Yea, didn't mean to bombard you. But I think that kind of criticism is what Jalen stans are talking about when they point out how its getting to be a little much. I think we likely agree with most things when it comes to Jalen though.
Alabama QB competition article
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Yea, didn't mean to bombard you. But I think that kind of criticism is what Jalen stans are talking about when they point out how its getting to be a little much. I think we likely agree with most things when it comes to Jalen though.
Pat yourself on the back for that one.
I know you don't, because you've made Hurts into a villain. Everything he does is bad, he injures Alabama players, his efforts steer Alabama towards losses (just paraphrasing what you said), etc...
This has become, for some, a game of how many bad things can you come up to say about Hurts. So you just toss every good thing he did in the trash, call it a fluke, or discredit it, and harp about all the horrible things you can come up with. It goes too far, the dude didn't beat up Alabama players. The guy played a lot of good games. He struggled some with passing, he had some bad games, but it's absolutely ridiculous to take away all his accomplishments because for some reason, he's become a personal affront to you.
Let me give an example. Jacob Coker, he actually had positive rushing yards, so not the worst Alabama runner. In his senior season he logged 74 rushes for 68 yards and 2 TDs.
Remember, they count sacks as a rush attempt.
Now, what did Jalen Hurts do? He rushed the ball for 137 times, for 768 yards and 8 TDs last season. Now, your argument that he's taking away touches from the incredible RBs when he ran, is overlooking how much more productive his running was than, for instance Coker. If you do a little math you start to see how big it was. So Coker managed 68 yards on 74 rushes right? Let's subtract that and the 2 TDs.
We get, 700 yards and 6 TDs on 69 attempts. That's over 10 yards per rush and almost 1 TD every 10 rushes. Alabama's running backs are good, but they're not that good.
At the end of the day, Coker and Hurts accounted for almost exactly the same amount of yards and TDs as each other. Now, Hurts did that in less plays though (backup played more, etc...). I'm not saying Hurts is better than Coker mind you, but to discount what he did with his legs, is absolutely ridiculous. Sure he could have run a bit less, but he was an effective runner, and a 9 yard run beats the heck out of a 1 yard run, while not taking a sack is better than taking one. But Hurts deserves no credit (unless it is for something bad) so it doesn't matter what I say.
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And this is why I still think you just might be Jalen's dad. I have never ever said that Jalen was a villain. I have repeatedly said he is a great kid and a heck of an athlete. And I am not discounting what he can do with his legs. I am just saying I wish he wouldn't so often. I wish you had taught him back as a younger child to read offenses and anticipate openings and throw the ball to where the receiver is going to be when he comes open. I wish you had taught him that it is a little more diplomatic to hand the ball off to a RB when the read on a read-option is for the RB to get the ball, and when in doubt, go ahead and let the RB get the attempt. That's what he is there for, after all. Or maybe you could have had him play RB instead, since that seems to be what he does better. I will tell you what I don't want. That is for us to lose any more recruits due to players looking at what we do on offense and deciding that they will get to showcase their skills better at other schools with a different QB. And if you don't think that our offensive performance last year cost us some offensive recruits (not to mention nearly lost us some we had from the year before), then I don't know what to tell you.
What doesn't show up in Jalen's rushing yards is how many of those runs that went for 10-15 could have actually been passes for 20-25 yards and TDs.
Too many times on replays you can see him tuck an run and get yardage...sometimes a big chunk of it...but at the expense of throwing the ball to someone who was wide open.
BTW, I'm not Calvin Riddley's dad, but I felt his pain too many times last year!
Too many times on replays you can see him tuck an run and get yardage...sometimes a big chunk of it...but at the expense of throwing the ball to someone who was wide open.
BTW, I'm not Calvin Riddley's dad, but I felt his pain too many times last year!
He's already receiving criticism as a passer, that's included in the criticism. We can see his passing stats. We get that he didn't throw for 3,000 yards last season. The fact is that his rushing does offset that downside somewhat though, you can't go double on complaining about his bad passing. I mean RedWave already said his good passes were flukes, so instead of a bad pass he made a good run right? That still counts for something, which is my point.
You can criticize Hurts, and correctly so on a lot of things, without taking away credit for what he did do. The guy still ranked 7th out of over 100 ranked QBs in total QBR. He was still 20th out of over 100 QBs in passer efficiency. He had issues, but he was productive most of the time. He should have developed better as a passer, and run less, sure, no argument there. But, when he ran into the end zone for a touchdown, that still helped the team. It wouldn't have been better if he just got sacked or threw an incompletion.
I agree Tua should be the starter, but I'm puzzled at how many different ways there are to come up with how to discredit Hurts and his accomplishments. Would people really have preferred Cooper Bateman? Let's just get a guy who was a worse passer and a worse runner, then may be they would have been happy?
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That's what I'm saying.
I agree, as you say, sometimes he made something out of nothing. Sometimes his runs were for positive yards when there was literally nobody open.
But there were plenty (too many) of times he ran for nothing, threw it out of bounds, or got a few yards when he missed somebody wide open for a TD or big chunk play. All QBs will miss some open guys, but Jalen missed guys regularly and what was even more puzzling is it looked like he saw some guys who were open but he still ran it.
Actually, what I tried to say(and did so poorly) was that I saw enough of the bad passes/lack of reads/running instead that when he throws a good pass I wonder where that came from and why can't just do more of that.
Jalen's inability to see the open wr and get the ball to him left a lot of points on the table. Though he may have gotten some yardage with his legs. Many times it didn't result in points on the board or move the chains like it should have. Whether it was Danielson or Todd Blackledge, I can't tell you how many times after a play where Jalen tucked it and ran. They would cue the crew to replay and point out one (and many times two) open receivers Jalen completely didn't see (but should have) streaking open. That if he would have made the right read would have more than certainly resulted in a huge chunk play or a td. Rather he'd tuck the ball and run, possibly getting minimal yardage compared to what we could have gotten with the right read. Comparing stats of other Bama quarterbacks doesn't give the accurate picture of how much Jalen hindered the offense. Looking at the missed reads and plays/yardage/potential points left on the field is where that becomes overwhelmingly obvious.
Yep. And not to mention the read options where handing the ball to the RB was the right read but he kept it himself.
I agree that the stats are not really Jalen's problem since his legs make up for some of his passing problems. Jalen's real problem isn't his stats. It is his inability to make passing plays under duress, he is not able to throw receivers open, he is not able to anticipate when/where a receiver will break open based on routes and coverages, and he is simply not able to make decisions quickly enough against elite defenses.
I agree he hindered the offense some time in some respects. But the argument that he was a massive obstacle to Alabama's offensive success basically is arguing Alabama had an offensive juggernaut that was far better than any other Alabama offense before (including when they had AJ) and he screwed that all up.
So, it goes beyond comparing him to other Alabama quarterbacks (none of which are perfect), but to other Alabama offenses. Here's the yards per game average.
2017: 444
2016: 455
2015: 427
2014: 484
2013: 454
2012: 445
2011: 429
2010: 444
2009: 403
2008: 355
2007: 373
Now, I will concede that there were times Hurts hindered the offense. There were times he was very productive though. It's really hard to look at those numbers and go sure, no Hurts and Alabama is going to be averaging 500 yards per game. I'd love it, I hope Tua can do that, but more likely we're probably talking 10-30 yards per game. Which isn't good, that's a lot to leave on the field, but there's no massive drop off there to be found. His running ability did largely offset what he cost Alabama in the passing game, if it didn't then you'd likely have seen more of a nosedive.
Hurts needs to develop more as a passer. Early last season it looked like he was moving in the right direction and then he took a step back. No question his lack of ability as a passer cost Alabama in some big games. Not denying that, I'm just not comfortable with the narrative that he was a liability (all the time). Is he as good as Tua? No, is he as good as Coker? May be not. Was he still productive and helpful most of the time? Absolutely.
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I think to ensure we're on the same page. The games in which we're talking about are those three maybe four games per year in which Bama plays defenses that have the ability to make Bama "dribble left handed". The other games it didn't matter. Jalen, Tua, heck YOU OR ME could walk up to the LOS and tell the defense what we're running and we'd over power them. In most games Bama is in a position of such talent superiority that what we're discussing doesn't even come into play.
This is why I don't think looking at overall season stats and averages gives an accurate picture. It's the plays not made (that should have been) in the three/four games a year in which Bama was actually challenged, that I think his impact on the offense stands out. Too many three and outs and stalled drives due to misreads and wrong decisions. We saw the perfect example of both sides of the coin in the title game. The first half was a perfect picture of what hindered us in the tough games and the second half was one of what it should have been when a quarterback in our offense is able to make the right reads and execute those reads.
This is why I don't think looking at overall season stats and averages gives an accurate picture. It's the plays not made (that should have been) in the three/four games a year in which Bama was actually challenged, that I think his impact on the offense stands out. Too many three and outs and stalled drives due to misreads and wrong decisions. We saw the perfect example of both sides of the coin in the title game. The first half was a perfect picture of what hindered us in the tough games and the second half was one of what it should have been when a quarterback in our offense is able to make the right reads and execute those reads.
I think that's fair and here's kind of how I thought about it. Most of the time, if Hurts missed a guy 30 yards downfield, he was going to get to that point of the field anyway. Run, pass, what ever, he usually was going to make it down the field. So, the times that sort of thing was really crucial, was when there was almost no margin of error. Then, when he missed a guy 30 yards downfield, they might have to punt, so it's almost as bad as an interception. I get that, I just think that sometimes people don't realize how much Hurts did actually contribute to the offense.
That got me thinking, I wanted to see what an offense does look like with truly great and truly terrible QB play. Auburn seemed like the best example, so we can both marvel at Alabama's amazing consistency at the position (in terms of productivity) and Auburn's amazing inconsistency. I'm going to add the leading passers to underline the point.
2017: 451 Stidham
2016: 440 White
2015: 369 Johnson
2014: 485 Marshall
2013: 501 Marshall
2012: 305 Frazier
2011: 337 Trotter
2010: 499 Newton
2009: 432 Todd
2008: 302 Burns
2007: 335 Cox
I feel pretty lucky after looking at that.
You are still operating under the assumption that I view Jalen as a bad kid, the devil, or not a good athlete, while I have never said such a thing. Look, I want you to look at the link I provided earlier again, and let's talk about his runs. All told, he averaged a very good 5.55 yards per rush for the season. Jalen is also very good at making the occasional long run that causes us all to celebrate. But, I love numbers, so let's look one step closer here. Let's go look at each game just from 2017 and back his long run out of his total and see what his yards per carry is. After doing that, he still has 3 games where his ypc average is over 5. However, he has 7 games where that number is under 3 ypc(and in 4 of those, it was less than 2). In those 7 games, he carried the ball a staggering 88 times, while averaging less than three yards in those games. In those same 7 games, Damien Harris only ran the ball 81 times(average of 7.41 yards on the season). Do you want to guess how many times his yards per carry in those particular games was less than 3? None, not even when we back out his longest as well(which is only fair since I backed out Jalen's longest too). In fact, he only has one game under 3 yards per carry, and that was against UGA, the game when all of the freshmen took over. I didn't take the time to consider yards by N. Harris, Bo, Robinson, or Jacobs. But what these numbers tell me is that, yes, Jalen can make some really good runs and is a great athlete, but distributing a lot of those runs of his to other players on the team would have likely yielded better results. Harris's 1000 yard season might have been closer to 1600, or perhaps Bo or N Harris would have gotten those carries instead. For the record, if we back out the long in each game, for the whole season, Jalen does have a respectable 3.72 yards per carry. Damien's average by the same method is 4.76.
Now, I am aware there are plays where the defense truly covered all the receiving patterns and Jalen had no choice but to run, and I do not fault him when that was really the case. But him failing to see open receivers quite often and running instead has already been well documented.
And that's it in a nutshell. All the other stuff is pointless. Tua is just a better qb.
Oh, there's no doubt Jalen brought a lot of positives to the offense. He's a very talented college quarterback and better than the majority. The problem (and I think we both have said this over the past year or so) is that the type offense we were running and wanted to run didn't maximize the strength's Jalen brought to the table. It actually did the opposite. So the success he did have within our offense is a compliment to him. Remember, he came to Bama to learn to be a pro style quarterback. Tua came to Bama already a pro style quarterback. Jalen's flaws in our offense were the things he came to bama to learn how to do. Tua could and can already do them. Hence the offense beginning to roll in the second half of the title game.
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I already alluded to this, but you can not compare a running back's running numbers head to head with a quarterback. This is because they count sacks, scrambles, hurries, etc... all together. So, Harris gets handed the ball on his run, but Hurts runs might in fact be with a defender about to sack him.
That's why I used Coker as an example and showed the difference, because every QB has to scramble sometimes, and it hurts the numbers. You did allude to this, but I'll do it again but with a less proficient runner. GMac in his senior season ran the ball 60 times for -12 yards and 1 TD. You subtract those "necessary" QB scrambles from what Hurts did last season and you get 75 rushes for 780 yards and 7 TDs. That once again comes out to over ten yards per rush, and roughly 1 TD every 10 rushes.
I started the season out saying I wanted him to throw more and run less. I'm not arguing that he should have run that much, but I am saying it was still often productive when doing it. I can't see it as oh he's a bad passer and he shouldn't have run the ball either. His running was unquestionably a weapon, that part is clear, he just, unfortunately did lean on it too much.
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I am going to say this and be finished with this thread. IMO, Coach Saban owes it to Jalen to let him know where he stands in the competition with Tua so he and his father can make an informed decision before fall camp. Playing him randomly and in mop up is not fair to Jalen. I agree with all who say that Tua has better QB skills, so what is wrong with letting Jalen get on with his career at another program? I would certainly think more highly of Coach Saban if he does the right thing by Jalen. It is obviously not our decision and what will happen will happen. If Jalen and his father truly want him to get a shot as an NFL QB then he needs to go ahead transfer and make the most of a fresh start at a new program.
If Saban has made up his mind, I agree. But I have watched Saban (and Meyer) really struggle with this in the past. I believe that it is entirely possible that Saban has not made up his mind at this point.
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