Watching Some Tape - Landry Jones

Well, some would argue that there are different degrees of talent. For example, I am a talented football player. I was the most talented football player at my middle school. But if I were in the NFL, I would probably be among the least talented players there.

Brady threw 665 passes in college. Landry Jones threw 2,183. That's what I meant.

Sorry, that's what I thought the definition of determination was.

 

how would tom tom have looked behind our line the last 5 years,or anywhere else but NE? without spygate would tom even have won a SB? he hasen't since. marino never did. jim kelly never did. fran tarkington never did. brett farve won one.

alot depends less on talent then where they land sometimes. i agree cajun, even the UDFA's have talent. they didn't get this far by not having it. not many players even make that level, let alone get an NFL tryout.

i hope the kid at least is a viable choice when we need him and everything i've seen so far from him is pretty encouraging. he's not ben. he's not charlie. he's not lefty. he's landry jones. he's played on the big stage for a national power for 4 years as a starter. i loved the pick and until he shows me he can't do it, i'll just welcome him here as another pittsburgh steeler that i expect to win with.

i don't care who any of them were drafted ahead of or behind or what he did in college. he's playing for the best team in the land, all he has to do is play like it when asked.

 

He did have talent but a lot of mediocre quarterbacks that never accomplish anything in the NFL have talent too. In fact, some of them have more "talent" than Tom Brady. How many QBs had more arm strength, mobility and size than Joe Montana. What do you think differentiates quarterbacks with lesser talent and ability who go on to win Super Bowls from those that have all the so-called talent and ability in the world and suck? Football IQ obviously plays into it, but why do you want to discount heart, desire and effort? I'll put it this way. With some players the switch gets turned on at some point and they blossom into very good or great football players. With others the switch stays off and they muddle in the land of mediocrity for their entire careers. Heart, desire and effort are the catalysts that turn on the switch.

 

Why was Casey Hampton better than Chris Hoke?

I love Chris Hoke. He was one of my favorite players. Everyone knows he had a bigger heart and a bigger drive than my man Big Snack. But Casey was still always better, because he had more talent. Heart and hustle is what I built my game off of, personally. I don't want to discount it. My favorite players are the ones with the best motors and best sportsmanship. And it makes a difference. But it's still just one aspect, along with arm strength, accuracy, IQ, mobility, etc. It's one part. Without it (Jamarcus Russell, Jonathan Dwyer), your career suffers. But even if you have it, but you don't have something else - say throwing accuracy - your career will suffer.

 

It may be semantics at this point, but heart and desire are EXACTLY the reason Chris Hoke had a solid NFL career. A lot of players with Hoke's talent level bounce around and are out of the league in a short period of time. Obviously, the situation a player finds himself in means a lot too. So the formula is, talent+heart+desire+effort+situation=success.

By the way, now that Big Snack is gone any chance you pull a Blast Furnace (formerly known as TomlinEra) and change your moniker? :???:

 

I'm just glad you're here so I don't have to wonder if the whole world is crazy or just me.

 

Gone? He's still big, idn't he? I'll change it when he's Little Snack.

Don't hold your breath.

I agree with your formula, but I don't give each part equal weight. I'd say it's 60% talent, 20% situation, and 20% split among the rest, which are all more or less the same thing in my opinion. ***And I reserve the right to change those numbers later, because I put absolutely no thought into them just now.

 

Yet we always say of Hines Ward that he has the heart of a lion which enabled him to excel when receivers who obviously were more talented (by most objective standards) often failed. Why is it okay to talk about the heart and desire Hines has but when we get into a conversation about how important heart and desire is you can't believe the conversation is taking place? Obviously you've got to have some talent and ability or you wouldn't have the opportunity to play at the highest level to begin with, but the only point I'm trying to make is that you can be somewhat limited from a talent and ability standpoint and make up for it by working harder and wanting it more than the other guy. What's so hard to understand about that?

 

Of course you can make up for it some, but only so much. Just like talent without effort will only get you so far, heart and desire and effort will only get you so far without superior talent. That's how Casey Hampton was able to eat doughnuts for 9 months, roll out of bed, and immediately be better than Chris Hoke, who worked harder every one of those days in between. Hines didn't get where he did on heart alone. He was loaded up to his eyeballs with talent. What makes him a special case (besides his heart) is that his talent lied in places less conventional than normal.

Football is so complicated, but if you think of it as something simpler, like sprinting, I think it's easier to understand. By training 8 hours a day and accepting coaching and monitoring your nutrition, you can make yourself faster and improve your times. But some guys will just be faster than you anyway, even if they don't train at all and eat fast food all day, and you will never, ever catch them. If the faster, lazy guy had the other guy's heart, he could be even better. But as it is, the hardworking slower guy will just never get there. And you don't get to be at Tom Brady's level (screw you all for making me say this, by the way) on effort alone. As others have pointed out, he has the situation going for him too (put him behind Kemo and Mahan and Stapleton and see how he does), but a good OL and heart doesn't make you that good. Talent does.

 

No I wasn't, but all I hear from everyone on this board is that he was the most intelligent and handsome board member of all time.

 

mclendon shows me heart like hoke and he will succeed because of it. hoke had a near perfect starting win percentage. was he just not as good or just loyal in the wrong place?

 

He was outstanding, and if he'd left he probably could have started on any other 3-4 team. But Casey was still the best in the biz. That's just my opinion. It'll be easy to remember Casey as a fat oaf, but we should remember that he was one of the most dominant players in the league for a really long time. Hoke did more than just hold down the fort, but I don't think he was ever as dominant as Casey.

 

casey was really dominant early in his career, then he gained to much weight. there were years he just wasen't that dominant too. i wish he had stayed around 325-330, that was the dominant casey. he probably could have extended his career here. i think it took a toll on him at 350-375. he also lost alot of his quickness which made him more dominant then others.

maybe casey was the better player but it's hard to say. we won on a steady pace when hokie started. i'm glad we had both.

 

One of points I was trying to make, being extremely close to the OU program, was that Landry Jones would have an better chance fitting in to a system like New England, where Brady seems to have all day to throw and had a go to guy like Welker, as opposed to what Ben has had to go through. This is a classic example of why I try to stay away from these types of boards, not being a "regular" seems to lend an idea that someone else doesn't have some insight and the capability to spell correctly. Thanks for your time, I'm sure there are other Steeler fans around that I can have a decent conversation with.

 

Nope, wasn't you.

 

Just dont see this kid being on our roster 3 years from now.....Wasted pick!!!

 

OR...he may be our starter 3 or 4 years from now...GREAT PICK! (If that happens)

 

We will see....My guess...BUST.....Dont think he is a NFL QB....JMO,,,,,ICBW!!!!

 

we should have charlie back by then. they called the nursing home to see if he could come out on sundays.