An Honest Question About Dak

[DogFace]

It doesn't help that people continue to compare Dak's stats to HOFers who started their careers during a different era as evidence for him being a top QB.

Would it help to compare to Wentz and Goff?

What does that look like or why is that also a bad comparison?

How to we compare players? Is that now impossible because the game has changed so much?
What is the proper amount of time between starts of careers to fairly compare?

 

[817Gill]

Nobody really says this.

And the problems always arise when people do stuff like compare him to quarterbacks who are a) far better right now and b) played their first 3 seasons years ago. 4,300 yards in today's NFL is NOTHING.

4300 is good enough for top 10, and Russell Wilson played and plays in today’s NFL.

 

[Philmonroe]

I have said from the get go on what i think alot of the hate for Dak comes from. And i really think it has nothing to do with football. But ill leave it at that and i ope nobody goes into a debate about it because we will get benched lol. Ill discuss my view on this with anybody who wants in pm.

I just think alot of people think you have to be drafted high to be acceptable or you ave to be the QB they wanted. Everybody wanted Wentz or Goff. Wentz is a guy who is outplayed by his backup. And Goff is strctly a system QB. Which everybody with any football knowledge said during the draft process. Hell you saw it this past saturday. When Goff was forced to go thru read progressions he was horrible. Dallas went zone and all of the sudden Goff had the inside routes open. The Rams system had two types of plays. A run up the gut if Dallas shifted to the bunched Wr side. Or a in route if Dallas stayed in its base. Of ourse you have to have the players to make the plays. And they did. Dallas was just off balance with the presnap movement and misdirections on the snap.

Why do you think Philly and LA get the LOS so fast? Because the coach can speak to him until there are 15 seconds left on the play clock. The coach is walking him thru the defenses set. Moreso with Rams. Philly slowed down once Foles was in and i think thats why they have more success because Foles can read a defense better than Wentz. Dak has had to learn the pro system. He's had to make the adjustments because of type of offense the Boys run.

We saw Wentz and Goff in when they didnt have a coaching holding their hand presnap and it was really bad.

Challenge accepted on that lazy non football take business

 

[817Gill]

Look at the QBs you mentioned. In Wilson's first 3 years the Seahawks got to the Super Bowl twice and won once. In Ben's 2nd season the Steelers won the Super Bowl. In Brady's first 3 years as the starter, the Pats won the Super Bowl twice. So, no there is no argument that Dak outperformed those "teams" that had Wilson, Ben and Brady at QB.

He didn’t outperform teams, I literally said those early teams were better. He statistically outperformed those QB’s.

 

[Philmonroe]

You may as well forget trying to convince the Dak haters, I don’t care what kind of stats you put up, they have made up their minds already

You cant convince either side so what's your point? Y'all that think he some next great thing are just as bad as the ones that think he isn't nothing. Y'all have no high ground on this issue.

 

[Them]

I would like to ask the forum why we as an NFL treat Dak so different from any other young QB. The easy answer is he’s the Cowboys QB, but let’s dive in a little more.

Dak just finished up year 3. His biggest criticisms are:

-Inconsistent with decision making and accuracy.
-Issues with pocket awareness.
-“Game Manager”

Here are his first 3 years:

Dak Prescott- 975 completions on 1,475 attempts for a 66% completion percentage and about 3,625 passing yards a season. He’s averaged 23 TD passes and 8 interceptions. His YPA for his career is 7.4

Let’s look at 3 other quarterbacks in their first 3 years

Russell Wilson - 794 completions on 1,252 attempts for a 63.33 completion percentage for about 3,316 passing yards a season. Over those years he averaged 24 TD passes and about 8 interceptions. His YPA in those 3 years was 7.8

Big Ben - 644 completions on 1,032 attempts for a 62 % completion percentage and about 2,840 yards passing a season. He averaged about 17 TD passes and 14 interceptions. His YPA those years was 8.4

Tom Brady - 954 completions on 1,541 attempts for a 62% completion rate and about 3,409 yards passing a season. He averaged about 23 TD passes and 13 interceptions. His YPA was 6.7

Dak arguably has performed the best statistically of all these teams with worse coaching and worse players (remember these are all Super Bowl teams within those first 3 years of those guys careers).

I hear so much talk on this forum about how much better Romo was and they back it up with stats and highlights from when Romo already had years of experience and reps.

Dak is only in year 3. While the other QB’s mentioned above were given some of the same criticisms, they also were given time to grow.

-R. Wilson was a game manager who routinely sailed fastballs over WR’s heads.
-It took Tom Brady 5 years to shake off his rep as a game manager with an all time great HC.
-Big Ben barely got to throw the ball this first few years.

Why do most other QB’s get a chance to improve while Dak is supposed to be at peak potential right away?

Is it because Dak’s lows are aesthetically unpleasant while his highs don’t look that sexy either? Is it the color of his skin? Is it the 2016 season that spoiled us all?

Dak has obviously made strides in improvement this season once he got a semblance of a WR/TE group.
Why do most fans shut the door on any more improvement from him? Why do we give Jared Goff a pass for bad QB coaching but Dak doesn’t? Help me understand why we as a fanbase refuse to give Dak the same leash as everyone else. All these QB’s were limited in their first few years, let’s let the growth process complete before we make a definitive judgment.

...I actually have liked Dak from the very start. I knew he needed experience, time to grow. He also needs a good team around him...
Last year was a setback for many reasons. This season he got better over the last half. To bad the Defense laid a freakin' egg last week...
The FO will probably handle player contracts, and the draft fairly well this next season. My main fear is the coaching...I'm still willing to give Coach JG
one more season, but the OC Linehan should take a bus...To bad I'm hearing that he'll return in 2019.

 

[817Gill]

I think you left off a huge thing about DAK..

he took a HUGE number of sacks.

He killed a ton of points and wins with this problem.

Until he learns to take care of the ball at the professional level..

we are all stuck with DAK.

If he throws one more pass to the other teams LBer and it bounces to the ground becuz the opposing player is shocked it hit him..

I am going to strangle him.

He had one in every game it seemed coming down the stretch and any of them could have ended the game for all intents and purposes.

Remember the TD to Cooper against the Eagles that won the game.?

Even that pass should have been intercepted but didn't.

I once was very high on DAK..

but I have tempered it for now.

The problem with this is that you are looking at Dak only here. Ben used to drive Steelers fans crazy with how long we stayed in the pocket. Wilson had an overthrow problem his first years due to him trying to throw the ball too hard instead of using the touch he displays now.

The point is all these QB’s had flaws in their youth. Give him some time. Also Cam Cameron has broken down our pass protection in an in-depth video and said we were amongst the worse in the league and you could easily scheme guys unblocked against us. Yes Dak has to work on it but it’s not a 70/30 Dak thing.

 

[817Gill]

#1 way to get me to not pay attention is to mention completion percentage. That is such a skewed stat based on how often he throws check downs, regardless of down and distance. Dak has more support around him than those other QBs, I'm not hearing it

That’s why I included YPA. Try again next time bud

 

[Future]

4300 is good enough for top 10, and Russell Wilson played and plays in today’s NFL.

So? Being top-10 doesn't mean anything. Eli is in the top 10 in yards and is one of the 7-8 worst quarterbacks in football. There were also 13 quarterbacks who had the yards/game to hit 4,300, including studs Ryan Fitzpatrick, Nick Mullens and Joe Flacco.

Russel Wilson was a rookie in 2012. Passing is far, far easier today than it was then. He was also 4th in y/a as a rookie at 7.9.

 

[Nav22]

There’s something about Dak that some fans don’t like.

His numbers and W/L record prove his worth. Men lie, women lie, numbers don’t lie. He was a top-10 QB after the Cooper trade, period.

So it’s something else. Something he’ll never be able to change.

We have our franchise QB; we also have many VERY stupid fans.

 

[pansophy]

Would it help to compare to Wentz and Goff?

What does that look like or why is that also a bad comparison?

How to we compare players? Is that now impossible because the game has changed so much?
What is the proper amount of time between starts of careers to fairly compare?

I do think it is a fair comparison to look at Wentz and Goff. FWIW I thought Dak outplayed Goff the other night.

It's also reasonable to look at rankings rather than raw numbers, which should account for rule differences etc. I'm old enough to remember when passing over 3000 yards was considered a solid year, equivalent to a 1000 yard rusher, and Dan Marino's 5000 yard passing record was 'unbreakable' it was so over the top incredible. Big Ben and Mahomes both passed for over 5000 yards this season, and Matt Ryan almost did as well.

It's just not the same to talk about Russel Wilson in 2012 as if those were the same conditions to pass within as it is now.

 

[LatinMind]

There is no conspiracy against Dak. Smart people with no allegiances or ill will towards the Cowboys look at his film and judge him fairly. He lacks elite arm talent, he too often doesn’t make the optimal read, and he lacks pocket awareness. He has positives too. And when you judge him on his production then extrapolate all of that out it looks like to those who get paid to analyze this stuff that he’s never going to be elite. Does that mean he can’t overcome the odds? No. And I sincerely hope he does. But odds are we will look back at Dak’s career and judge him as “serviceable” and not much more than that. So the question becomes is serviceable really what you want at the most important position in the league? You don’t have much of a choice for now. But it should be factored in when it comes time to make an investment in Dak.

Game film? Lets not kid ourselves, we dont watch "film" we watch the same game we saw on tv only recorded it on our dvr. dont make it out like u know what ur looking at. None of us do. We dont know the progressions the play calls for. We dont know the instructions from the coach on that spacific play. All we have is a madden view of the game bein broadcasted.

What is the optimal read? You say he lacks pocket awareness? How did he win the game vs the Giants? Alot of you need to stop with the thinking that you know how to play QB. I like what Jimmy Johnson had to say about Dak on the pregame before the Rams game. He said Dak has been playing the best football of his career. He said his ceiling hasnt been reached and loved how his "pocket awareness has improved so much" Terry Bradshaw echoed the same thing.After the game Rod Woodson said he was very impressed how Dak was able to keep bringing the Cowboys back in the game vs the Rams. And also said he was playing as good as any QB in the playoffs.

 

[Flamma]

I don't hate Dak, I think he is a pretty decent QB. I just don't think he's worth more than 15 Mil a year tops. More like 10-15 Mil a year. But I also don't think Cousins is worth half of what they're paying him, but there he is, making much more.

 

[pansophy]

Game film? Lets not kid ourselves, we dont watch "film" we watch the same game we saw on tv only recorded it on our dvr. dont make it out like u know what ur looking at. None of us do. We dont know the progressions the play calls for. We dont know the instructions from the coach on that spacific play. All we have is a madden view of the game bein broadcasted.

What is the optimal read? You say he lacks pocket awareness? How did he win the game vs the Giants? Alot of you need to stop with the thinking that you know how to play QB. I like what Jimmy Johnson had to say about Dak on the pregame before the Rams game. He said Dak has been playing the best football of his career. He said his ceiling hasnt been reached and loved how his "pocket awareness has improved so much" Terry Bradshaw echoed the same thing.After the game Rod Woodson said he was very impressed how Dak was able to keep bringing the Cowboys back in the game vs the Rams. And also said he was playing as good as any QB in the playoffs.

Dak was pretty bad at the beginning of the season, and he had his worst statistical year. Those factors tend to stick with people and distort what they see when he misses wide open guys or lobs passes into the end zone because he is worried about missing him and it ends up getting an INT instead of a TD.

He played much better after we got Cooper, and I thought I saw him finally throw defenses out of stacking the middle of the field to stop Zeke. We may have left some points on the table against the Rams, but I'm personally not a believer in the notion that the QB has to play literally perfect football to make up for deficiencies in other players. Defense gave up 270 yards rushing -- that should be the end of the story.

 

[OmerV]

He didn’t outperform teams, I literally said those early teams were better. He statistically outperformed those QB’s.

These were your words ....
Dak arguably has performed the best statistically of all these teams ...

In any case, my point is that winning Super Bowls obviously buys a lot of goodwill, and that has a lot to do with why Dak doesn't get the same consideration in his first 3 seasons that those guys did. It's much easier to be patient with a young player when the team is winning championships.

 

[HungryLion]

It’s going to be a long off-season debating about Dak.
I don’t think I have energy for it.

I’ll just say this:

I am not against the team continuing to try and find more QB talent. The truth is our front office has not invested enough draft capital into QB’s over the past couple of decades. They got incredibly lucky with Romo and they alsongo lucky with Dak, say what you will about him but he has already exceeded 4th round pick expectations.

So the front office SHOULD be drafting QB’s occasionally with a mid round even up to 2nd or 3rd round pick. If nothing else you can trade them for future draft picks if they show potential.

Having said all that. Dak was in fact a third year player, and he got better and better as the season progressed. He was playing horrible the first half of the season but really was making strides as the season went along. Clearly he was slumping (and also didn’t have enough receiving talent). Right now his trajectory is pointing up. So I just hope he continues to improve.

 

[LatinMind]

Dak was pretty bad at the beginning of the season, and he had his worst statistical year. Those factors tend to stick with people and distort what they see when he misses wide open guys or lobs passes into the end zone because he is worried about missing him and it ends up getting an INT instead of a TD.

He played much better after we got Cooper, and I thought I saw him finally throw defenses out of stacking the middle of the field to stop Zeke. We may have left some points on the table against the Rams, but I'm personally not a believer in the notion that the QB has to play literally perfect football to make up for deficiencies in other players. Defense gave up 270 yards rushing -- that should be the end of the story.

No argument here on the start of the yr, that had just lost his #1, his HOF TE and the best C in the nfl. And didnt have no proven replacements. Oh yeah and a guy coaching the Ol that wanted to take his monster blocking and turn them into a zone blocking unit. And ill correct you in saying he had better stats then his rookie yr this yr. 2017 was his worst.

He misses open guys deep, but i dont know if you noticed, on most of them drives he misses, he still takes the team down for a score anyways.

And ur right, no QB plays a perfect game, and too many people get caught up in stats. When the one that cant be walked around is he just wins games.In close games, and in these close games Dallas isnt giving the ball to Elliot. They keep it with Dak.

 

[jazzcat22]

Nobody really says this.

And the problems always arise when people do stuff like compare him to quarterbacks who are a) far better right now and b) played their first 3 seasons years ago. 4,300 yards in today's NFL is NOTHING.

Dak was 415 yards short of this for the year. If he had a legit #1 WR for those 1st 7 games, je would have been way over that.

 

[tm1119]

It’s as simple as the eye ball test. My eyes tell me he’s not a top 12 qb in the nfl when it comes to throwing the football. Therefore my common sense tells me that in order to win a Super Bowl we need to build an incredible overall team along with getting lucky

I’m not saying Dak is far below the top 12 and I’m not saying it’s easy to find a franchise QB, but id prefer to go looking than to sign Dak to a big contract and settle for mediocrity.

 

[Rockport]

I would like to ask the forum why we as an NFL treat Dak so different from any other young QB. The easy answer is he’s the Cowboys QB, but let’s dive in a little more.

Dak just finished up year 3. His biggest criticisms are:

-Inconsistent with decision making and accuracy.
-Issues with pocket awareness.
-“Game Manager”

Here are his first 3 years:

Dak Prescott- 975 completions on 1,475 attempts for a 66% completion percentage and about 3,625 passing yards a season. He’s averaged 23 TD passes and 8 interceptions. His YPA for his career is 7.4

Let’s look at 3 other quarterbacks in their first 3 years

Russell Wilson - 794 completions on 1,252 attempts for a 63.33 completion percentage for about 3,316 passing yards a season. Over those years he averaged 24 TD passes and about 8 interceptions. His YPA in those 3 years was 7.8

Big Ben - 644 completions on 1,032 attempts for a 62 % completion percentage and about 2,840 yards passing a season. He averaged about 17 TD passes and 14 interceptions. His YPA those years was 8.4

Tom Brady - 954 completions on 1,541 attempts for a 62% completion rate and about 3,409 yards passing a season. He averaged about 23 TD passes and 13 interceptions. His YPA was 6.7

Dak arguably has performed the best statistically of all these teams with worse coaching and worse players (remember these are all Super Bowl teams within those first 3 years of those guys careers).

I hear so much talk on this forum about how much better Romo was and they back it up with stats and highlights from when Romo already had years of experience and reps.

Dak is only in year 3. While the other QB’s mentioned above were given some of the same criticisms, they also were given time to grow.

-R. Wilson was a game manager who routinely sailed fastballs over WR’s heads.
-It took Tom Brady 5 years to shake off his rep as a game manager with an all time great HC.
-Big Ben barely got to throw the ball this first few years.

Why do most other QB’s get a chance to improve while Dak is supposed to be at peak potential right away?

Is it because Dak’s lows are aesthetically unpleasant while his highs don’t look that sexy either? Is it the color of his skin? Is it the 2016 season that spoiled us all?

Dak has obviously made strides in improvement this season once he got a semblance of a WR/TE group.
Why do most fans shut the door on any more improvement from him? Why do we give Jared Goff a pass for bad QB coaching but Dak doesn’t? Help me understand why we as a fanbase refuse to give Dak the same leash as everyone else. All these QB’s were limited in their first few years, let’s let the growth process complete before we make a definitive judgment.

You haven’t been here long enough to know that there is a certain group of posters who do NOTHING but complain about EVERYTHING. They couldn’t care less how Dak’s improved because someone like Cowturd says he was inaccurate. And when they are proved they were wrong they aren’t man enough to admit it. They will always ***** because they know they will get responses. Then their minions, who have the mental capacity of a slug, pile on so they get likes from the instigators. It’s quite sad actually.