Yeah, I know. I apparently have to have green goggles on to even dream of saying Leon Washington is even on par with Reggie Bush. A writer mentioning the "paltry" yardage of Leon Washington in another thread has finally set me off. It's time for me to kick off a comparison of these two. Statjeff, I'm lookin' at you. Throw your $.02 in here, it'll be greatly appreciated. First off, let's look at Reggie Bush. #2 draft pick by the Saints and probably should have been #1. Highly regarded in high school. Highly regarded in college. Broke his share of records and won the Heisman in 2005. He has plenty of endorsement deals and is a flashy and spectacular player. He didn't play behind a great offensive line. Deuce McAllister isn't a top 5 running back in the league, and the passing attack largely consisted of a 7th round pick (Marques Colson) and Drew Brees, both of whom could be one year wonders. We'll see how that turns out. You can never really predict these things. Let's go to the hard numbers: http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/players/7751/splits http://www.nfl.com/players/playerpage/407605 155 rushes for 565 yards. 3.6 yard average with 6 TDs. 88 receptions for 742 yards. 8.4 yard average with 2 TDs and a 8.2 YAC average. Two fumbles overall. No rushes for 20 yards or more and 27 rushes for a first down. Five receptions for 20 yards or more with two of them going for 40 yards or more and 32 receptions for first downs. Not bad for a rookie. To recap: He had a good power back (though by no means top in the league), an average offensive line, and a spectacular passing attack (ranked #1 in the league). Heck, he was part of that passing attack. 88 receptions makes you part of it without question. For comparison, let's take our look at Leon Washington. #117 pick, #20 in the fourth round by the N.Y. Jets. Was rated the #3 prospect out of high school in the state of Florida by the Orlando Sentinel (http://www.newyorkjets.com/players/leon-washington) and played on both sides of the ball. Played second fiddle to Lorenzo Booker in college but still did very well for himself. He was shunned in September (due to fumblitis in practice) and played behind one of the lesser offensive lines in football (D'Brick was the VonOelhoffen of our OLine: A traffic pylon. We had the third lowest YPC average in the league and bad pass protection spare when we picked Green Bay apart in the first half of that game) in addition to playing with an average passing game (ranked #17 in the league) and having to split carries with a horrible power back (Barlow) and a mediocre well-rounded back (Houston). Time for the number game again. http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/players/7866/splits http://www.nfl.com/players/playerpage/423207 151 rushes for 650 yards. 4.3 yard average with 4 TDs. 25 receptions for 270 yards. 10.8 yard average with 0 TDs and a 10.8 YAC average. Two fumbles overall. Two rushes for 20 yards or more and 33 rushes for a first down. Four receptions for 20 yards or more with two of them going for 40 yards or more and 7 receptions for first downs. Also not bad at all. Heck, if we didn't attach names to these guys, I'm sure most people would take the latter and utilize him more unless there were some serious reason that he wasn't used more in the season (which at this point, there isn't. For most of the season, there wasn't, unless it was protecting him until we had a legitimate power back) . To recap: He split carries with a horrible power back and an average well rounded back, a sub-par offensive line, and an average passing attack. Consider that 3.5ypc for the team that we had with Leon Washington leading the team with 650 rushing yards (out of 1738 yards) and a 4.3 yard average.(that's a 3.2ypc avg without Leon. That's what Arizona accomplished, people! I mean jeez!) . Oh, but Leon Washington can't run behind the tackles! Well, I can't find the stats for that. I do however know that he did some of his best work in the red zone (15-80, 5.3ypc 3TDs) whereas Reggie was average at best in the red zone (28-104, 3.7ypc 6TDs) . I do however, watch film, and from what I've seen Bush running up the gut is like driving a yugo into reinforced cement at high speed: Crumpley, and preferably never done. We all have seen Washington find holes and shoot through them while between the tackles and while he's elusive, he has taken his fair share of hits in the box and he has taken them well. So . . . Yeah. Had Washington had caught as many balls as Reggie Bush, you couldn't even have this discussion. Had Reggie Bush come here like some people wanted, he probably would have done jack. Yes, I said it. And had Leon Washington been in Bush's shoes with McAllister and Brees paving his way, you had better believe that the Saints would have been The Greatest Cajun Show on the Turf this past year. These are what-ifs. What-ifs don't matter. What does matter is this, however: Leon Washington is not bad, not by a long shot, and he is not only comparable to Reggie Bush but is indeed at the very least just as good as him, if not perhaps better.
Agreed. Leon was at least as good as Bush last year and a lot cheaper too. If we had gotten Bush, then we wouldn't have gotten Brick or Mangold. And who knows who else. Not getting Bush turned out to be a great move.
I'm sure you can say that if Washington were as talented as Bush, then he would've been incorporated into the passing game a lot more, but he's not. So don't compare the two. There's a reason Bush was one of the top players drafted. Not to say that I wanted him, but Reggie Bush is a much better player. For all the plays Leon didn't go out in the flats in a pass pattern, he was messing up in protection.
That's a good argument. But the major point behind this is that Washington is comparable to Bush. For the money Bush gets he should be much much better than Washington is. He is not that far ahead right now and Washington, Brick and Mangold and much much more valuable than Bush as is the money. Youth
IMO next year is gonna be a huge year for Reggie Bush. He started off really slow in his rookie season but finished big. He also stepped up big in the playoffs...it seemed like he had at least one huge play in each game. I actually think that Leon is more shifty than Reggie (trust me that's a huge compliment). However, I don't think Leon is quite as strong as Bush is. To compare Leon to Bush isn't as far fetched as some believe, but that being said Reggie Bush is still the superior talent. Like I said before, if Reggie Bush plays anything like he did towards the end of his rookie season he will be the possible pro bowler.
What writer said Leon gained paltry yardage, he was HUGE for us last year and he is our home run hitter coming into this year. He's going to be integral to our offense even if we did add Jones. I think you can argue he had the most impact for a rookie on our team, the only other guy being Mangold.
I want some of what he has in his pipe! You guys have to be kidding me. I doubt there is any combo backfield better with now THAN Duece/Bush. Maybe if you count LT/Turner as a combo, but it's really not.
Yep. We have pretty much hit the wall on discussion topics until training camp begins. The absolute bottom of the barrel material now. :lol:
I've been invisioning our Jones/Leon backfield in the same mold as last years Saints Duece/Bush ever since we got Thomas Jones. Jones pounding the rock and Leon getting the swing passes like Reggie. Bottom line...our running game is gonna be nasty with the above combo and another year under the belts of our young 1st round talent linemen, which will allow Pennington to finally be able to properly utilize his best asset -- The Play Action.
hahahahahahhahahahhahahahahahahah!!! cracked me the hell up. good god, there are some major joker's on this board. washington=bush, NOT!!!! WHEN BUSH STEPS ONTO THE FIELD, HE CHANGES THE WHOLE DEFENSE, EVERY PLAYER ON THAT DEFENSE IS AWARE AND LOOKING OUT FOR HIM!! you can put those stats on paper and wipe yourself with them, as useless are they are. i come to this board to read the posts from knowledgeable people and most of all to read the comic's. your post lists under the comical one's for sure. what if, eric mangini, instead of drafting for talent and coaching them up, just decides to get on his knee's and wish real hard every night, that the jet's win the superbowl this year. that is about the equivulent of your wildly homerific post. it did give me quite the chuckle though, i'll give you that...
I don't know man, almost 500 more total yards and four more TDs sounds pretty strong to me who the better back is.
the saints run block better. contrary to what homeboy said McCallister is a friggin beast. and the number 1 passing attack opens your running game tenfold. that said Bush is better. but if we actually had a strong OL that wouldnt matter and the production would be similar. Leon was one of my favorite college players his whole career. and is obviously one of my favorite players on the jets. hes spectacular and I want him to have a long career here in NY. and considering he only costs a fourth rd pick. I'm glad we got him over Bush. call me stupid but no Mangold equals no good. we can either continue to run a two back system (which seems to be the plan for the next 3 yrs) and build our OL till Jones retires and Leon can pickup by himself or we can draft a young talent in the coming years. im not worried about our offense as long as the line improves in the next yr or two
I first need to say that this was a great post. Next I think we need to analyze this from the perspective that when Bush does walk onto the field every defensive player is accounting for him, whereas Washington doesn't have that impact. Lets for a second say that Bush didn't draw the attention that he does. He would have racked up even more yards and receptions. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that Leon is GREAT but Bush is AMAZING. If Leon had the hype that Bush did his numbers would be significantly lower. I think we got a great deal for Leon and he'll be a solid provider and that the health of Bush/McCallister is not as good as the health of Washington/Jones due to Deuce's nagging knee problems. We'll have to see what happens this year but I think the unaccounted for intangible factor is hype.
That's not a fair statement. In preseason, and early in the year, Washington struggled with his blocking assignments and was more often than not relegated to the bench. By the end of last year he was quite good at blocking and picking up the blitzes...
