Marcus Mariota: Is it Time ??

[TitanSS]

Where's @Kookie23? I need to apologize for being blind.

[KingTitan]

5 minutes ago, TitanSS said:

I'm done with the he doesn't have weapons argument. You can make that for a QB in year 1 and 2. By year three he needs to be moving the ball or he's Alex Smith, or worse.

Andrew Luck in year 4 would kill for our offense today.

Over the past two years he's had one of the best offensive lines in the NFL. There's his weapon. Demarco Murray, Delanie Walker, first round pick in Corey Davis. Derrick Henry, Dion Lewis. 

At some points you have to stop blaming the guys around him.

To that I'd say with Luck's numbers. He still is losing. Do we want numbers or wins?  

Our line is living on rep. They had one good year. They aren't the best. 

The weapons argument is old. But I feel it still has merit. 

Marcus needs to be better. But he isn't the problem to me. 

Better players I feel we see a more consistent Marcus. 

[TitanSS]

2 minutes ago, ragevsuall17 said:

YEah... it's hard to compare Rodgers... and even McNair... they sat and kept growing.  At 24, I would hope MAriota can continue to grow.  He showed potential early... was unlucky last year... but maybe he is too far gone...too broken from this franchise to succeed here or anywhere else.

I'm not ready to throw in the towel... I don't want to do this again... He's got a year and a half before I completely give up on him...

Absolutely. We know he can win games and it is incredibly hard to find a QB in the NFL, so we may be rolling with him for the foreseeable future regardless. Unless we get to the point where we're so bad that we're picking in the top 5. 

If we finish the season with the 30th overall offense, I wouldn't be surprised if we pick top 5. Look at where the only two teams worse than us are projected to pick.

[TitanSS]

13 minutes ago, KingTitan said:

To that I'd say with Luck's numbers. He still is losing. Do we want numbers or wins?  

Our line is living on rep. They had one good year. They aren't the best. 

The weapons argument is old. But I feel it still has merit. 

Marcus needs to be better. But he isn't the problem to me. 

Better players I feel we see a more consistent Marcus. 

We're talking solely about offense here. Luck can't control the fact he's going to have to score 35 to win week in and week out. All you can put on him is that he is capable of scoring 35 nearly every week. This year he seems to have started rusty, but the offense is coming around.

The OL was great as pass blocking for two consecutive years. Even this year they have been good outside of the Texans game and yesterday, despite the injuries. The run-blocking is atrocious this year, but a lot of the sacks yesterday were on Mariota and there is no way around that. The OL had a bad game, but he should have been sacked maybe 3 or 4 times. Also, why is he not audibling, hot routing, adjusting protections? It's not like they were just lining up 4 people and beating us. They blitzed us, disguised blitzes. He was just confused and overwhelmed. Talent around him aside, in year 4 the game has to slow down and he shouldn't be confused.

I mean, you could make the same weapons argument for Blake Bortles. Where are his weapons? Do we really want to sound like the Jags fans who think Bortles is a franchise QB? I do think he's better than Bortles, but why can we make that argument for Mariota and not Bortles?  Mariota's support cast has been better than Bortles.

Edited October 15, 2018 by TitanSS

[ttitansfan4life]

Also moving away from Marcus a moment, I’ve been saying since this OL was put together that the interior isn’t very good. All 3 are very below average. Wouldn’t mind letting Spain go, cutting Jones(maybe start Levin next season) and find a LG.  Although Kline might be the worst of all 3.  Hoping we can get out his contract rather easily.

[TitanSS]

1 minute ago, ttitansfan4life said:

Also moving away from Marcus a moment, I’ve been saying since this OL was put together that the interior isn’t very good. All 3 are very below average. Wouldn’t mind letting Spain go, cutting Jones(maybe start Levin next season) and find a LG.  Although Kline might be the worst of all 3.  Hoping we can get out his contract rather easily.

I've been saying the exact same thing. Even after their great 2016 season. They are decent as a unit pass-blocking, but horrendous run-blockers.

Kline has at least one more season as a Titan and then he can be cut for only 1 million in dead money. I don't think we see him go this year.

Maybe sign a free agent to replace Spain and draft an OG in the middle rounds to sit a year and replace Kline.

I wouldn't feel comfortable with Levin. I want someone with more power at the point of attack.

I don't think we replace all 3 in one year. 

[KingTitan]

21 minutes ago, TitanSS said:

We're talking solely about offense here. Luck can't control the fact he's going to have to score 35 to win week in and week out. All you can put on him is that he is capable of scoring 35 nearly every week. This year he seems to have started rusty, but the offense is coming around.

The OL was great as pass blocking for two consecutive years. Even this year they have been good outside of the Texans game and yesterday, despite the injuries. The run-blocking is atrocious this year, but a lot of the sacks yesterday were on Mariota and there is no way around that. The OL had a bad game, but he should have been sacked maybe 3 or 4 times. Also, why is he not audibling, hot routing, adjusting protections? It's not like they were just lining up 4 people and beating us. They blitzed us, disguised blitzes. He was just confused and overwhelmed. Talent around him aside, in year 4 the game has to slow down and he shouldn't be confused.

I mean, you could make the same weapons argument for Blake Bortles. Where are his weapons? Do we really want to sound like the Jags fans who think Bortles is a franchise QB? I do think he's better than Bortles, but why can we make that argument for Mariota and not Bortles?  Mariota's support cast has been better than Bortles.

Bortles was better when he had Robinson, Hurns and Lewis to throw too tho lol. 

So just to the nitty gritty. Do you think Marcus is holding this team/offense back. 

If we have any other QB not named Brady, Rodgers, or Brees. Do you think that we would have won yesterday or done better? Not saying that in an argumentative way. Who do you think would have won us that game yesterday with the team playing like it did?

Me. I think maybe Big Ben, Wilson, Goff( only because of the knowledge of the system). That's about it for me. 

[SerenityNow]

35 minutes ago, TitanSS said:

We're talking solely about offense here. Luck can't control the fact he's going to have to score 35 to win week in and week out. All you can put on him is that he is capable of scoring 35 nearly every week. This year he seems to have started rusty, but the offense is coming around.

The OL was great as pass blocking for two consecutive years. Even this year they have been good outside of the Texans game and yesterday, despite the injuries. The run-blocking is atrocious this year, but a lot of the sacks yesterday were on Mariota and there is no way around that. The OL had a bad game, but he should have been sacked maybe 3 or 4 times. Also, why is he not audibling, hot routing, adjusting protections? It's not like they were just lining up 4 people and beating us. They blitzed us, disguised blitzes. He was just confused and overwhelmed. Talent around him aside, in year 4 the game has to slow down and he shouldn't be confused.

I mean, you could make the same weapons argument for Blake Bortles. Where are his weapons? Do we really want to sound like the Jags fans who think Bortles is a franchise QB? I do think he's better than Bortles, but why can we make that argument for Mariota and not Bortles?  Mariota's support cast has been better than Bortles.

This is a very good point, and something I was thinking about yesterday.  I've been waiting for Marcus to grow in his presnap reads and start to beat defenses at the line of scrimmage before the ball is even snapped. That's what separates average/below average QB play from great QB play, and that aspect of Marcus' game just hasn't come around yet. He kept getting sacked over and over again and didn't change protections/give himself a hot read at all yesterday so that even when pressure was coming he could say "who's my hot" and at least get the ball out on a few of those sacks and not put the offense in such terrible spots.  

It kinda reminds me of the years when we had VY, and he always struggled against 3-4 defenses.  He just could never figure them out, never knew what he was seeing, and that led to a lot of bad games for him similar to the game Marcus had yesterday.  I don't doubt Marcus' football IQ, but he did seem very overwhelmed by the defenses he was seeing yesterday. That's a great Ravens defense, but once again, if we're going to invest long term in him there's aspects of his game that still need a lot of refinement, and the more time that goes on, it gets harder and harder to believe that he'll actually get to the level that we need him to be at to be successful.

Edited October 15, 2018 by SerenityNow

[TitanSS]

2 minutes ago, KingTitan said:

Bortles was better when he had Robinson, Hurns and Lewis to throw too tho lol. 

So just to the nitty gritty. Do you think Marcus is holding this team/offense back. 

If we have any other QB not named Brady, Rodgers, or Brees. Do you think that we would have won yesterday or done better? Not saying that in an argumentative way. Who do you think would have won us that game yesterday with the team playing like it did?

Me. I think maybe Big Ben, Wilson, Goff( only because of the knowledge of the system). That's about it for me. 

He was, but does that mean he's a franchise QB and the Jaguars should just put a lot of talent around him? It's not the QBs fault, it's that he has no weapons?

I think yesterday, Mariota absolutely held the offense back. He was hesitant to make any throws. He didn't do anything pre-snap to account for the extra pressure and almost never looked for a check-down when he was about to go down. Not to mention half of the time if he had just stayed put he had a couple more seconds to throw the ball. He got scared and fled. Created his own pressure.

Someone made the argument that his check-downs were only a couple yard passes. Right. That's what check downs are. It's because a 2 yard gain is so much better than a 7 yard loss on 2nd down.

Those guys can maybe win it, but I'm willing to bet with Carson Wentz we can convert a third down and not get sacked 11 times. I bet we score some points with him. We're 30th in the NFL in offense, so it's not just a one game issue. It's a we suck on offense issue. Even a QB that I really don't believe in, Cam Newton, would have scored points yesterday.

To be fair, I also admit that is the worst I have ever seen Mariota play.

 

[KingTitan]

15 minutes ago, TitanSS said:

He was, but does that mean he's a franchise QB and the Jaguars should just put a lot of talent around him? It's not the QBs fault, it's that he has no weapons?

I think yesterday, Mariota absolutely held the offense back. He was hesitant to make any throws. He didn't do anything pre-snap to account for the extra pressure and almost never looked for a check-down when he was about to go down. Not to mention half of the time if he had just stayed put he had a couple more seconds to throw the ball. He got scared and fled. Created his own pressure.

Someone made the argument that his check-downs were only a couple yard passes. Right. That's what check downs are. It's because a 2 yard gain is so much better than a 7 yard loss on 2nd down.

Those guys can maybe win it, but I'm willing to bet with Carson Wentz we can convert a third down and not get sacked 11 times. I bet we score some points with him. We're 30th in the NFL in offense, so it's not just a one game issue. It's a we suck on offense issue. Even a QB that I really don't believe in, Cam Newton, would have scored points yesterday.

To be fair, I also admit that is the worst I have ever seen Mariota play.

 

Right now I'm not even looking to call him a franchise Qb. Can we win with him is my question. Bortles isn't a franchise QB and is proving you can't even with him. Maybe you can if you put good players around him. 

I think we can win with Marcus. Think we could win it all with him. With the right players. 

I think there are few players that could have won yesterday. I think other QBs wouldn't have been as gun shy as Marcus was. Maybe forced the ball and gave the WRs a shot.  Maybe causing INTs or completions. 

A lot of maybe there. But I think Marcus is here to stay. 

 

[TitanSS]

11 minutes ago, KingTitan said:

But I think Marcus is here to stay. 

 

For the end of this year and for next year sure, but I'm not convinced we won't draft his replacement this year if we finish the season ranked where we are offensively.

And the Jaguars don't win with Bortles, they win in spite of him. The same could be said for us, but it's not how you build a championship contender and we all know that.

Edited October 15, 2018 by TitanSS

[TitanSS]

In 5 of Mariota's last 6 regular season games he has under 135 yards passing. 

Holy hell that is depressing.

8 of last 11 regular season games under 190 yards passing.

I'm going to cry. How the hell did I avoid seeing this for so long?

Edited October 15, 2018 by TitanSS

[dtait93]

2 hours ago, FutureIsWhite said:

Marcus couldn’t pass against Jags , bills , ravens and dolphins in first half .. heck even the eagles first half. 

So instead of us trying to find 2 games where he was bad, I’d like to find two games where he could pass .. and don’t include 2016 that’s years ago. I get the homerism in you but let’s face it the guy has put up more duds then good games the last year and a half. Actually here’s an even better stat , Marcus has missed or left early in more games since 2017 then 300 yard games passing lol. 

 

He was playing well against Miami until the injury, was clearly limited against Jax and still played well enough to win even with all the drops, played well against Philly, I missed the Buffalo game so I can’t speak on it, and was poor against Baltimore.

And why omit 2016? Clearly he can be atleast that.

Here’s a thought: 2016 was the year we could actually run the ball - Marcus’ best year. In the same scheme in 2017 and in LaFleurs scheme this year, the play action is supposed to be the bread and butter of the passing attack. But because the rushing attack is so horrible, defenses don’t have to respect it and therefore, the play actions are nullified. Because the run game isn’t working and the play action isn’t working, the basics of the offense is broken and we are left with Marcus trying to figure it out by himself with his legs or through airing it out in the shotgun and the fact of the matter is, we don’t have the pieces to air it out consistently. Now yes Marcus can be better as I’ve stated numerous times now, but it still doesn’t change the fact that we have the worst WR and TE corps in the league and quite possibly the worst rushing attack in the NFL. The entire offense is broken right now. You can bang on Marcus all you want but it’s not like the offense is running in perfect unison and he’s holding it back even if there are improvements he can make (which there are).

[FutureIsWhite]

11 minutes ago, TitanSS said:

In 5 of Mariota's last 6 regular season games he has under 135 yards passing. 

Holy hell that is depressing.

8 of last 11 regular season games under 190 yards passing.

I'm going to cry. How the hell did I avoid seeing this for so long?

I think we all saw it , we just didn’t want to believe it .. 

[TitanLegend]

This is by and large a big issue with this fanbase. Marcus is what he's always been. A decent but not spectacular QB. I'm not really concerned about yesterday's game, it was a mess all around and nobody showed up. When Marcus wasn't getting sack he actually did OK. PFF actually gave him an average grade of 62.5 which is pretty accurate I think.

Performance with him isn't really the issue. It's injury. If he can't get and stay healthy, it doesn't matter what his play is,