Brunell vs. Bledsoe

I would prefer to know how many points the gunslinger and the game manager put on the board and how many they give up due to mistakes before I'd pick one over the other.

You do know the answer to that. Both Bledsoe and Brunell threw for 23 TDs this year.

Your entire argument centers around your inability to filter out co-variances when talking about statistics. You're basically hiding behind the fact that YOU personally can't see a difference between Bledsoe and Brunell's play, and the statistical co-variance argument is the perfect veil behind which you can hide your flimsy stance.

I will not dispute that lots of factors go into deciding the outcome of a game, and to focus in one one or two of those factors as if they're the end-all be-all would be short-sighted. But some factors are larger than others, and turnovers are the biggest.

Regarding sacks, I think you need to go back and read post #22. There are three main causes for when sacks occur:
1) The biggest, offensive line protection breaks down.
2) The QB can't get away from rushers.
3) The receivers can't get open, and the QB fails to get rid of the ball.

You can't blame Bledsoe for a bad offensive line, so I'm not saying all 49 of his sacks are his fault. But there were a number that were his fault because he held the ball too long, or couldn't escape the rush. Brunell was much better at this. You don't need stats to tell you that, you can tell that by watching games. It's very simple. If you put Brunell and Bledsoe behind the same offensive line over the course of a season, Brunell would end up with fewer sacks. There's your cause right there, maybe you missed it the first time.

But, in this case, we all know a little about the length, width, and height. Also, if you have enough of a sample, (Brunnels overall historical stats) you can start to piece together a more complete picture. These stats do tell us something more than you are admitting. Based on you r reasoning we also can't draw any conclusions about how good Moss was last year based on his stats because we would have to say it was based on the QB, playcalling, blocking, teams played... Brunnel got the QB job last year because he was willing to protect the football.

We heard the phrase "system back" attached to C. Portis when he came here from Denver. The inference was that his stats were jacked up because of Denver's scheme. I'm saying that the stats of all players are heavily influenced by the system they play in.

Jake Plummer's stats make him look like a better QB in Denver than he was with the Cards. If he went to Seatlle, they'd look even better. That West Coast offense would make his numbers look super.

But, how good is Jake Plummer compared to other QBs? We have no way to know from those QB stats.

The best we can do is to form judgments by watching them play.

You have an opinion but no arguments to offer?

i do. stats matter and that's generally accepted. your arguement of other factors making them worthless has no basis in fact, its just mere opinion, so don't try going all high and mighty on me :P

We heard the phrase "system back" attached to C. Portis when he came here from Denver. The inference was that his stats were jacked up because of Denver's scheme. I'm saying that the stats of all players are heavily influenced by the system they play in.

Jake Plummer's stats make him look like a better QB in Denver than he was with the Cards. If he went to Seatlle, they'd look even better. That West Coast offense would make his numbers look super.

But, how good is Jake Plummer compared to other QBs? We have no way to know from those QB stats.

The best we can do is to form judgments by watching them play.

there are RAMPANT logical fallacies throughout this post. Maybe jake actually GOT BETTER and that helped his stats improve too. Maybe if y ou watched him you'd know he makes stupid decisions and hasslebeck actually makes far less. that career TD/INT ratio isn't 100% on the QB, but its a weak arguement that the QB isn't the primary factor.

CP left denver and still put up killer stats, so, if the denver system helped him so much, why was he fine in a totally different system?

some guys can play, others can't, and the stats bear that out. All i see is opinion, i don't see any actual research or factual analysis of any kind to prove your case. Since you seem to be the only one in the "stats don't matter" camp, let's see some hard evidence.

Can I nominate this thread as the most pointless thread of 2006 thusfar?

Can I nominate this thread as the most pointless thread of 2006 thusfar?

I'ld bet you a shiny nickel I could find at least 5 even more worthless than this one.

But then again, that's not factual it's opinion:)

Can I nominate this thread as the most pointless thread of 2006 thusfar?

the "CFL can beat the NFL" thread was in the same category of spurious arguements.

I'ld bet you a shiny nickel I could find at least 5 even more worthless than this one.

But then again, that's not factual it's opinion:)

I'll see your nickel. Feel free to nominate another and we can debate which thread is more worthless. :)

the "CFL can beat the NFL" thread was in the same category of spurious arguements.

When did Steve Sprurrier start coaching in the CFL?

the "CFL can beat the NFL" thread was in the same category of spurious arguements.

Ahhh......thankfully I must have either ignored it completely or been on vacation when it was around because I don't remember it (which is probably a good thing from what I hear now).