Does Jake have tunnel vision?

[Mr. Scot]

So here's a look at who "spreads it around" the most, and who does it the least.

I put the stats from this year's regular season receiving on several teams side by side, compared who had the highest percentage of throwing to one guy, who had the biggest dropoff between the first and second or first and third receivers, who hit the most guys, who hit the least guys, etc. And last took a look at who had the most guys with 10 or more catches.

Here's what I found:

By this definition of tunnel vision, the worst offender of the QBs surveyed is...

Matt Cassel, with 33% of his passes going to Wes Welker (111). Randy Moss was second, getting 21% (69), a dropoff of 12%.

Delhomme? He comes in second here for targeting one guy, hitting Steve Smith 32% of the time (78). He did a better job than Cassel of getting to to the second receiver though. Muhsin Muhammad had 26% of the Panthers catches (65), a dropoff of only six points.

Number three on the list for hitting a number one? That goes back to 2007. Carson Palmer hit T.J. Houshmandzadeh with 30% of his passes (112). Chad Johnson was five points behind at 25%. The next guy down was Kenny Watson with 14%. FYI: If you go looking, you'll also find a pretty significant difference between the number one and number two with this year's Bengals, but since Ryan Fitzpatrick was their main guy this year I didn't count them.

Not far behind. Another one from last year. A fellow by the name of Tom Brady hit Wes Welker with 28% of his pass completions. Not as much of a dropoff to the number two as Moss had 24%. The next guy down? Kevin Faulk with about 12%.

(always locking on to the same two receivers; wow, these guys must suck)

Next one down, Ben Roethlisberger. He hit Hines Ward with about 27% of his passes. Number two was Santonio Holmes with a nine points drop down to 18%, barely above TE Heath Miller with about 16%.

As far as receivers with 10 catches or more, you might be surprised (or you might not) to find that one of the two leaders is a guy who plays in a West Coast Offense. That'd be McNabb who had ten guys with ten or more catches. Drew Brees was first with eleven, Kurt Warner, Phillip Rivers and 2007 Carson Palmer all had nine.

Delhomme, Cassel, Brady 2007 and Ben Roethlisberger all were tied with the fewest at six. Standing just a notch above, both of the Manning brothers, who had just seven apiece.

Based on this, and using the logic of this thread, I have to conclude that Delhomme, Matt Cassel, Tom Brady, Carson Palmer and Ben Roethlisberger all have tunnel vision. Hopefully, their teams will each bring someone in to push them, or maybe get someone to coach them into doing a better job of spreading it around.

(we can only hope)

[GRWatcher]

First off, I would like to know when it became impossible to teach a 34 year old man how to throw a football more effectively? How is teaching a 26-27 year old QB easier than teaching a 34 year old QB? Do QB's go retarded at 33 and are unable to learn after that age? If so I would like a link to this research because my nephew is a QB and I will have to seriously consider telling him to switch positions just in case he ever makes it to the NFL.

Second, has anyone ever really noticed our reciever's positions on the field at the time Jake throws the ball? Apparently not.

Generally as an offense when you are passing the ball a bunch of sh*t can go wrong so you must simplify it as much as possible. Thus, what you attempt to do is have all of your QB's targets in the same area at different levels of the field. This way a qb is not having to look all the way across from one side to another to see who is open or about to be open.

This does not mean that you want everybody bunched up together but everyone spread out but in a manner that is easy to see.

So when you see Delhomme staring to the left and not even going right it does not mean he is staring down Smith, although he is probably watching him close because Smith is usually your primary target. It just means that 95% of the action is on the left half of the field. Yes, Williams or Moose or whoever may be to the right and fairly open but Jakes main concern will be left. If Jake diagnosis that there is no way anything to the left is open and he has yet to be sacked, then look right.

Jake is flawed but he does not have tunnel vision.

:iagree: Tons of imaginary rep for you!

See, this is tunnel vision.

"Nobody makes mistakes except our quarterback" :rolleye:

And to throw Roethlisberger in there? Do you know how many people have been making the "yes but he's a leader and a winner and we're going to the Super Bowl" argument to his numerous critics this season? Sound familiar?

Go to other team's message boards and you'll find the vast majority of teams with a quarterback not named (Peyton) Manning have their fair share of armchair critics. This is why I'm always telling people to watch other teams to get perspective.

Fans always think the grass is greener elsewhere. Geez, how many of our own fans thought David Carr was a great QB who'd just been on a bad team :nonod:

Or who thought Weinke was better than Jake? just sayin'

I've watched Jake more often than not check down his receivers. Any QB has less than a split second to look at each and if they're not open then they're not getting the ball. They may become open the minute Jake throws the ball but that also could be because the defense will gravitate towards the ball and away from who they were covering. On average, the QB has 3 seconds to get the ball down the field, if he's lucky and his o-line is good.

So why was Jake upset Stewart didn't run his route as he was supposed to? Because he didn't have time to look for him and the play was designed so he didn't have to. Stewart was to run the route and stop, not continue down the field. He was the safety net, where Jake could throw without looking first. Where Stewart would be open because Jake had been looking the other way. I hope those lapses by Stewart are rookie mistakes and will go away with experience.

Why was Proehl such a clutch receiver? Because he ran his routes as they were supposed to be run and then fought to be open so Jake and even Weinke knew exactly where he would be. Smitty & Moose can do that. If the other WR's and the RB's would do that, Jake would have no problem finding the open man and it wouldn't always be Smitty.

[magnus]

Name me one Panther receiver/TE besides Steve Smith or Muhsin Muhammad who ever had more than 50 receptions in a season?

I notice a number of guys who came close, so you obviously chose that number for a reason. Or that the second receiver with the Muhammad/Smith combination always happens to meet your criteria, and they're the only WR besides Proehl we've had in seven years worth those targets.

[CarolinaSock]

I'm more interested in number of targets rather than receptions to truly see how often Delhomme locks in on targets. If anyone knows where to find this stat I'd love to see those numbers. I've seen some numbers around in articles and on boards but haven't found a source for this information that I can access.

[Skew]

I'm more interested in number of targets rather than receptions to truly see how often Delhomme locks in on targets. If anyone knows where to find this stat I'd love to see those numbers. I've seen some numbers around in articles and on boards but haven't found a source for this information that I can access.

Delhomme tends to go to Targets about as often as Wal-Marts, so I don't see the the drop-off in the access of this information.

[carpanfan96]

I'm more interested in number of targets rather than receptions to truly see how often Delhomme locks in on targets. If anyone knows where to find this stat I'd love to see those numbers. I've seen some numbers around in articles and on boards but haven't found a source for this information that I can access.

He got targeted by delhomme 19 times less this season then our QB rotation did last year. This season was actually his lowest amount of targets in a season since 2002. (in a season in which steve wasn't hurt)

2008 - 129

2007 - 148

[carpanfan96]

In regards to targets I did some research on it.

Top WR vs SS

Smith's 129 - 78 - 1421 - 6

Fitzgerald's 165 - 96 - 1431 - 12

Johnson - 170 - 115 - 1575 - 8

White - 148 - 88 - 1382 - 7

Compared to teams that run Rushing offenses

Ward - 126 - 81 - 1043 - 7

White - 148 - 88 - 1382 - 7

Smith - 82 - 57 - 574 - 1 NYG'S

Mason - 121 - 80 - 1037 - 5

You see his actual target numbers are that of an typical Wr in a run first offense. I don't see how you can say he had tunnel vision, he just has poor mechanics. I believe many of us on here have said that many times before. He can't pull Db's off of his receivers and he lacks field vision. Those things doesn't mean he has Tunnel vision. He's just playing the plays how they are called and just lacks the field vision to find the guys on the other side of the field.

I guarantee if you broke down his throws, I'd say 70 percent were to the right, He just can't pass to the left or doesn't like to, so they use crossing routes and get his receivers to his right. Watch the ARZ game, every time he threw a pic besides for the one endzone pic which was a cross going from right to left, and the messed up smoke route. The ball was thrown too the right and there was more then one carolina panther receiver in the area. Almost always coming in from the left side of the field on cross, or slant routes. Watch the zone coverage, it is tilted to the right almost the whole game, couple that with them catching his tell for his throws and there is no way he could have succeeded with our game plan and playbook.

[frash.exe]

I notice a number of guys who came close, so you obviously chose that number for a reason. Or that the second receiver with the Muhammad/Smith combination always happens to meet your criteria, and they're the only WR besides Proehl we've had in seven years worth those targets.

I can only think of Colbert's rookie season off the top of my head (47). Jeff King had the same amount but Jake was out most of that year anyway.

[Mr. Scot]

You see his actual target numbers are that of an typical Wr in a run first offense. I don't see how you can say he had tunnel vision, he just has poor mechanics. I believe many of us on here have said that many times before. He can't pull Db's off of his receivers and he lacks field vision. Those things doesn't mean he has Tunnel vision. He's just playing the plays how they are called and just lacks the field vision to find the guys on the other side of the field.

I guarantee if you broke down his throws, I'd say 70 percent were to the right, He just can't pass to the left or doesn't like to, so they use crossing routes and get his receivers to his right. Watch the ARZ game, every time he threw a pic besides for the one endzone pic which was a cross going from right to left, and the messed up smoke route. The ball was thrown too the right and there was more then one carolina panther receiver in the area. Almost always coming in from the left side of the field on cross, or slant routes. Watch the zone coverage, it is tilted to the right almost the whole game, couple that with them catching his tell for his throws and there is no way he could have succeeded with our game plan and playbook.

This may be a valid point.

Someone else had also mentioned that the receiver patterns tended to bunch in a particular section of the field. Obviously not true all the time, but believable.

This is the sort of thing I want to see Scherer have an effect on.

[magnus]

when you're running a lot of playaction you're going to have flow in a direction.

I actually believe we used combo routes with receivers too little, because there are a lot of great options there compared to just looking across the field between the two guys who are realistic options.

[frash.exe]

So here's a look at who "spreads it around" the most, and who does it the least.

I put the stats from this year's regular season receiving on several teams side by side, compared who had the highest percentage of throwing to one guy, who had the biggest dropoff between the first and second or first and third receivers, who hit the most guys, who hit the least guys, etc. And last took a look at who had the most guys with 10 or more catches.

Here's what I found:

By this definition of tunnel vision, the worst offender of the QBs surveyed is...

Matt Cassel, with 33% of his passes going to Wes Welker (111). Randy Moss was second, getting 21% (69), a dropoff of 12%.

Delhomme? He comes in second here for targeting one guy, hitting Steve Smith 32% of the time (78). He did a better job than Cassel of getting to to the second receiver though. Muhsin Muhammad had 26% of the Panthers catches (65), a dropoff of only six points.

Number three on the list for hitting a number one? That goes back to 2007. Carson Palmer hit T.J. Houshmandzadeh with 30% of his passes (112). Chad Johnson was five points behind at 25%. The next guy down was Kenny Watson with 14%. FYI: If you go looking, you'll also find a pretty significant difference between the number one and number two with this year's Bengals, but since Ryan Fitzpatrick was their main guy this year I didn't count them.

Not far behind. Another one from last year. A fellow by the name of Tom Brady hit Wes Welker with 28% of his pass completions. Not as much of a dropoff to the number two as Moss had 24%. The next guy down? Kevin Faulk with about 12%.

(always locking on to the same two receivers; wow, these guys must suck)

Next one down, Ben Roethlisberger. He hit Hines Ward with about 27% of his passes. Number two was Santonio Holmes with a nine points drop down to 18%, barely above TE Heath Miller with about 16%.

As far as receivers with 10 catches or more, you might be surprised (or you might not) to find that one of the two leaders is a guy who plays in a West Coast Offense. That'd be McNabb who had ten guys with ten or more catches. Drew Brees was first with eleven, Kurt Warner, Phillip Rivers and 2007 Carson Palmer all had nine.

Delhomme, Cassel, Brady 2007 and Ben Roethlisberger all were tied with the fewest at six. Standing just a notch above, both of the Manning brothers, who had just seven apiece.

Based on this, and using the logic of this thread, I have to conclude that Delhomme, Matt Cassel, Tom Brady, Carson Palmer and Ben Roethlisberger all have tunnel vision. Hopefully, their teams will each bring someone in to push them, or maybe get someone to coach them into doing a better job of spreading it around.

(we can only hope)

Your research does conclude information. But stats are only the tip of the iceberg, and there's a whole bunch of other factors to draw conclusions on. I remember reading some article about the 2005 offense that every passing play was designed for Steve Smith to get open. And while it did spur results, it didn't last very long before people figured out that was the guy he was aiming for, and when they put a lot of coverage on Smith Jake couldn't do anything. And even that was before the Seattle game, where Steve was pretty much our only weapon.

One thing I'd like to see Scherer improve is decision-making. Jake doesn't make quick decisions and just sits in the pocket with all day to throw but he stands there and waits for someone to get open. He doesn't make quick decisions in the pocket like the other guys do. Other guys will get rid of the ball quicker. Other guys can fit the ball in some tight spots to get it to their receiver.

[Mr. Scot]

when you're running a lot of playaction you're going to have flow in a direction.

I actually believe we used combo routes with receivers too little, because there are a lot of great options there compared to just looking across the field between the two guys who are realistic options.

Davidson's been good at adapting though. Hopefully he takes this sort of thing into account.

The emergence of Williams and Stewart should give us a lot of options next year. Best case scenario for me would be two things happening.

1) retain Jordan Gross

2) get a legit "hybrid" TE

(trading for Heath Miller is my ideal there, but it's pure wishful thinking)

[magnus]

I think our TEs are OK. Rosario has more than he's shown in the final 15 games last year and King seems to have grown in size and blocking. It'd be nice to get one guy who can do all that, but we have a pair that can do well and we run a crapload of 2 TE. Plus, King doesn't fall down at the spot he catches the ball at anymore, and that's a big step forward.

You could, as I've said elsewhere, be fiscally smart about the Gross thing - let him walk and keep Hangartner to move Wharton over. You'd save millions, you have a moderately proven commodity, and you keep continuity. I don't want to do that by any means, but a lot of people are going to get sticker shocked by Gross.

[Mr. Scot]

I think our TEs are OK. Rosario has more than he's shown in the final 15 games last year and King seems to have grown in size and blocking. It'd be nice to get one guy who can do all that, but we have a pair that can do well and we run a crapload of 2 TE. Plus, King doesn't fall down at the spot he catches the ball at anymore, and that's a big step forward.

You could, as I've said elsewhere, be fiscally smart about the Gross thing - let him walk and keep Hangartner to move Wharton over. You'd save millions, you have a moderately proven commodity, and you keep continuity. I don't want to do that by any means, but a lot of people are going to get sticker shocked by Gross.

You already know I hate the "one blocker, one receiver" formula the panthers use, but I've got no realistic hope of that changing.

I'd really hate to see Wharton moved outside again. Heck, I'd hate to see many changes at all given how little continuity this team's had up front from year to year.