BUSTastic! JaMarcus Russell Benched

[Tailback U]

And Gradkowski gives the Raiders a win today over the Bengals.

Perfect. Hopefully we'll never see JaMarcus Russell again.

[NAHSTE]

Best Kanye beat?

What's odd is if you go back and look at draft information and projections from before the year Russel was like a 3rd-4th Round guy. He stayed that way a majority of the season....then LSU started taking the ball out of his hand, running the ball 35-40 times a game, only throwing it 25 times or so a game and started winning.. Russel then somehow became "good" all of a sudden to people..even though LSU's strategy and own scouting told them the opposite.

Then the Sugar Bowl all of a sudden turned into Quinn vs Russel for the top pick in the draft/top Qb taken..how the hell that happened I have no idea. It seemed like noone paid attention to LSU until they were winning and assumed this huge freak of a player with a cannon arm was the difference when it wasn't. He goes on and plays an unimpressive Sugar Bowl against an overmatched defense and all of a sudden he's the top pick?

I'd still love to sit down with a scout and ask them what Russell was showing at the end of the year that made him a Top 10 pick compared to what he was showing prior to the season/in the early season when he was being projected at somewhere around the 3rd-4th round.

Not sure if I'd say nobody paid attention, we lost both of our games on nat'l TV that year. And I also think JaMarcus was a guaranteed first rounder based on arm strength alone. And he did finish 3rd in the NCAA in passer rating, so it's not like nobody had heard of him.

He actually shouldered the offense several times throughout his career. I've never seen a better 2 minute QB. He seemed like he was only good when we were in a huge hole though. Usually a hole he got us in.

But he could work some magic in the no huddle. This was before he ballooned to 290 and joined a moribund offense.

[FirstTimer]

He actually shouldered the offense several times throughout his career.

The thing is though when he shoulded the offense his junior year he usually didn't perform that well.

He seemed like he was only good when we were in a huge hole though. Usually a hole he got us in.

Kind of the point I was making...and that helps him rack up easy completion and stats that lead to a QB being 3rd in the nation in passer rating..when he really isn't that good of a passer.

But he could work some magic in the no huddle.

Agreed but IMO it's because he was facing more vanilla coverages and facing a lot of prevent/soft coverages in those situations more than it was Russell making tight accurate throws.

[NAHSTE]

The thing is though when he shoulded the offense his junior year he usually didn't perform that well.


Kind of the point I was making...and that helps him rack up easy completion and stats that lead to a QB being 3rd in the nation in passer rating..when he really isn't that good of a passer.


Agreed but IMO it's because he was facing more vanilla coverages and facing a lot of prevent/soft coverages in those situations more than it was Russell making tight accurate throws.

Multi quotes? JaMarcus v. Quinn debates? Is this MM? And yeah, you're right, those situations are usually base level athleticism. Whenever there was no time for coaching, and he could just fly by the seat of his pants, he'd thrive. When you asked him to sit in a room and dissect coverages for hours, he'd likely shy away. He was always a moment guy, and you can't just show up and turn it on like that in the NFL.

I was wrong about him for sure. But he led game winning 4th quarter drives in Knoxville and Tuscaloosa in his career, and led a winning drive vs. Ole Miss in his last home game.

[GoChargers]

Anyone else notice this - With 33 seconds left in the game just before Oakland's kickoff when scores were locked at 17-17.. The camera cut to Russell and Gradkowski reading off the clip board, Russell was listening to his ipod and bouncing his head up and down to the music. Pretty funny - probably wasn't paying any attention.