Felger: Start BenJarvus Green Ellis

[PATRIOTSFANINPA]

Okay, so let's change this discussion up a bit. Clearly the O-Line is to blame for Maroney's problems. The next question would be, when are we going to replace these bums on the offensive line that can't block for our All-Pro running back? I'd hate for Light and the rest of the guys on the line to ruin Maroney's possibly stellar career. And, if it's not the talent on the O-Line, but the blocking schemes they cant seem to handle, then when are we going to give Dante the boot?

Don't you know that according to some of our highly intelligent posters here who reign over most of us(sarcasm) that if Maroney was running behind the OL in Minnesota (arguably the best OL in the NFL) that he would be rushing for 1,300+ yards annually?

Pffftttt Give me a fu(king break

 

[BradyFTW!]

Re: Felger: Start Ben Jarvis Green Ellis

Originally Posted by Patriot 37
The Moroney has more speed and talent than Morris (or BJGE) but his running style causes a lot negative plays, were Morris's doesn't.




Maybe in 2007, but not in 2009. Mike Riess just blogged that Moroney had 7 plays for negative yards in 27 attempts. Morris, Faulk and Taylor had 5 combined in 74 attempts.

No doubt- Maroney has been awful in 2009. Dunno why, all I'm saying is that this isn't the norm for him. Whether it's him, the line, or both, we need to have some patience and let him get untracked, because he's a good RB.

For the life of me, I can't understand how people can get burned by this chicken little mentality over and over again and never realize how stupid it is. You'd think it was absolutely unheard of for players to start slow then make adjustments and improve over the course of the season. Were you the same people who were calling for the heads of Matt Light, Randy Moss and Derrick Burgess after week 2 (and there were people calling for their heads)?

 

[BradyFTW!]

Yeah, you know i didn't say that, that's why you didn't quote me. I said the best game I recall, I happened to check his short yardage runs.

That's OK, I know you're just being argumentitive.

I judge by what my eyeballs see. I didn't need to wait for stats to see that Biesel shied from contact, or Eugene Robinson had become gun shy. It was on the screen.

Maroney had a broken shoulder. Pretty big reason to avoid contact there. How long did he? Does he still? If so, that's a pretty big factor.

If not, and he's having a lot of trouble running inside, hesitating, then his career as an NFL running back is in danger. Any back has to run inside sometimes. If defenses know you're afraid, you're cooked. Has nothing to do with any one or ten games.

That's exactly what you said. You keep using two specific games to discount Maroney's ability to run for short-intermediate yardage, despite the fact that his body of work has proven him to be capable in that area. You are, by definition, judging him based on two games.

Beyond that, I dunno what to tell you. The statistics have said conclusively that your eyeballs are wrong, but you've made it very clear that that means nothing to you, so it is what it is. Anecdotal evidence tends to reinforce biases- that's human nature, but I wouldn't expect you to understand that anyways.

 

[BradyFTW!]

Don't you know that according to some of our highly intelligent posters here who reign over most of us(sarcasm) that if Maroney was running behind the OL in Minnesota (arguably the best OL in the NFL) that he would be rushing for 1,300+ yards annually?

Pffftttt Give me a fu(king break

If Maroney had as many carries per game as Peterson does, running behind the line that Peterson runs behind, then I don't think that 1,300 yards would be out of the question at all. When he has been a feature RB, Maroney has produced very well.

 

[PATRIOTSFANINPA]

If Maroney had as many carries per game as Peterson does, running behind the line that Peterson runs behind, then I don't think that 1,300 yards would be out of the question at all. When he has been a feature RB, Maroney has produced very well.

You have a right to believe whatever you want to believe my friend

 

[Patriot 37]

Re: Felger: Start Ben Jarvis Green Ellis

No doubt- Maroney has been awful in 2009. Dunno why, all I'm saying is that this isn't the norm for him. Whether it's him, the line, or both, we need to have some patience and let him get untracked, because he's a good RB.

For the life of me, I can't understand how people can get burned by this chicken little mentality over and over again and never realize how stupid it is. You'd think it was absolutely unheard of for players to start slow then make adjustments and improve over the course of the season. Were you the same people who were calling for the heads of Matt Light, Randy Moss and Derrick Burgess after week 2 (and there were people calling for their heads)?

It's not a chicken little metality, he was a 1st round pick that has never really done anything, gaining 800 yards for the most prolific passing team of all time isn't impressive. He's been in the NFL 4 years now it's not like getting on a Rookie. RB is ussually a position people hid there stride in the 2nd year.
I've been down on Moroney for a couple of years. Honestly I'm suprised that there are people that don't think he's a bust.

 

[BradyFTW!]

You have a right to believe whatever you want to believe my friend

AP carried the ball 363 times last year. a 3.57 YPC average will get you 1300 yards with that many carries, which is over half a yard below Maroney's career average. Granted, I doubt he could maintain a 4.2 average over 300+ carries, but he wouldn't fall that far. Frankly, it's pretty stupid to even suggest that Maroney *wouldn't* get 1300 yards with that many carries, even behind the Patriots' line, which doesn't run-block nearly as well as the Vikings'.

 

[RayClay]

That's exactly what you said. You keep using two specific games to discount Maroney's ability to run for short-intermediate yardage, despite the fact that his body of work has proven him to be capable in that area. You are, by definition, judging him based on two games.

Beyond that, I dunno what to tell you. The statistics have said conclusively that your eyeballs are wrong, but you've made it very clear that that means nothing to you, so it is what it is. Anecdotal evidence tends to reinforce biases- that's human nature, but I wouldn't expect you to understand that anyways.

No, if that's what I said, you would have quoted me. that's two times.

What I said was Maroney really ran hard and had a noticeably consistent, effective game against San Diego. Since I had already noted it was his best performance I could remember, I decided to check his runs.

I did not need evidence. The evidence was, "I watched the game".

The fact that consistent running = consistent ground game is kind of self evident. Obviously, watching an inconsistent runner makes the running game seem inconsistent, that's kind of a self fulfilling situation.

Please, feel free to find another nit to pick based on your reinterpretation of what you didn't quote me on.

 

[SpiderFox53]

You have a right to believe whatever you want to believe my friend

If Maroney got his career average per rush for the amount of rushes that AP got per year, he'd have:

2007 999.6 yds
2008 1524.6 yds

There is a major factor working against this. Maroney doesn't get that amount of touches. He's been on an RB by committee team since he was drafted. AP has not. I choose to beleive this is by design on BB's part. The worst of the Maroney bashers beleive it is because LM stinks.

Nothing anybody says here is going to change anybody's mind. The only thing that will do that is LM perfoming on the field, or getting cut.

 

[BradyFTW!]

No, if that's what I said, you would have quoted me. that's two times.

I quoted you the first time, and I'll quote you again:

Yeah, I don't judge players on one game. I don't even judge them on statistically great games either. Usually it's better to trust what you see, then see if statistics back it up.

Interestingly, I did not chart every carry of his career, but i did for two games that inter3ested me.

You say in one paragraph that you wouldn't judge a player on one game, then in the next explain that your opinion on Maroney is supported by the two games that you cherrypicked for no good reason.

 

[BradyFTW!]

The fact that consistent running = consistent ground game is kind of self evident. Obviously, watching an inconsistent runner makes the running game seem inconsistent, that's kind of a self fulfilling situation.

Once again, I broke down every carry that Maroney had over the course of the 2007 season. He was an extremely consistent runner. Whatever you claim your eyeballs told you, it was pretty obviously wrong to anyone who was watching the games without an intense bias in place. I watched the games too, and I saw Maroney playing the role of a decisive, workhorse RB very effectively. And lo and behold, the stats validated my perception, as he finished the season with an extremely high success rate, and my carry-by-carry breakdown proved that he was *extremely* good at getting short and intermediate first downs on third down, in particular. Whether you're inclined to admit it or not, the simple, objective, undeniable fact is that he was effective at the very thing that you claim he can't do.

 

[SpiderFox53]

Re: Felger: Start Ben Jarvis Green Ellis

It's not a chicken little metality, he was a 1st round pick that has never really done anything, gaining 800 yards for the most prolific passing team of all time isn't impressive. He's been in the NFL 4 years now it's not like getting on a Rookie. RB is ussually a position people hid there stride in the 2nd year.
I've been down on Moroney for a couple of years. Honestly I'm suprised that there are people that don't think he's a bust.

I'll address only the bolded parts. 800 yards for a RB who gets less than half the carries for his team that has the most prolific passing attack of all time is VERY IMPRESSIVE The team just didn't run the ball that year.

He's been in the league for 3 years with one lost to injury, this will be the 5th game of his 4th year.

If you've been down on Maroney for a 'couple of year' that would include the year he got 4.5 yards per carry while getting less than half of the teams total attempts, that were very low because the team threw the ball all the damn time.

EDIT: I stand corrected, they did run the ball quite a bit. It just seemed like only a small amount due to the passing game. The point is still valid. LM got 40 carries fewer than the half the team total, and still ran for 800 yds at a 4.5 clip.

 

[BradyFTW!]

Re: Felger: Start Ben Jarvis Green Ellis

It's not a chicken little metality, he was a 1st round pick that has never really done anything, gaining 800 yards for the most prolific passing team of all time isn't impressive. He's been in the NFL 4 years now it's not like getting on a Rookie. RB is ussually a position people hid there stride in the 2nd year.
I've been down on Moroney for a couple of years. Honestly I'm suprised that there are people that don't think he's a bust.

If people expected Maroney to be Corey Dillon 2.0, then that's their problem. He wasn't drafted to be that, and he was never going to be that. From day one, Maroney has been part of a running back committee. I can't read Belichick's mind, but I think the reason why is pretty obvious: because he saw what 2004 did to Corey Dillon. There's a reason why the feature RB has gone the way of the dinosaur, and there's a reason why the few teams that still rely on a feature RB tend to do all of jack**** once the playoffs roll around. In the modern NFL, RBs can't absorb that kind of punishment over the course of a full season. Defenders are too big, the game is too fast, and the hits are too hard.

Seriously, when's the last time that a team won a SB on the strength of an offense that was driven by one workhorse RB? You could maybe make a case for 2004 with Dillon (and, as I mentioned before, that came at great cost to Dillon and, therefore the team over the next couple years), but other than that you're going back to 1998. Teams that rely on one RB to the extent that you guys want to see Maroney used have one thing in common- those RBs get hurt, the offense stalls, and they go out with a whimper in the playoffs. Don't believe me? Go look at the list of the top rushers in the NFL in each of the last few years, and let's talk about how their teams did once the playoffs rolled around, and they suddenly found that their top weapon was a shell of himself.

The standard that you guys are holding Maroney to is one that very, very few RBs achieve in the modern NFL. In fact, if you go back through all of the first-round RBs picked in the last 5 years, *most* of them will be busts by the standards that you've set up for Maroney, and a lot of those guys were picked 10-15 spots ahead of him. Let me know next time a team with a 1500 yard rusher wins a SB- I'm pretty sure that it won't be happening for a long, long time.

 

[FredFromDartmouth]

If Felger says start BJGE, then we most definitely NOT. Felger is a total fool and obnoxious to boot.

All during the preseason he was say how the Patriots should cut Ben Watson.

The Sports Hub should cut Felger. If I want to hear mean-spirited, ill-informed football talk (what little of it there is), I will tune into Jerry Callahan on WEEI.

 

[moosekill]

Belichick said the same thing, though. Not to say that Belichick would readily come out and rip Maroney- no, he'd just say nothing. He sure as hell wouldn't say that the team has had trouble blocking if that wasn't the case. When the starting LT and the head coach both go out of their way to touch upon the fact that the OL is having trouble blocking in these situations, then there's probably some basis for it.

Yep you sure are right, often as you listen to BB's press conferences he comes out and rips the players.

He isn't playing well this year, there is no way around it. Does it mean he sucks or won't ever play well again...nope sure doesn't. But he hasn't done anything this year and all of your ball washing of him won't change that.

 

[moosekill]

That's not what anyone's saying, either. After all, Maroney's had a great deal of success running behind this exact same line in the past. Clearly there is a shared issue between the line and Maroney, and whatever it is needs to get worked out so that we can really unleash our running game. Maroney is capable of running, and our line is capable of run blocking, so its' reasonable to expect that they'll get untracked. It's not reasonable to freak out because Maroney had a bad game against one of the best run defenses of all time.

Or the other possible answer is he isn't playing well this year, be it from an injury, poor conditioning or bad habits. Nah thats just plain crazy talk. I guess it could be that the o-line doesn't like him and refuses to block for him too, but I guess I'll go with the first answer.

 

[moosekill]

Belichick said the same thing, though. Not to say that Belichick would readily come out and rip Maroney- no, he'd just say nothing. He sure as hell wouldn't say that the team has had trouble blocking if that wasn't the case. When the starting LT and the head coach both go out of their way to touch upon the fact that the OL is having trouble blocking in these situations, then there's probably some basis for it.

Wrong again, he has repeatedly used what Matt Light said to counter what other ex players have said. That being his main counter argument to what Christian F. said.

 

[moosekill]

Finally, and I have said this before, I think Maroney is a good back who has played poorly so far this year, for whatever reason. I hope he plays better, and I would argue, returns to his past form. I never thought he was a bust and still don't, but boy he really has sucked so far this year.

 

[BradyFTW!]

Wrong again, he has repeatedly used what Matt Light said to counter what other ex players have said. That being his main counter argument to what Christian F. said.

You've completely misread what I said, but it doesn't really even matter, since we seem to pretty much agree- Maroney's a good back who has had a tough time getting on track this year.

 

[PatsWickedPissah]

Felger is an idiot.

Fact: Bruschi and Fauria have been critical of Maroney's 2009 play
Fact: Maroney had a poor game against the Ravinz, KR and rushing

Let's simply see how Lawrence does against the Donks. I for one will be rooting for him.