lamafist
Rotational Player and Threatening Starter's Job
- Joined
- Jul 26, 2008
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Re: Temporary WR Solution
This is really just crazy talk.
Maroney isn't a receiver. If he has any experience as a WR, it was in high school. In college, he wasn't even much of a receiving back, as that wasn't really part of their offense. On the Pats, he's caught some screens and dumpoffs, and maybe a ball or two in the flats, but he's *not* a route-running back like Faulk.
See, before it even comes to a question of whether he's got "good hands" or not, he needs to be able to get open. That means he needs to learn the passing tree, he needs to learn how to run crisp routes, he needs to learn how to make sight reads from the coverage he sees, he needs to learn how to get a clean release at the line of scrimmage, he needs to learn to wait 'til the last second to snatch a ball, so as not to telegraph to the DB when to knock it away, and he needs to learn how to shield the ball with his body when going up into the air.
And there's more. And after he learns all that stuff, he needs to practice it until he can do it at game speed, because, sure, maybe he has a better capacity for "good hands" than Aiken, but considering he hasn't been developing them his whole time in the NFL and college, they're not going to be very good right now.
And as for our CB's -- that might be more of a natural transition, but it's still going to take a lot of practice time to get them remotely comfortable in the offense, and, let's be honest here, I think our secondary is going to need all their practice time to work at, you know, defending passes.
Now, you mention Stanback as an example of how you wouldn't be surprised by any player switching positions at this point. Well, look how long it's taken Stanback to make the transition from college QB to NFL WR. This is his third year in the league, and he's still not all the way there.
So while I agree that getting guys like Maroney, Faulk and Taylor more involved in the passing game is a good idea, if it happens, it's going to be, for the most part, coming out of the backfield -- except for Faulk, who, has a limited number of WR-type routes under his belt. But even then, he works best when he starts behind Brady and motions out wide, as it makes it more likely that he has a LB covering him.
This is really just crazy talk.
Maroney isn't a receiver. If he has any experience as a WR, it was in high school. In college, he wasn't even much of a receiving back, as that wasn't really part of their offense. On the Pats, he's caught some screens and dumpoffs, and maybe a ball or two in the flats, but he's *not* a route-running back like Faulk.
See, before it even comes to a question of whether he's got "good hands" or not, he needs to be able to get open. That means he needs to learn the passing tree, he needs to learn how to run crisp routes, he needs to learn how to make sight reads from the coverage he sees, he needs to learn how to get a clean release at the line of scrimmage, he needs to learn to wait 'til the last second to snatch a ball, so as not to telegraph to the DB when to knock it away, and he needs to learn how to shield the ball with his body when going up into the air.
And there's more. And after he learns all that stuff, he needs to practice it until he can do it at game speed, because, sure, maybe he has a better capacity for "good hands" than Aiken, but considering he hasn't been developing them his whole time in the NFL and college, they're not going to be very good right now.
And as for our CB's -- that might be more of a natural transition, but it's still going to take a lot of practice time to get them remotely comfortable in the offense, and, let's be honest here, I think our secondary is going to need all their practice time to work at, you know, defending passes.
Now, you mention Stanback as an example of how you wouldn't be surprised by any player switching positions at this point. Well, look how long it's taken Stanback to make the transition from college QB to NFL WR. This is his third year in the league, and he's still not all the way there.
So while I agree that getting guys like Maroney, Faulk and Taylor more involved in the passing game is a good idea, if it happens, it's going to be, for the most part, coming out of the backfield -- except for Faulk, who, has a limited number of WR-type routes under his belt. But even then, he works best when he starts behind Brady and motions out wide, as it makes it more likely that he has a LB covering him.