Why Tannehill should be a better QB now Lazor is gone

Here come the 15 pages of rehashed arguments.

For my part, good job on the analysis.

 

Ryan Tannehill should be better because [*insert former Offensive Coordinator here].

No different then when we had gotten ridden of Sherman. Lazor was supposed to be the guy that got Tannehill over the top, at least thats what most fans kept telling me, I'll hold my reservations till after the season when our QB finally proves it. Happy Easter.

 

Hella good post, man!

 

Great job digging out those stats.

I think your conclusion is in line with what most people feel Lazor brought to the table (both good and bad). From what we all saw, the Dolphins offense was very bad when it would get stuck in the mud and it seemed to stall out quite often. Certain weeks would just be frustrating as all get out. As I recall, there were many instances where the entire operation just looked pathetic: a pass-heavy mix with a lot of short throws which got eaten up.

On that note, I think it's more interesting to ask why the coaches continued doing those things despite the problems. Was it a product of a simplified game-plan? A bad O-line? A lackluster QB? What were the coaches saying in private that made them believe they were on the right track or that they had to keep things so tightly boxed?

I don't know. Someone who's an expert of Bill Lazor's offense would be able to tell us more about what Lazor was trying to accomplish. I don't think we're going to learn anything more by looking at stats that continually show the Dolphins' offense was inconsistent. We know that much. I think we'd all get a bit smarter if we knew what strategy helped lead to that ultimate end.

The fact that nobody here can provide any detail on that matter is why these conversations remain ambiguous and roll on forever. Until someone steps up with information we don't already have, there's nothing much we can learn from re-hashing the same notions.

 

One of the best posts I have seen on about Tannehill. Good job man.

 

just looking for a certain amount of intelligence from ryan, a sense of awareness, and an understanding as to how to win and convert in critical situations..

If he really wants to improve his game and our chances of improving our scoring average on offense he's gonna need to learn how to use his legs.

I know its been talked about a lot, but he hasn't shown the specific ability I'm talking about since entering the league..until he does his ceiling is close to being tapped out..

At this point and time, besides 1 or 2 read option runs a game, he is strictly, a one dimensional qb..

and, he needs to step up as a leader and figure out a way to be one.

 

You're calculating what 2014 Tannehill's passer rating would be if he played with a lead 30.9% of the time and comparing that to what 2015 Tannehill's passer rating would be if he played with a lead 43.6% of the time and saying those two are around 90. That's the wrong comparison.

You have to equate the % of the time both Tannehills play with a lead. So either force both to play with a lead 30.9% of the time, in which case you get 90.1 vs. 88.8 (2014 vs. 2015) or force both to play with a lead 43.6% of the time, in which case you get 92.8 vs. 90.2. Depending on which you choose you're getting 1-3 points difference in favor of 2014 Tannehill.

I agree that's not much of a difference.. just pointing out the stated reason why is wrong.

This is of course true, but I'm not sure one can expect any OC or HC to get a QB that generally performs better when tied or ahead to perform equally well when behind. If Gase can do that, he's way beyond average, but right now I wouldn't say it's realistic to expect this.

btw.. I think another story those same stats tell is that Tannehill has been able to improve on playing while tied or ahead way more than he has been able to improve his ability to play from behind, whatever the reason (can't ascribe all the differences to everyone or everything other than improvement or lack thereof in the QB).

 

I think it's silly to act like the surrounding cast doesn't significantly impair Tannehill's stats when playing from behind.

 

I think this is true, but it won't give you a lot of the specifics and particular circumstances. Of course most QBs play better with a lead. It makes the play calling much easier. Yes, Lazor certainly appeared to get nervous and would start throwing the ball too much. That probably happens with most OCs given certain circumstances.

I always thought Lazor was overrated and kind of "meh", but look what happened with Cambell. He was going to be the old school, smash mouth, pound the ball more of a type of coach and it worked for a couple of games against bad teams, but when the s--t started hitting the fan and things weren't going so well, the same thing started happening under Cambell's watch. People were crucifying Philbin and Lazor for the same exact thing. It's circumstantial.

Tanne is not as bad as some want to make him out to be, but there are certain aspects of his game which he will need to improve this year. He will need to have better recognition and awareness. It still needs to slow down for him a bit. Recently, on NFLN, they were breaking down some plays where Tanne had enough time and had receivers who he could have gotten the ball to, but didn't recognize or pull the trigger and just took the sack. That needs to improve. I do have confidence that, after having studied that film of Tanne, Gase is well aware of this and they will work together to correct that issue. There is a lot of good in Tanne's game and skill set and I have confidence that this regime will bring out the best in him.

 

I agree, but when playing from behind, all those weaknesses are magnified. Down by a couple scores, the QB can't simply keep taking the short throws he's being given, he needs to try to get the ball downfield. I agree that coaching was a problem, but the oline was terrible.

 

Yep, that's pretty much it. Good posts, Pauly.

 

You can show all the stats in the world. The fact is that with Tannehill, it has always been the fault of the wide receivers, the offensive line, the offensive coordinators or the head coach. For Tannehill supporters, he is the Teflon Don of NFL QB's. He is never to blame because it is always someone else who is responsible when the team doesn't win or the offense plays terrible.

I am willing to see if he shows drastic improvement under the QB guru Gase. If he does, great. That will mean that he did have valid excuses for his very average play last year and we can only hope he will continue to improve as he matures as an NFL QB.

If on the underhand, he continues his up and down play he has shown throughout his career. Perhaps that will show that he is just a mediocre NFL QB and the Dolphins will need to start looking to upgrade the QB position if they ever want to get beyond mediocre.

I look forward to seeing how he performs over an entire season. I just hope the days of blaming others on the team when he plays poorly and him getting all the raves when he plays well are over. As far as I am concerned, the days of blaming others on the team or the coaching staff for Tannehills shortcomings are officially over. Going into his fifth season as the Dolphins starter, it is time for him to put up or shut up, IMO.

 

Give it a rest, jw. You are severely misstating people's position on Tannehill. No one is saying Tannehill is perfect. No one is saying that Tannehill didn't have problems. We are saying that the coaching, oline, and defense all played huge parts in the failure of the team. Many people have been on here complaining about Tannehill, acting like he's the problem.

I'm sure you'll be on here raging about Tannehill if the defense routinely gives up 30 points a game next season, and the Dolphins go 8-8. But that would be ignorant.

 

I agree with this in one importance sense: given how important the QB is in today's game, I think our path to the SB is faster if we gamble on a new QB after 2016 if Tannehill's performance isn't well above average.

And I say that even if our OL, coach and defense stink it up like in 2015. At some point you have to compare the odds of filling out a roster full of good enough players to allow an average QB like Tannehill to thrive vs. finding a QB that can overcome such deficiencies. And I think if Tannehill looks average even with a bad OL, defense and coach again, it's better to gamble on finding that next great QB than paying an average one big $$.

Tannehill's contract is perfectly set up for this with the team taking a small hit if we get rid of him after 2016. Anyway, story isn't written yet so we'll see. But yes I agree this is a make-or-break year, regardless of the rest of the team.

 

Nice OP.Great thread .I thought I was in Club forum for a while. Keep it up

 

And a year ago this time of year people were calling for Lazor to be promoted to HC (before another team stole him away) having just helped Tannehill to his best season.

 

And then Lazor melted down, and proved to be incapable of adjusting when it was blatantly obvious that other teams had it figured out.

Or, if you subscribe to jdang's theory, Lazor pitched the biggest ***** fit I've ever heard of in the NFL, and intentionally screwed his QB, team, and franchise.

 

The only problem I had with Tannehill and consistency is that it got worse in 2015. Easy way to measure consistency is variance-to-mean ratio. You look at how much something varies and divide that by the mean (you divide by the mean because distributions around smaller means naturally have smaller variance and you want to adjust for that).

Tannehill's variance-to-mean ratio for passer rating from 2012-2015 was: 8.71, 5.59, 4.19, 6.67.

For comparison, Brady's from 2001-2004 was: 10.77, 8.76, 7.47, 4.53.

So you can see Tannehill's consistency in his first 4 years is better than Brady's, except for his 4th year. Tannehill's inconsistency went up last year, and it's something one has to hope is just an aberration, but if it's not then it's something to worry about. Other than that, consistency with Tannehill isn't an issue relative to the rest of the NFL.

 

Something else regarding the question of what may happen to Tannehill (and the team) with a new OC. Suppose we calculate the correlation between passer rating and wins, and compare that to the correlation between Y/A and wins, over the last 4 years for Tannehill.

Why is that interesting? Because arguably Y/A depends more on QB ability than passer rating, which is more of a team stat than Y/A.

The correlation between passer rating and W/L from 2012-2015 for Tannehill was: 0.63, 0.72, 0.49, 0.51
The correlation between Y/A and W/L from 2012-2015 for Tannehill was: 0.55, 0.78, 0.72, 0.88

The decreasing correlation between passer rating and W/L and the increasing correlation between Y/A and W/L during the Lazor years basically suggests Lazor made more of the final outcome dependent on Tannehill's ability than on the rest of the team. Given that Tannehill is an average QB, that's probably not a great idea.

So one benefit we'll have if the new OC is more like Sherman in this regard is that W/L should depend more on the team (which sadly is crappy haha! but still the right strategy). Of course.. I never liked Sherman either. He was WAY too predictable.

 

It sucks because you don't know, what you don't know.

Can I pay half a year of your club membership? Lead you to the enlightened land.

 

You have to stop.

 

Hey pot, kettle here.

 

You keep saying things that happened in club that didn't.

 

Yeah, I don't buy Lazor and Philbin going all kamikaze on their careers because they had to deal with a QB they decided they didn't want. It would seem far more likely that they would just go run heavy. If they win, they're geniuses. If they lose, Ross replaces them. But they don't look like asshats.

 

There's nothing in club about that happening. He's making it up just like he made up the "audible" thing.

 

Variation always exists, even when you just look at the different game conditions you looked at. You only pointed out the averages, not the variances (only way variance is 0 is if Tannehill's stats were absolutely identical from game to game).

Anyway, point is variance-to-mean is a simple way of measuring consistency, and while I didn't calculate it for different game conditions (but neither did you), one can show Tannehill is fairly consistent relative to the rest of the NFL statistically speaking. Only issue I had with Tannehill was the increased inconsistency in 2015.

 

Tannehill, in his best year, 2014, was pretty inconsistent even though overall, was pretty good at the end of the year. I play fantasy, so one of the metrics was, how consistent the QB is. Because a guy who ends the year pretty good, but had half his games excellent, but half his games really bad, ruined his fantasy owner. Tannehill had one of the most highs and lows that year. Is that all his fault? Oline? Coaches, playcalling? Receivers? Not sure. But based on production that's what it was in 2014

 

I will buy you half a year. It's only $15. I spend more than that on a 6 pack of beer (Ballast Point Sculpin, yummy!)

 

Going back to his days as the Texas A&M QB, Tannehill has never been a consistently effective QB in the fourth quarter of games where his team is behind in close games.

He just doesn't make the plays quality QB's make to win those type games. This happened in college and throughout his NFL career. He just hasn't proved that he is the QB you want leading your team in the fourth quarter of close games.

Of course Tannehill apologists will blame his issues in these instances on everyone else on the team or the coaching staff, but never on Tannehill. To them, it is the OL, the WR's, the head coach or the OC who is to blame when the team fails to move the ball to score at the end of games.

As one of my college professors told our class many years ago. "You can manipulate statistics to prove anything you want to". Tannehill certainly isn't the worst QB in the NFL, but I see him a lot closer to the bottom than the top.

To me, good QB's don't play in the league for 4 years and their team not have a single winning season during those 4 years. Of course I realize none of this has anything to do with Tannehill. It is everybody else who is to blame for the sub 500 record since Tannehill became the starting QB in 2012.

As I stated yesterday. I hope Tannehill can become a better and more consistent QB under Gase. I would love to see him become a top tier QB and be able to lead Miami for the next decade. I just don't know if he will ever be more than he has been so far, which to me is mediocre.

I don't expect much from the team overall this coming season. I think a 6-10 record is likely going to be the best we can expect based on their 2016 schedule. So to me the season is all about seeing if Tannehill can become a better QB under the coaching of Gase.

Because his contract calls for him to start making the big money in 2017. I think it is important he proves in 2016 that he is the long term answer at the QB position for the Dolphins or else the Dolphins need to look for a long term solution once the 2016 is over.

 

Yes, the pathetic defense giving up 27+ points routinely, combined with a poor oline, poor coaching, and mostly poor receivers (along with a raw developing for at least the first two years QB) didn't contribute to poor records. See, this is why we continue to have the arguments. If you guys post in a thread long enough, IT ALWAYS comes back to win/loss record. It's insane. Tannehill is not the main reason for the record, no matter how many times you say it. Tannehill, since his rookie year, has been asked to throw more than almost any QB in the league, while having the worst oline in the league, along with bad coaching and poor receivers (and no run game) AND expected to lead his offense to 27+ points in a majority, I think, if games. But yeah, let's lay the blame of the record on him.

Four years in, and the same tired, beat arguments are being trotted out. For four years, you guys have ignored all the arguments against your position, and continued to repeatedly day the same thing, no matter what people show you.

Yet I, and a few others, are the ones accused of having an agenda.

 

I have no agenda. I would love for Tannehill to prove me wrong, when I say his is merely a mediocre QB in the NFL.
He doesn't make the players around him better, as the top QB's in the league do. The Colts are an example of a team which hasn't had anymore talent than the Dolphins the last four years. Yet when Luck was able to play without injury his first three years in the league, he led his very mediocre team to the playoffs each of those seasons.

When he was injured last year and missed most of the season, the Colts showed that they were barely mediocre without him.

There are at least 10 young QB's with four years or less experience I would gladly trade Tannehill for. Obviously the Dolphins have numerous spots to fill on their roster and Tannehill certainly isn't the major problem on the roster.

I just don't know after four years as the starting QB for the Dolphins if he is the long term solution for the most important position on the team either. To me the 2016 season should be a make or break season for Tannehill with the Dolphins.

 

I guess the problem is, you seem to be waiting for an improved team record before you say Thill proved anything to you. The reason that is a problem, is you're giving too much credit to the QB. Win/loss record is not now nor has it ever been a qb stat.

See Peyton Manning and Philip Rivers this past year for all the proof needed to back that up.