Excerpt from MMQB: Let Goff sit...

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Let Goff Sit (Just Look at Bortles), Still Plenty to Worry About for Packers

Plus, a solution to the London games and Thursday Night Football debacles and more heading into Week 8


An apology to loyal reader(s): I was on vacation Friday and Saturday this week, so this Gameday 10 Things is slightly abbreviated (it was mostly written in the car while two kids shrieked with joy about a trip to Sesame Place, and two adults shrieked in pain about driving on the Jersey Turnpike during Friday rush hour).

1. I understand why Rams fans want Jared Goff under center when they return from their bye week to host the Panthers next week. You’re not only tired of watching Case Keenum, but you’re tired of watching Case Keenum and then hearing from analysts how two interceptions weren’t Keenum’s fault but also ignore the four other throws that absolutely should have been intercepted but instead fell incomplete.

We’ll see if there’s fire with the smoke of Steve Wyche's report that the Rams are getting Goff ready. But it’s not a surprise if Goff isn’t ready yet. While the NFL has borrowed elements of the Air Raid offense, it isn’t an NFL offense. Goff’s time at Cal, unlike Carson Wentz’s time at North Dakota State, didn’t prepare him to run an NFL offense. He needed to be programmed, and that’s fine. I’ve run this list out about 14 times (and I’ve only written about 30 of these columns), but these are quarterbacks who also sat for a lengthy amount of time to begin their NFL careers: Tony Romo (three-plus years), Aaron Rodgers (three years), Philip Rivers (two years), Tom Brady (one-plus year), Drew Brees (one year), Carson Palmer (one year), Eli Manning (half a year).

So all the Goff questions we get around here: Is Jared Goff a bust?, Is it fair to say the Rams should have taken Carson Wentz since Jared Goff can’t even beat out Case Keenum? On a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being the worst bust of all time and 10 being merely the worst bust of the last decade, how would you rate Jared Goff? Jared Goff is clearly not good at football. Sorry, I forgot to ask a question. Just because he’s not playing doesn’t mean he won’t be good. There’s no such thing as “too late” for a developing quarterback to ascend to the starting role (maybe for the head coach’s tenure, but not for the QB’s development). And you can do real damage by sending a guy out there too early. For instance…

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2. Bad habits of rookie quarterbacks can be corrected on the practice field. It becomes much more difficult in the games. Sometimes it’s that the QB doesn’t want to be embarrassed in front of millions of fans, so he falls back on the things he’s comfortable doing rather than the things he should be doing. A lot of times it’s simply a matter of, once the proverbial bullets start flying, adrenaline flows and instinct and muscle memory take over. So if that young quarterback hasn’t been fully reprogrammed before he gets on the field, he regresses.

Which brings us to Blake Bortles. You might have noticed something about Bortles. He wasn’t a very good passer as a rookie. He was better last year, his second season. And now in Year 3, he has regressed to an almost unbelievable degree. If you made a line chart of his game-by-game performance through two-and-a-half seasons, it would somehow spell the words “GETTING CRAPPIER.” His mechanics look like a piece of found footage in a horror movie about a small town that is haunted by the murderous ghost of a deceased quarterbacks coach. He saw the flawed mechanics on film so many times that he went mad and… ate his own brain, or something. (Whatever, the bones are there. Look for it next Halloween.)

Now I’m just piling on. But honestly, Bortles’ throwing motion looks like Pete Townshend playing “Pinball Wizard.” And it would be one thing if Bortles were simply a limited athlete. He’s not. His mechanics should have been correctable. The only thing I could think of is that he can’t get comfortable with the mental aspects of the game.

A couple years ago I asked a veteran who had played with Tim Tebow something along the lines of “Hey, y’know how Tebow can’t throw it right? Like, what’s up with that?” The answer was basically: Tebow can absolutely throw accurately and with proper mechanics during drills. When he gets in the game, he has no idea what he’s looking at with all the moving parts. His mechanics fall apart because it’s not muscle memory, and he has no confidence in whether or not the area he’s throwing to will be open. (It’s not a “smart or dumb” question, it’s just whether or not the quarterback has the brain type to be able to process defenses.)

Anyway, back to Bortles. The Jags were talking up a redshirt year the moment they drafted him in 2014. Then they changed course and threw him into the fire. Maybe Bortles would have struggled regardless. Maybe the fact that he had to be rebuilt as far as throwing mechanics while simultaneously learning to read NFL defenses were too much to handle, not unlike Tebow. Maybe Bortles can still be salvaged. But looking back, and looking at what he is now, I can’t help but think that a redshirt year (or even two) might have done him a world of good.