Once again, instead of studying for the two exams I have tomorrow or at least doing my homework that's due, I find myself back on MHR for the third or fourth time today. And MHR, you're breaking my heart.

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So this weekend on a trip out to Portland to the Steve Hunt Classic NPDA (that's parliamentary debate for you lay types) tournament, we switched off the house/dub-step for a bit right around Tri-Cities or The Dalles and caught everyone's favorite team-wrecker on an interview on xm radio's comedy station.

Oh shit you better jump there's a bar right here.

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Decided to stop by and ask if anyone else'd seen the sheer idiocy on the NFL network yesterday...

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I'm bored senseless in Moral Ethics right now so I thought I'd post my (roughly) quarterly fanpost. I don't feel like I have many  fanpost-worthy ideas very often so I like to keep my thoughts confined to the comments sections, but like I said this class is boring me to death. While a bit premature, the thesis is based on my assumption that we sign Jamal Williams today.

Since the '97 season was when, at a ripe age of seven years old, I first found my love for the Broncos (and was subsequently rewarded with two SB wins), I tend to see everything Broncos through a '97-tinted lens. So my question is this: if we sign Jamal Williams, will he be as Neil Smith was for us or as Gilbert Brown was for the Pack? The answer might surprise you...

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First, this from a post I made after the Colts game. I'm sure most of you remember it--there was quite the lively discussion:

On a second and ten he appeared to make a great slip out of a collapsing pocket, only to run out of bounds short of the first down. When I was streaming the video in the first half he rolled out on a boot and did a similar thing--made it back to the LOS and ran out of bounds with a solid two-yard cushion between him and the nearest defender. Those two are indicative of willingness to sacrifice for the win--and of course I have to juxtapose the Elway Helicopter with that. Come on, Orton, Elway had over a decade on you, was playing against a hard-nosed D rather than a finesse one, and he still took the punishment. Granted the game was more important, but still...

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and while drifting in and out of sleep throughout the second half, it seems very, very clear that KO is not our answer at QB. Maybe we sign him to a short-term deal while McD trains Brandstater but that's the longest he lasts in Denver IMO. On a second and ten he appeared to make a great slip out of a collapsing pocket, only to run out of bounds short of the first down. When I was streaming the video in the first half he rolled out on a boot and did a similar thing--made it back to the LOS and ran out of bounds with a solid two-yard cushion between him and the nearest defender. Those two are indicative of willingness to sacrifice for the win--and of course I have to juxtapose the Elway Helicopter with that. Come on, Orton, Elway had over a decade on you, was playing against a hard-nosed D rather than a finesse one, and he still took the punishment. Granted the game was more important, but still...

More fundamentally, Orton (and our piss-poor first-half run blocking--how many times did Weigmann double a DT just to have an LB shoot right by him!? this is not a big D line, no one needs to be doubled!) was the primary reason that we didn't win. You have your defense holding Peyton Manning et alia to 27 yards in 7 possessions across three quarters, generating THREE turnovers during the course of all that, giving you an (approximated) average field position pretty close to midfield, and you put up 16 points total!? According to Logan, he seemed to be under-throwing/throwing behind his receivers all half, and no better example of that is the goalline INT. You have a 6-3 receiver with SEVEN INCHES AND FIFTY POUNDS on the guy in one-on-one coverage with him and you put up a jump ball that the DB can snag? Granted Marshall fell but the way Dave told it made it seem like that ball was nowhere near the height necessary to get it up and above the CB.

Dunno if anyone's noticed but this is the first time I've gotten on board with the 'Orton is not the future' crowd. To have our D play so well for a stretch...maybe if the offense had had their backs they wouldn't've given up a seven minute, eighty yard TD drive.

It's amazing what a little refresher on recent Broncos history does for ya. Credit aldren and his last post for this (I always knew we stole our talent from the Skins in the last five years, but the specifics were lost to me) little refresher course on our running game in the last 15 years.

A lot of suppositions found in the MSM (completely OT thought of the day: this isn't just sports media, guys) are completely, 100% false. We've been learning a lot about this recently. One that hasn't been is Shanahan's/Gibbs's zone-blocking creation of thousand-yard-rushers out of guys that should be selling cellphones. Part of the unrecognized genius in the Bailey + [Tatum Bell - 2nd Rd Pick] for Portis is the risk avoidance. Running backs have short shelf lives. I would argue (though this is very debatable--it was also the blockbuster trade of the season) that the Cutler trade will seem more significant in six years than the Portis trade does now. The fact is, however, this is a far more significant trade, in terms of net gain for both sides (hint: it's hugely positive for the broncos). Analysis follows the stats, not really based on them but they help give perspective. Oh, below the stats my analysis assumes the only refresher you need on the last decade-and-a-half of Broncos rushing is the stats themselves.

First, the career stats (in order drafted, most recent on):

Tatum Bell
5 yrs 569 car 2773 yds 16 tds 4.9 yds/att

Clinton Portis
8 y 2172 c 9692 y 78 t 4.5 y/a

Mike Anderson
7 y 919 c 4067 y 37 t 4.4 y/a

Reuben Droughns
8 y 929 c 3602 y 19 t 3.9 y/a

Olandis Gary
5 y 496 c 1998 y 11 t 4.0 y/a

TD
7 y 1655 c 7607 y 60 t 4.6 ypc

Now, some visceral analysis, loosely based on those stats:

These are all our 1000-yd rushers in the last 15 years.

First thing to note: the two best rushers here were picked in the sixth round, all others were picked earlier (including *heh* Droughns two rounds before Anderson in the same draft, even though they both wound up RB/FB hybrids, and Droughns with a little return upside; of course I'm not spending more than a sentence and lengthy aside because you could write a billion fanposts about who got drafted before who).

In terms of yard production, if Portis had continued developing along TD's pace he would've been far better (in terms of sheer yard production). However, while TD is the true, selfless franchise back--earned himself the starting job through rock solid ST play, would call a 200-yd game a 'disaster' if he missed a block--Portis is today's teamless 'star'. After injuring himself in the preseason he said, "I don't know why myself or any other player of my caliber should be playing in the preseason. I think for the last four years I've done enough to show the world I'm going to be ready for the season." While selfish, he inadvertently makes a good point, which I'll get to shortly. His wiki even deigns to note that he "bounced back" in the 2005 season and was a "better pass-blocker."

The fact is, running backs get injured. TD, Portis, Anderson all saw the most significant harm come to their careers due to injury (ironically, they're the best three up there). From Mike's wiki (emphasis mine):

He was plagued by injuries in the following years, not even playing in 2004, the result of tearing both groin muscles while blocking on a punt return in the waning moments of a meaningless preseason game. Anderson set several modern-day NFL records (longest stretch between seasons leading a team in rushing, longest stretch between a player's first and second 1,000-yard rushing seasons, and greatest number of seasons passed between 1,000-yard rushing seasons with no intervening seasons rushing for that distance).

Note the bold italics up there. Repeat to yourself, "running backs get injured." One more time. Now watch this:

Terrel Davis hit-Tokyo 98 (via kozmicklown)

I'm not sure I want my franchise RB doing that sort of thing. Portis had a point. It's a waste of all the money you pay that proven skill player to utilize him in the preseason. This brings us back to the trade:

We got a hall-of-fame (hof) corner (though he's been playing in Denver a little long for the committee's liking, now) and a thousand yard rusher for a longer-lived, slightly better RB. Oddly enough, a player worth this corner and back was signed to an 8-year, 50.3 mil deal while the corner alone cost 63 for 7 (all according to wikipedia, nothing on guarantees/actual cost). If you're a stats guy you'll notice that T. Bell averaged .4 y/a more than Portis. I didn't take it into consideration, but I know people like the CHFF eat that stuff up.

In terms of where you spend your money, though, you want to pay the players who are least likely to have their seasons cut short. You pay them for their impact, loyalty, and longevity if they're hof good. Let's look at great or near great running backs who have played in the last decade, just in the AFC West: Terrell Davis, Mike Anderson, Clinton Portis, LDT (not LT! there will only ever be one LT), Larry Johnson, Priest Holmes, Shaun Alexander. Now, repeat after me: running backs get injured. Not to belabor a point, but all these backs have suffered major, season ending or severely-limiting injuries. While that might not affect they're career y/a stats (too much), do you think that it might have an impact on a team, especially mid-season? You bet it does! On average these guys have put up a little more than four thousand-yard seasons per-career. One is a hof lock, I would say two others have outside chances (that includes my irrational hope for TD), and barring injury all of them would probably be close if not in (ignoring Holmes's & TD's injuries opening the way for the later guys to have a chance). So by all means, go ahead and sign that back to a blockbuster deal to see four years of solid performance from him. I'd rather trade him in the midst of his contract demands for a hall-of-famer we'll see running the show for at least two more seasons plus another back that can team up with a veteran for over 1900 yards rushing between the two of them, in addition to chalking up his own thousand yard season the next year. Once TD got injured Mike realized that running backs are a money sink, and when Portis started clamoring to get paid he promptly leveraged his value for far, far more in return.

Okay, enough with the history, let's look at how this pertains to the '09 season and on. First: be cautious on Moreno. I love him too, but as a high first round pick unless he's an hof back he's a bust in my mind (anything besides an hof back taken in the first round is a bust). I love KnowMo, don't get me wrong, and I'm gonna move on before I dig myself a deeper hole. Assuming continuing trends, and basing a whole lot of assumptions off these seven weeks, I think we've entered the Peterson/Jones-Drew/Rice era, which followed the Tomlinson era, which followed the Davis/Sanders/Smith era. Names will of course fall out as time winds its course, and my prediction is it will wind up the Rice/Jones-Drew era. Their cannonball style is fresh, it has worked for both of them since (during) their rookie year, and I see their small/stocky stature helping prevent injury. All right, that's the extent of my really ill-informed predictions, you can open your eyes now.

As an end note, you can tell Sean Payton learned from this, as Mike Bell has 343 yds with a 4.8 ypc average in 4 games for the Saints this year. Pretty good production from an undrafted player and an undoubtedly cheap free-agent pick-up. Isn't Gibbs their line coach now?

As a second note, yes, I ignored the failures over the years like Mr. Griffin (sorry to single you out, Quentin, but it's true) who were only prevented from getting 1000 yards in a season because they couldn't hold onto the ball long enough as a starter to secure the job...with a good blocking scheme/line, you can stick any old guy in at RB and he'll get 1000 yards. (Hint: part of this post is mocking that as a 'benchmark' for a successful season. LDT ran for over a thousand last year and no one told him it was a good year, did they?)

*sigh* This is getting old, but one more thing. This was kinda the gist of my response to the trade for stephen jackson fanpost from a few weeks back. The author said something like 'proven history of 1000 yard seasons' and it got me a little riled because that's what our team has had (a thousand yard rusher) since the TD era, besides the last two years (Cutler love, injuries) and 3 total in those 15. We basically created the running-by-committee or tandem backs setup that's now not just the bane of fantasy owners with Denver backs but fantasy owners league-wide.

You'd think I'd know how to spell latin words considering I've taken three years of it...

Anyhoo, I was watching marshall faulk blabber on still-erringly about our team on one of today's Horse Tracks when I realized that the MSM still isn't completely sold on B-Marsh as one of the best receivers in the league, despite the fact that he was the Beast even when he was a rookie. Before going on this rant, I decided to confirm my belief by refreshing myself on his amazing rookie year:

There's some amazing stuff (and not just stuff that made that week's Top 10). My favorite is when he puts a Titans DL on his ass (1:20). However, another part of the reel got me thinking...

At 1:25 Cutler throws, off his back foot, somewhere around 55 yards from scrimmage. BM has to sit like a return guy and get killed by the corners (who could've intercepted it). Compare that to Orton's Simms-defying 62-yard hailmary on Sunday.

Cutler obviously has the stronger arm (despite throwing it shorter in the example; that's seven yards shorter on a half-hop of his back foot). But, more importantly, Orton would've seen B-Marsh and hit him in stride. There's no need for Cutler to break out of the pocket on that play, and if he had calmly gone through his reads he would've seen the fifteen yards Marshall had on both the safety and the corner and hit him in stride.

Obviously this is all hypothetical, but look at the results:

Actual:

Cutler goes wild on an impromptu and unneeded bootleg, throws a ball way behind his star rookie receiver, forcing him to catch it like a punt return and increasing the chance of injury by quite a bit when Marsh is hit head-on as soon as the ball is caught. 57-58 yd gain.

If we had a 'game-managing' pocket passer:

Stays in the pocket, stepping up and to his left where the pressure is non-existent and the backfield wide-open. Hits B-Marsh in stride as soon as he blows by the DBs. Touchdown.

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