So, what now about Clemens?

The 300 yards means absolutley nothing man. He pretty much played from behind all game long. When you're that far behind, you have to throw. 300 yards in a loss means nothing, 300 yards in a win means something.

 

alright, fair case. (see Jon Kitna)

but that doesn't explain the rest...

 

I'm a Pennington fan, too. But I do need to point out that Todd and Pennington have both won two postseason games. Todd was 2-2 postseason and Pennington is 2-3.

 

That's not my issue.

Obviously it's asking a lot to have a top 3 QB with a top 3 arm and all that and I accept that that is asking a lot. But Vinny Testaverde wasn't in either of those categories either and he led the Jets back from a couple scores down on more than a couple of occasions over a 5 year period.

I like Chad, I just hate the game being over before it's really over, as has been the case a bit too often against good teams over the last few years.

Do you know that we lost a 7 point lead headed into the 4th quarter against the Steelers in the playoffs in '04? The only score the Jets got after halftime was an interception return by Reggie Tongue.

 

Fair enough, but I think the Jets won those games in 82' in spite of Todd. Sure he could throw it downfield but he had like 8 ints that postseason.

 

Yes, he had 8 ints. And five of them came at the Mud Bowl in Miami.

First win at CIN was mostly Freeman McNeil running for over 200 yards (and throwing an option pass to Jabar Gaffney's dad, Derrick, for a TD). But Todd played well. He was 20 for 28, 259 yards, one TD and one INT.

Second win at LA vs. Raiders was a team effort, and it did include a late 45 yard bomb from..uhh...Todd to Walker to set up the winning score. This was a physical battle against the bad boys of the NFL in all their swagger. So Todd did get picked off twice in the game. But overall, he was 15 for 24 for 277 yards, one TD (to Walker) and the two INTs.

He was hardly a detriment in those two victories IMHO (having the NFL rushing king in your backfield didn't hurt either, of course).

But the last thing I want to do is bury Chad Pennington. I like him better than Todd. But Todd deserves his due for the good things he did back in the day.

 

I'm using the Todd to walker to state my point about he long ball. I never said Todd was a great QB. Please don't remind me of that Miami game in which Todd through like 5 interceptions ( i lost count). all I'm saying is that IMO Chad will win games, get us to the first or second round but i don't think we can win a SB with him. If he only had average arm strength I would say yes, but he is so limited with his throws. I said in an earlier post that Bert Jones use to have a great arm and then had the rotator surgery and that was it. His career was done. Yesterday you saw the difference between brady and Chad in the red zone. Chad never throws the dart. It's either a floater to the back of the corner or the WR runs it in.

Also, look at his TD to interception ratio. Not very good. And the reason is not because he makes bad reads, its because the CBs can get a better jump on the ball. Honestly, I give the guy all the credit in the world, but i just dont think he has the physical skills for us to win a SB. I will qualify that by stating maybe if we had the steel curtain as a defense.

What I am saying is let them go to camp and compete for the job. If Chad is better play him, but I would like to see what the kid can do

 

Statements like this drive me crazy. The rules of football dont change during the Super Bowl. If a player can win games, he can win games, the nature of the game doesnt change regardless of what the circumstances surrounding the game might be (unless were talking about a player who cant handle the pressure, which doesnt seem to apply to Pennington). If you think his arm is too weak to win games, thats a valid argument at least. But if hes good enough to win with against a given team in week 1, hes good enough to win with against that same team in the wild card round, championship game, or super bowl. Theres nothing different about the super bowl or the playoffs, either hes good enough to win football games or he isnt. If they were going to play Basketball next year in the Super Bowl, then there would be something to discuss here, but its still a football game (and Penningtons like 6 inches taller than Clemens anyway).

Aside from that, I generally agree with what your saying, Pennington's poor long balls do make it harder to win the farther behind the Jets get. But I think that tends to be overstated; weve seen him move this team down the field pretty fast in end of game, or end of half, situations before. A lot of the things Pennington does well are a lot more valuable than a rocket arm. You dont give all of those things away just because hes lacking in one aspect of the game.

Anyway, its my long held belief that if this team can put together a nice power running game, Pennington will go back to being the guy he was in 2002 (which was more or less the same guy he was this year, except he threw way fewer interceptions). Bring in a guard (Im hopin for Steinbach from the Bengals) and maybe upgrade over Clements at RT (his reviews have been mixed at best) and maybe well be able to run the ball in normal ways, not just reverses and draws and such.

Still, Mangini has hinted in the past that the door is going to be left open for Clemens to beat Pennington out in training camp, and theres absolutely nothing wrong with that. If he can legitimately beat Pennington out, then good for him and good for us, because hed have to be a pretty damn good player to beat out Pennington (and hell have had to come a long way since last summer, because he didnt even make the competition interesting then). But some people seem to be suggesting that Mangini should just go with Clemens regardless of whether or not he can beat Pennington just because of this one facet of Pennington's game, and thats total horsewash, that I have a problem with. You dont go with a player based on some abstract idea or based on what the media or the fans say, you go with the player who gives you the best chance to win each game. Whoever that ends up being, thats the guy who should play, and if it turns out to be Clemens then thats fine by me, but my money is on Pennington.

 

i still dont know what all the hype is with clemons. mangini had a qb competition begining of the year and penny won. even when chad had to sit out, ramsey was back-up, again clemons fails to show up. i'd like to see him move to the #2 qb position first before retiring chad.

 

Pennington BARELY won the starting job over Clemens. Ramsey was #2, not because he was ahead of Clemens but because Mangini would rather not stick a rookie QB into that situation if Chad head to be replaced. Mangini's refusal to annoint Chad as starter next year should be a clue as to how he is thinking. I would say it is better than 50% chance that Clemens gets the nod next year.

 

I love the projections being made today.

Nobody here has any idea what Mangini is thinking. People read way too much into the 1 sentence snippets that are reported by the media.

I'm going to say there's a 67% chance Pennington starts next year, give or take 3.5%.

 

How do you know that Clemens barely won the job over Pennington? Do you and Mangini have chats every week to discuss gameplan and personel. Mangnini doesn't even tell this stuff to the media, how would you know. If Clemens was the better QB he would have been in the second QB spot. He actually moved up to that spot at one point because he was playing better before dropping down again. Don't act like you know what Mangini is thinking, because you don't.