This is directly from the Rotowire 2007 Football Guide: #24. Pennington is the Jamie Moyer of the NFL, as butterflies sail faster than his spirals. All of the measurables are overrated with QBs. But there are bare minimum requirements for things like arm strength, and Pennington is dangerously close to that line, if not under it completely. The hope was that he would regain arm strength he had previous to his 2 devestating shoulder injuries and the major surgeries that followed. But that seems unrealistic now. Pennington was once Montana-esque in his ability to compensate for his so-so arm with great timing and touch. But those days appear to be gone. During that magical 2002, Pennington was the best intermediate passer in the NFL. But he is well below average now on 11-20 yard passes, and the Jets have put the deep ball in mothballs, throwing just 8% of all passes more than 20 yards from scrimmage. Whether Pennington is effective on intermediate routes, it's over the middle of the field where arm strength isn't needed. Teams now dare Pennington to throw the out to either sideline, and he just can't muster the strength to do so. It's sad to watch. Unless there's a miracle recovery, the Jets will have no choice but to turn to Kellen Clemens, a total unknown that reportedly has a big arm and was given the thumbs up from QB guru Ron Jaworski when the Jets grabbed him in the 2nd round of the 2006 draft. Here's how they ranked all the QBs in order: 1-Manning 2-Palmer 3-Brady 4-Vince Young 5-Bulger 6-Brees 7-Romo 8-Hasselbeck 9-Vick 10-McNabb 11-Roethlisberger 12-Delhomme 13-Cutler 14-E. Manning 15-Leinart 16-Kitna 17-Rivers 18-Losman 19-Favre 20-Huard 21-Jason Campbell 22-A. Smith 23-Schaub 24-Pennington 25-Jason Campball 26-Garcia 27-McNair 28-Grossman 29-Green 30-Leftwich
Just another shmos opinion...Chaddid fine last year, I don't see how he could have gotten any worse. If anything he will be stronger...hopefully. What the hell is Rotowire anyway? Can't be that important if they have so many spelling errors.
This analysis was written with respect to usefulness to one's fantasy squad. Pennington has always been and will continue to be a much better quarterback than his fantasy statistics indicate. His regular Top-10 standing in DPAR tells all you need to know.
The criticism is also unfair and outdated, given that the guy hasn't seen Chad throw a single ball in over six months. Let's see what he has this year before reverting back to the old cliches about butterfies, etc.
I find it amazing that none of these people ever mention that Chad had no serious running threat last year, which completely neutralized the best part of his game when it came to the long ball, the PA pass. But hey, what do I know. I don't write for a "fantasy" sports site like "rotoworld.com." TBTF
Blah, blah, arm strength... blah, blah arm strength... This is all people can manage to say about him. Nevertheless, when he plays we win more than we lose. Let's see how this season fares for him now that he's been healthy for a whole year and we add a possible upgrade in the backfield for him. Pretty shitty analysis if you ask me.
It isn't fair to conflate Rotoworld and Rotowire. Rotoworld is generally trusted as a credible news source and offers some generally solid analysis.
Every year I buy all of the Football Magazines (good bathroom reading). This year, Athlons, Lyndy's, Sporting News and Street and Smith all have Chad ranked in the mid 20's.
If they are writing about fantasy, than they should mention fantasy in the description. Write about how the Jets have a short passing game, that's going to spread the ball around and is going to be efficient, but not put up the big time passing yards, or 40 passing touchdowns. They shouldn't try and break down Chad's game on the field, because that was laughable. He won 10 games last year with no running game, but he has to have a miracle recovery if he wants to keep being the starter? I just wonder if they even watched football last year. They make it sound like he's a player who's career is hanging on by a thread, even though he played pretty well and took the team to the playoffs last year. One of the most ridiculous articles I've read in a long time.
If they are evaluating him on a Fantasy Football benchmark then I would guess this is pretty good because he isn't exactly a great or good Fantasy QB. To evaluate him against other QB's (as an NFL player - not fantasy) I would put him in the top 15 and opinions vary on how high or low in that group he should be.
I'd put money down that a Jets fan wrote this analysis on Chad, as it is an outlook I have read many times on this board by many a Jets fan that wants to see a change at QB. I would be lying if I said I didn't completely disagree with, either, although I wouldn't put him as far down as 24th.
That has to be based on fantasy values. I'm guessing Chad is ranked low because of Thomas Jones. Maybe the writer is figuring we will run more than pass. Just a thought. And let me clarify that IMO Chad is ranked too low even for fantasy. Boo hiss.
Romo # 7 and Jason Cambell 3 spots ahead of Chad. Now that's just plain stupid. Lets see, can I average armed QB lead a team to the Super Bowl. Answer=yes. Then who cares. Its the brains and system stupid
I thought so too. And regardless, the analysis the guy gives is liek he is rating him in erms of his quality as a player, and I think he is way too ahrd on him. That said, alot of the hardcore fantasy guys can only think in terms of fantasy football, so to them, fantasy potential is the real-life evaluation of the player...
I'm not a big fan of Penningtons ability but he is way under rated. He compares favarobly to most of the QB's in the league not named in the top 3. I'm not saying there aren't 10 to 15 QB's I wouldn't prefer to Pennington but over all he is certainly comparable to any below the top 3.
Pennington, right now...is better than these gentleman ranked ahead of him: 4-Vince Young 6-Brees 7-Romo 9-Vick 11-Roethlisberger 13-Cutler 14-E. Manning 15-Leinart 16-Kitna 17-Rivers 18-Losman 19-Favre 20-Huard 21-Jason Campbell 22-A. Smith 23-Schaub