sloppy" when he had had none to begin with.

I don't think we're in a position to be gleeful, considering we're at the absolute bottom with Bryce tied around our necks like a millstone.

I think he could improve significantly to the point where he becomes good enough to be a borderline starter for maybe bottom five teams in the NFL, provided that we keep him for at least two more years and surround him with Dolphins type of talent. Anything is possible.

The line is average. If anything, it was above average for the 1st half of the season and trailed off somewhat in the 2nd half. Frank's system may be archaic by today's standards, but his system has a reputation of being QB friendly by pushing the ball down the field. It's not Reich's fault that Bryce has terrible accuracy beyond 20 yards and couldn't make many of the throws Reich's system demands. Our WRs are terrible, I'll give you that, but only for half a season. For the first 10 games or so, our WRs had been NFL average in terms of getting separation per PFF. Their performance suffered a steep drop after Reich's firing. Again, who could blame them for not playing as hard when they knew Bryce was scared, weak armed, and couldn't find an open receiver?

What poo are you talking about? You do understand that Bryce is the primary reason why the rest of our offense had underperformed, don't you?

What's this obsession with putting JT/OB School on a pedestal as if he's some kind of authoritative judge on QBs? JT is a copium merchant trying to get your subscription dollars. Compare his breakdown videos to those done by Kurt Warner, Sloter, and Drew Brees, it's immediately obvious that objectivity isn't what JT is about. Both Warner and Sloter immediately flagged Bryce's horrendous footwork from the outset, but it took JT until late in the season to briefly mention it in passing. FFS, even I can see Bryce's footwork is one of the root causes of his terrible play. JT's analyses are also extremely shallow, perfunctory, and lacks the kind of granular insights that we see from breakdowns done by just about any former NFL QBs. If I want zero to low-effort breakdowns, I can get them for free from any number of Youtube channels run by former high school QBs.

What are some of the skills in his 'great skill set'? The ability to differentiate a salad fork from a dessert fork? Looking unflappable while he sips soy milk and takes tiny bites out of a vegan burger? Please do tell.

Of course QBs can be fixed, but the relevant question is can Bryce be fixed? We shall see, but definitely don't keep your hopes up, because unfixable QBs vastly outnumber fixable ones when it comes to the NFL. Keep in mind that there are no miracle turnarounds, and Bryce is as bad as they come. He's starting from a historically low floor in terms of individual talent and physical gifts. It'd be a lot easier to draft better next time.

Please Bench Bryce if he doesn't show signs of improving by mid season.

Trust the process, as Tepper urged during the press conference after firing Reich.

We need to tank. Short term pain hopefully gives us long term gains, if we use the resulting picks wisely. Right now, there is no better quarterback in the NFL to help us accomplish that than Bryce. My worst fear is that Bryce improves somewhat, just enough to get the idiot owner to name him the franchise QB, and as a result we become the new Browns and are doomed to dwell in football purgatory.

And for 16 more, he'll get us that no. 1 pick. All hail the little tank commander!

In a nutshell...

If you're a gambling man, keep Bryce at QB because he will help us tank without even trying to tank. With that no. 1 pick, we go for a QB in the draft and hope he pans out. Quite a gamble. Or... We can hire outside scouts and evaluators to find good QB prospects in the upcoming draft and pick that diamond in the rough. No more of that S2 cognition test and table manners poo. Then come training camp, hold a genuine QB competition for the starting job, which will result in Bryce being relegated the backup or third stringer on the depth chart. We ride with the new QB come hell and high water while our FO begins a multi-year rebuild to find better pieces to fit the new scheme and playbook. It'll be a grind, but it is what it is. We've dug a deep hole by passing on Stroud for noodle armed midget, and it'll take patience and time to climb out of it.