agreed. I think the regime backs Henne. But if Henne has a long stretch of really bad games (presumably not due to really bad injuries to our team) then the regime would be justified to want to switch gears. Bottom line, optimists like me believe that Henne has progressed and we will not see that stretch of games. But from a business perspective, the regime would be foolish to not improve our depth at QB. They improve it everywhere else, why not QB? Garrard would be a very good backup QB IMO.
With the recent rule change, I think it's pretty stupid to "waste" an active spot on a quarterback that statistically has a one in a quadrillion (or close to) probability to being needed.
When this regime decided to go with 2 QBs on the regular roster and only added a very raw Devlin on the PS I had a hunch that they were waiting to fill out that third spot with a veteran QB who would be released .In fact I think Gerrard may have been on top of their list all along. IMO its not a reflection on Henne .Rather that they are short at the most important position in the game and they need another backup.
A lot of teams only carry two QBs due to the rule change, Crunch. It really doesn't make a whole lot of sense to have a third one.
Just a bad idea overall. If Henne flounders this year, he is gone along with out Front office and coaching staff (hopefully Nolan stays.) Moore is a capable backup. No point in signing extra baggage for the next regime.
Good signing for depth IMO. Maybe he didn't have a great camp but I'm sure he's probably still a better option than Matt Moore. Tony doesn't want to lose his job b/c Chad Henne gets injured.
What if Henne has 5 bad games to start the season? Should the organization just close up for the remainder of the year and tell the rest of the roster to go home?
At 0-5 or even 1-4, you might as well fold the tent, because you would need to go 10-1 or 9-2 the rest of the way to make the playoffs.
Tell that to 49ers fans. Inconsistent quarterbacks with bigtime potential tend to stick quite a lot longer than most people initially believe. If Henne "flounders" or only slightly improves, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to see a next regime giving him a chance again and to see this board having exactly the same kind of partisan offseason discussion it had this year.
Anytime you can improve depth at a position you do it. This is a no brainer. I don't see why there would be any problem. It has nothing to do with Chad Henne and his shot at being the man this season.
This is a conservative as well as a lame duck regime.Would you be confident going into the season with an unproven starting QB and an unproven backup. .Granted he is not the future for this team but Gerrard has more quality starts than both of them put together One injury and you are suddenly left with an unproven backup.You wont find a quality QB from the scrubs left over if an injury does occur later on in the season.We might as well sign the best one available now. We have the cap space to do it.
And "folding the tent" would have consequences that would be far more destructive and long-lasting than the record alone. There is way too much young talent on the team to essentially give the message that they don't need to put in any more work because they have no shot. Can you imagine if the Dolphins start with 5 games of poor play from the QB position, with no viable alternative? How do you think someone like Brandon Marshall would react in that situation?
I don't think that would be an issue. If another regime comes in and both Henne and Garrard don't look good this year, there's nothing to keep the new regime from cleaning house. If Garrard is starting because Henne flounders, our season is already over. Where it's more complicated: Henne plays well, we go 9-7, miss the playoffs, bring in a new regime. Then what do you do with Henne?
Me? No. But that's the situation they've put themselves into and adding Garrard as strictly a backup (not that I think he'd agree to that, not with several places that might just hand him the starting reigns) would only serve to stirr unnecessary controversion and likely not achieve much beyond mop up duty - if you give Henne half a season and he fails, the season's down the drain anyway, and you might as well give Matt Moore a look. Or even Pat Devlin. Garrard as a backup only makes sense if Henne plays well and then gets himself injured. It's not an impossible scenario, but I'd still prefer to have one more guy that actually helps me win games active on gameday instead.
Garrard makes sense because management is indicating to the players that they are 100% committed to putting the best team on the field as possible. Giving guys like Matt Moore or Pat Devlin a tryout during the regular season is the same philosophy that got this organization to 1-15. Would you be happy if you went to work one day, and your boss said "Hey I know this guy probably will do a bad job and make you look bad, but we're going to give him a shot just for the hell of it, so it really doesn't matter whether you do a good job or not.", how would you feel about your company?
Aw, c'mon. It's not exactly revolutionary to play a young development guy instead of the proven vet. And besides, what if Garrard never got cut or won't agree to sign with us and Henne gets hurt - is giving Moore a "tryout" then the same philosophy that got this organization to 1-15? They signed Matt Moore to be the backup and Pat Devlin to be the #3 guy. If they're so bad they can't start in an injury situation, they shouldn't have signed either. I'd feel pretty darn great
Knowing Frumundah, I'd suspect things in the ballpark of: "Sorry, don't have a cellphone" "I have mace" "Is there something moving in your backpack?" "You've been following me for the past 4 blocks" "I think I'm going to have to get the police involved" "OMG No means no" Things like that.
If Garrard never got cut, then I wouldn't have a problem, because there wouldn't have been someone available that has shown the ability of Garrard. Guys in the locker room aren't going to say "why is Moore starting?" if they know the front office didn't have any options. If you're playing Moore, and Garrard is available, you're telling the team that you either A. believe Moore is better or B. are telling the team you aren't committed to winning at this point. Thats exactly what Cameron did. He started John Beck when Beck had no business starting. Nobody is going to respect a coach that puts someone out there that they don't feel is good enough to win. I have no problem with playing a developmental QB, if he has shown something to indicate he's following his expected curve. Has Moore shown anything to lead people to believe he's better than Garrard? I haven't seen anything, but to be fair, I'm not in those practices. The players on the team certainly know what Matt Moore is capable of though, and ultimately they are the ones who the front office needs to worry about. Even if it made you look bad? If we get poor QB play this season, and Brandon Marshall only gets 900 rec. yds and 3 TDs, thats essentially money out of his pocket. These guys are playing for their next contract, and they won't be happy if they feel they're losing money because the team wants to see if Matt Moore is any good.
But that's not the situation we're facing right now; it's not like it's week 7, Chad Henne has just gotten hurt and David Garrard is sitting there on the FA list just waiting to be signed. The Dolphins, right now, can pass on Garrard for any number of reasons without anyone in the locker room being wiser. At the end of the day, they can always say he didn't want to come here. It's part of the job. Unless McCown can game manage the Jaguars to many wins, they'll play Gabbert at some point even if McCown gives them a better chance to win, as evident by the fact that he's starting. The funny thing is that we're not really that far apart. I merely think that if it comes to a big injury or horrible QB play, the players won't say, hell, why didn't we sign David Garrard back then in September - they'll say, heck, how on earth did they believe we'd be able to win with the guys we went into the season with?
The players will look back and say why didn't we sign Garrard/Hasselbeck/Orton/etc. My point is that the organization cannot even entertain the possibility of that occurring. Once a player believes that, then his future with the organization becomes extremely tenuous. Especially considering there were players that pointed to the QB position after last season. David Garrard prevents that from happening from my perspective. If Henne goes out and fails for 5 games, then at least the players will still have hope they can win with another QB.
So if Henne fails we'd turn to the guy who just lost his job to McCown and Gabbert? Sure hope nobody honestly thinks that's a reasonable idea. If we bring in Garrard it needs to be for peanuts and he should def be sitting behind Moore until proven otherwise.
I'm pretty comfortable with Moore as our backup and I actually might even rather have him start if it came down to it than Garrard
I think the fact that he's under-achieving, dealing with injuries at an older age, and by all accounts acting like a douchebag, might also factor in there. All those points make him look like a real attractive signing option.
I distinctly remember us signing a guy who had just lost his job to Sanchez and Kellen Clemens. I seem to recall that it worked out quite well.
Sometimes i hate that fact that we live in a world of twitter and blackberries and updated news breaks by the second because nothing can be done in secrecy. For all we know, Ireland contact his agent and got a ballpark figure for what he wants. And then again, for all we know Ireland plans on Garrard starting against the texans for us. Who knows? this is probably nothing though.
For one playoff season. This is relevant because you make it sound like it's a crap idea to sign someone who lost his job to a 1st round rookie and a career backup when we've recently signed a guy just like that who went on to be considered for MVP honors.
