Lamar Jackson wasn't, isn't, and never will be better than Patrick Mahomes

[Wallcrawler]

This "Lamar Jackson is in the same league as Mahomes" nonsense on every football related show I see needs to stop.

Lamar Jackson, on the biggest stage, has now shit down his leg in both opportunities. Lamar is a player who has to have everything around him working perfectly to have success. Put him down 2 scores and ask him to carry the team, he cannot answer the bell.

There's a big difference between a running quarterback, and a quarterback who can run. Lamar Jackson and The Ravens ran 88 plays and put up 12 points.

Jackson attempted 59 passes, only threw one touchdown, but also threw two picks and lost a fumble. 12 points on 59 pass attempts should tell you all you need to know about Lamar as a QB when the lights are the brightest.

Nobody would bat an eye if before the game, soneone told us Pat would put the ball up 59 times. Matter of fact, id be pretty excited to see how many points and yards he would put up in that span of plays.

When things got bad for both QBs, you saw the odds on favorite to win the MVP this year get visible frustrated, press, and ultimately fold. He was nowhere to be seen trying to work out what was happening, rallying his team, he simply pouted on the sideline as his team fell further behind.

The reigning MVP had literally no quit. Its one thing to say after the fact, that we had faith all along, its quite another for that to be true.

Down 24, think about that for a moment. 24. Mahomes is captured, in that moment on the sideline saying we have everything we want. Everyones already counted us the **** out, so go do something special.

Then, to walk the walk after talking the talk, leading the team to 7 straight touchdowns and 8 scoring drives, throwing 5 touchdown passes, and displaying a fiery emotion that if you dont feel anything when you see this kid going nuts after a huge play, call the coroner, because youre already dead.

The two qbs could not be further apart. Jackson cannot hold Mahomes jock when it comes to putting the team on his back.

Lamar should consider signing with KC as a running back. Its the only way barring injury to Mahomes, that hes ever getting a ring.

Mahomes is the MVP. Its not even close. Lamar is a running back executing the halfback pass play about 20-25 times a game.

Jacksons first two years have ended with dud playoff performances.

Mahomes first two years as a starter sees his team hosting back to back AFC title games for a frachise that in its entire history never hosted a single one before he arrived.

[rabblerouser]

Originally Posted by Detoxing

oooh look at you releasing your inner ****.

No one takes those conversations seriously. No one. Not the talking heads on T.V, no one.

This may come as a shock to your apparently stupid ass, but there are 31 other teams in the league with fan bases who like to hear things other than Patrick Mahomes.

95% of the media is unison that Mahomes is not just the best in the league, but possibly the best EVER, and your whining ass managed to find a few conversations that DARED to compare MVP's.

Oh the horror. How dare a few people compare QB's.

You've invented your argument that no one has paid any attention to outside of Ravens fans and you're here to whine about it. JFC....

Where's your Mahomes vs Watson thread?

Your Mahomes vs Josh Allen or Baker Mayfield or any of these other mother****ers that people had the gall to compare to Mahomes.

Shut up you whiny bitch.

[ThaVirus]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

Cam originated the "**** it, Tyreek's down there somewhere" meme...

Dude was hucking deep ball to Steve Smith left, right and center. He wasn't much of a pure passer, but he had no fear and was willing to just launch it and let Smith go get it.

He didn't really do a lot of 'quarterbacking' in a 'read the defense and run a calculus' sort of thing. Frankly he NEVER really developed that skill set. But he embraced a gamblers mentality and played with his hair on fire.

Ultimately for his career he was a sub-60% passer with a pretty pedestrian Adjusted Y/A so he wasn't making up for low precision through an avalanche of downfield connections. He was Eli Manning with the ability to to run the football. That's valuable, but it's not what I would call a great pure passer.

But he was who you would ultimately hope Jackson could become. A guy who was never a truly good passer but who could threaten all parts of the field. And with his ability to do to that AND run the football, he makes defenses account for a lot.

Jackson simply doesn't threaten enough of the field as a passer. Even if he's a little more precise on the short stuff than Newton is, he's not a credible threat to challenge too many parts of the field so I think his ceiling is lower than Newtons in terms of team success.

It's not like he was out there chucking up 50/50 prayer balls every other snap. If he was we'd have seen him throw a lot more picks than he did. He seemed to understand when and where to be aggressive. Kind of reminds me of a less refined Ben Roethlisberger, actually, which makes sense because their career INT% is actually very similar: 2.6 for Roethlisberger and 2.7 for Newton. Stafford is at 2.4, Eli's at 3, Philip Rivers 2.6. Brett Favre is at 3.3 and he was a ****ing dog back in the 90s.

Plus I like the fact that Newton seemed to elevate his receiver's game. Steve Smith hadn't had a thousand yard season in years prior to Cam's arrival. His first year in Carolina propelled Steve back into that near-elite category. Greg Olsen was just doing OK and pretty much immediately he became a premier TE. The Panthers just never really surrounded him with great receiving talent. When Kelvin Benjamin, Ted Ginn and Devin Funchess are the best of the scrubs you've been throwing to, it's gotta be tough to settle in and become a truly great passer.

[DRM08]

I would say Cam's arm was a lot stronger than Lamar's. Cam's raw arm strength is fairly similar to Mahomes. Obviously Cam has never had the accuracy or field vision or ability to read defenses like Mahomes. But he had the physical talent. Lamar has pretty questionable arm strength IMHO.

[ThaVirus]

Cam was one of the most physically gifted QBs to ever come out, IMO. His arm was a cannon, you couldn't have asked for better size or a more perfect build, and he was fast as shit.

[ThaVirus]

I've said that I think Lamar Jackson is one of the most natural runners I've ever seen. He's impressive when he tucks it, but his arm is nothing special. I don't think even the staunchest Jackson defender would argue that his game from pocket doesn't leave a lot to be desired.

[DRM08]

Originally Posted by ThaVirus

Cam was one of the most physically gifted QBs to ever come out, IMO. His arm was a cannon, you couldn't have asked for better size or a more perfect build, and he was fast as shit.

Freak show athlete in general, no doubt about it!

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by ThaVirus

Cam was one of the most physically gifted QBs to ever come out, IMO. His arm was a cannon, you couldn't have asked for better size or a more perfect build, and he was fast as shit.

I agree with you w/ a minor quibble.

I've said for years that accuracy comes down to repeatability and repeatability comes down to biomechanics.

If you look at it from that perspective, then accuracy is a 'physical gift' in the same way short area quickness is. It's either something your body is blessed with or it isn't. You can't really do a hell of a lot to fix it - all you can do is disguise it through play-calling.

Cam simply never had much in the way of accuracy. He had the arm strenght to get the ball to places most guys couldn't and allow his WRs to adjust over the flight path and make plays on the ball. But shorter throws is where you see true precision come to play because there's just not enough flight for WRs to save marginal passes. That's why Brees and Brady have been so damn good as short passers - they are razor precise and so they can implement that short passing attack in a way few others can (especially combined with mental processing).

Cam Newton's sporadic accuracy would've made it virtually impossible for him to be a truly elite short passer. He simply couldn't run something like a WCO. And because of that, he's easier to adjust to and eventually figure out.

While he had a great deal many 'splash' gifts; the kinds of things that show out loudly in a combine, for example - he lacked the biomechanics for the repeatable deliveries that could've made him an accurate passer and thus a more difficult QB to adjust to.

[ThaVirus]

Originally Posted by DJ's left nut

I agree with you w/ a minor quibble.

I've said for years that accuracy comes down to repeatability and repeatability comes down to biomechanics.

If you look at it from that perspective, then accuracy is a 'physical gift' in the same way short area quickness is. It's either something your body is blessed with or it isn't. You can't really do a hell of a lot to fix it - all you can do is disguise it through play-calling.

Cam simply never had much in the way of accuracy. He had the arm strenght to get the ball to places most guys couldn't and allow his WRs to adjust over the flight path and make plays on the ball. But shorter throws is where you see true precision come to play because there's just not enough flight for WRs to save marginal passes. That's why Brees and Brady have been so damn good as short passers - they are razor precise and so they can implement that short passing attack in a way few others can (especially combined with mental processing).

Cam Newton's sporadic accuracy would've made it virtually impossible for him to be a truly elite short passer. He simply couldn't run something like a WCO. And because of that, he's easier to adjust to and eventually figure out.

While he had a great deal many 'splash' gifts; the kinds of things that show out loudly in a combine, for example - he lacked the biomechanics for the repeatable deliveries that could've made him an accurate passer and thus a more difficult QB to adjust to.

I do have a habit of not including accuracy under the umbrella of physical gifts, but perhaps you're right and I should start. I can't think of many QBs with accuracy concerns who turned pro and improved greatly in that aspect. Maybe Matt Stafford and Michael Vick?

And I guess you'd have to make the distinction between those who's accuracy issues are clearly a result of poor mechanics (like a Stafford) and a guy who just can't seem to hit the broad side of a barn (like a Josh Allen). I'm not sure where Cam falls on that spectrum. I've never been a fan of his throwing motion, that's for sure.

[DJ's left nut]

Originally Posted by ThaVirus

I do have a habit of not including accuracy under the umbrella of physical gifts, but perhaps you're right and I should start. I can't think of many QBs with accuracy concerns who turned pro and improved greatly in that aspect. Maybe Matt Stafford and Michael Vick?

And I guess you'd have to make the distinction between those who's accuracy issues are clearly a result of poor mechanics (like a Stafford) and a guy who just can't seem to hit the broad side of a barn (like a Josh Allen). I'm not sure where Cam falls on that spectrum. I've never been a fan of his throwing motion, that's for sure.

Vick never got more accurate - he's the kind of example I'm talking about where you just scheme around it. He never was worth a damn throwing underneath.

Reid got especially good at upping the reward on his throws without signficiantly upping the risk, thus making the expected ROI higher for him. He's a letter-perfect example of the kind of guy who simply never had the physical tools to be an accurate passer but who could be worked around.

Stafford is, IMO, more accurate than he gets credit for. When he'll just calm the !@#$ down and throw the ball, he generally throws it where he wants to. He's a guy who lets his brain sabotage him because he's just so damn aggressive even when discretion would've been the better part of valor. Some of his improvements came from simply knowing where to go with the ball and being more willing to take what he had instead of force passes that he didn't.

Ultimately that's why I wonder exactly what kind of ceiling Jackson has left. He MAKES smart decisions with the ball. His ego doesn't have him out there writing checks his arm can't cash so he can complete a nice percentage of balls by simply making the right throw.

So in a lot of ways I'd rather have a guy like Stafford who's processing CAN improve to a point that he's a genuinely dangerous passer. Jackson, OTOH, just can't make decisions much better than he's presently making them. He goes where he should with the ball. But when he's asked to make difficult throws in tough spots, he just doesn't have the tools to make 'em.

[FAX]

This is an interesting discussion (with a few glaring exceptions) ...

Generally, I use my eyes rather than stats when evaluating a QB. That's why I haven't been as impressed with Deshaun Wishkins as most people are. People talk about Mahomes' "surrounding cast" all the time, but where would Wishkins be without Hopkins, I ask you? I'm not a stats guy, but my guess is that Hopkins is personally responsible for 40% of Wishkins' QBR.

Besides being very selective in my choice of peyote button dealers, if I've learned one thing in my life it's looking for the Larry Bird Clutch Gene in a QB. If your guy has that, you're in better shape.

With that in mind, there's really only one current QB I'd take if I couldn't have Mahomes and it's Russell Wilson. You can keep your Cams and your Jacksons and your Vicks ... give me the guy who can get you the 2-minute drive TD when you absolutely need it.

We Chiefs fans are very fortunate in that respect.

FAX

[DRM08]

Originally Posted by FAX

This is an interesting discussion (with a few glaring exceptions) ...

Generally, I use my eyes rather than stats when evaluating a QB. That's why I haven't been as impressed with Deshaun Wishkins as most people are. People talk about Mahomes' "surrounding cast" all the time, but where would Wishkins be without Hopkins, I ask you? I'm not a stats guy, but my guess is that Hopkins is personally responsible for 40% of Wishkins' QBR.

Besides being very selective in my choice of peyote button dealers, if I've learned one thing in my life it's looking for the Larry Bird Clutch Gene in a QB. If your guy has that, you're in better shape.

With that in mind, there's really only one current QB I'd take if I couldn't have Mahomes and it's Russell Wilson. You can keep your Cams and your Jacksons and your Vicks ... give me the guy who can get you the 2-minute drive TD when you absolutely need it.

We Chiefs fans are very fortunate in that respect.

FAX

Yep, it's Wilson and Mahomes. Rest of the league is overpaying for their QB's when they give them top dollar. We're gonna see it with the likes of Prescott, Watson, Jackson, and others. We've already seen it with Stafford, Cousins, Carr, Jimmy G, etc.

The other legitimately great QB's are all old. That includes Rodgers, who has really showed signs of aging the last couple years. The others are flat-out ancient (Brady/Brees).

[PurpleRiders51]

Damn straight! **** Skip Bayless.

[eDave]

Lamar has peaked.

[suzzer99]

I always kind of wondered early in the season when Jackson was throwing those flip passes 50 yards downfield on a dime - is this really repeatable?

I had the same concerns over Mahomes flip passes - which were usually because he didn't have time/space to make his full delivery. And unlike last season, this season a lot of those missed the mark. But at the same time I also felt 100% confidence Mahomes would work to fix his delivery/footwork/movement in the pocket - to be more sound whenever he could.

I think Lamar will also work his ass off to fix his issues and I'm not going to sweat a pro-bowl skills challenge when the dude is probably still reeling at how his season ended and would rather be pretty much anywhere else (but you can't turn down your first pro-bowl).

But yeah the big question is how much of his accuracy problem is fixable. I guess we'll find out. One thing I know is the QBs I always feared were the ones like Manning, Elway, and now Mahomes - who could lead a huge comeback. Jackson has yet to prove he can be in that category.

[Trent Green GOAT]

What's the problem here? Other teams can and do have good quarterbacks.