Originally Posted by 44Deezel
At this point in their careers, Barber is better than Portis. Portis had HUGE holes to run through during the first half of last year and couldn't muster a run longer than 31 yards. Now if you want to blame downfield blocking, go ahead. But the holes were there at the line of scrimmage, so don't blame the O line. Everyone likes to point to Portis' EOY yardage totals, but he benefits from being a "feature back", which is something you you rarely see these days. There are lots of talented RBs that would have similar or better numbers if their coaches were stupid enough to give them the ball 342 times. So far this year, Barber's averaging 6.3 yards per carry. He's faster, a better receiver, more elusive, harder to bring down and can score from anywhere on the field. That said, I like Portis a lot, just not for the price tag. I also respect everything he does for the ball club, particularly his blocking and durability, and think he's the least of our problems and probably the best thing we have going for us Offensively. I don't think Barber is head and shoulders better that Portis, but I do think he's better.
And I'll take Romo over Campbell any day. Romo may choke once he gets to the playoffs, but at least he gets there, which is more than anyone can say for Campbell. Yes, Romo throws Ints, but he also throws a lot of TDs. I would much rather have his TD to INT ratio over the last 2 season than Campbell's (and I won't even bother with yardage and I could give a damn about QB ratings):
Romo:
2008 - 26 TDs and 14 INTs
2007 - 36TDs and 19 INTs
Campbell:
2008 - 13 TDs and 6 INTs
2007 - 12 TDs and 11 INTs
As for Campbell being hamstrung by Zorn, when he does get a chance to throw deep, it's been woefully inaccurate and just plain ugly. The deep pass to Moss against the Giants wasn't even close, the first pass of the game against the Rams should have been an EASY TD, but Campbell underthrew it. On the same route but to DT, he threw the ball 5 yards out of bounds and on an attempted bomb to the end zone, he almost threw it in the first row of the stands. He's not shown that he can even get the ball close on deep passes this season, so maybe that's why Zorn isn't "taking the reigns off". I've also said a few times that I get the sense that Campbell is petrified to throw into single coverage unless his receiver has 2-3 steps on the defender, while we see WRs making plays all over the league with defenders draped all over them. 4 things can happen - INT, Completion, Incompletion, Pass Interference. 3 of the 4 ain't that bad, so why not throw the damn ball. I could be wrong, but that's how it looks from where I'm sitting.
Lastly, I think Zorn is deranged if he's totally pleased with what he saw between the 20s against the Rams. They can not continue to plod down the field taking 15 plays to get to the Red Zone. They had only 7 friggin possessions against the Rams. They need to find a way to get down the field every now and again in 5 or so plays and, of course, they need to get the ball into the end zone.
Good news is that both are not impossible to correct, and the next 4 games couldn't be a better opportunity for the Skins to fix what ails them. For the record, I hate Dallas and will never root for anyone but the Skins, especially the Ravens from that one-horse town of Baltimore.
EOM
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