I dont blame the player at all. If they decided to trot me out there, I could be worse, but I didnt force the decision. I will argue that the coaches pretty much neutered Weeden with the 1 read and checkdown philosophy. This is a very simplistic offense that does not rely on a ton of timing, pick plays, etc. 99% of the passes were basically runs. Defenses definitely compensated. In steps Cassell, airs it out and throws 3 picks - 2 of the next 3 games nary a TD. To say there is no culpability of those performances on coaches (and org) just doesnt compute because you have TJYates jump off the couch and torch the 6 ranked pass def of the NYJ pass def. And the previous week throw the only TD to beat a undefeated Bengals team. TJ Yates can lead a TD drive(s) vs NYJ and Cincy, but nary a one can we get vs Tampa. So Im sure there are areas that you can point to deficiencies in other areas, but that is also saying that the game plan/philosophy, etc was sound. That is where I cant buy it for 7 weeks straight.
And its not an either/or QB or Randy Gregory option in the least. How about Landry Jones? Picked in the 4th Round 2013, Right After the Dallas Cowboys picked CB - BW Webb. Shaun Hill was also available right after 2013 from Detroit. Even with that, there were other options better than Weeden for 2 straight years. He was already over 30 and was basically a horrid rookie This isnt a backup QB vs Gregory discussion.
The odd part is they "groomed" Weeden for 2 years to check the ball down where 95% of the throws were within 5 yards of the LOS. If that is the plan, and I stated it since day 1, go with Flowers or someone who prides a hint of mobility as a backup. After 0-7 I just cant take any excuse that seriously. You have to be weapons grade unlucky to do that.
The team rolled the dice on a player that has played 3 complete seasons since 2007 and that all in on boxcars came up 3-6 and the sent career cooler in as relief. That strategy is never a good idea. Many didnt need 3 games to see it
Good post, btw. You're right that the staff bears some responsibility somewhere for not successfully backing up Romo, whatever their reasons. Whatever the mix, some of that has to be on Garrett. I think we liked Shaun Hill because of Linehan, but I don't know if his availability in 2013 overlapped Linehan's presence on the staff or not. It's really hard to second guess how we might have had QBs in the draft rated relative to Weeden/Vaughan or relative to the players we ultimately took, but I'll concede that we didn't cover ourselves adequately at QB. Then again, I was saying the same thing this offseason, because I didn't like our backup QB at that point, either.
As far as Weeden goes, we lost more games without him than we did with him, and with a better roster. And to be fair to the guy, he did play great in the PHI game in relief.
As to the losing streak, how much does the fact that they're really consecutive matter? A season loss is a season loss as far as evaluating a coach is concerned, isn't it? Does 8-8 with a seven consecutive losses look any worse than 8-8 with the losses spread over 17 weeks? Or does it maybe look better because the reason for the losses can more reasonably be attributed to personnel being out of games than it can be to something else? I'd say the latter. Of course, that means we have to get to 8-8 from 3-7. That's not necessarily likely. But we might end up pretty close. At any rate, I'm sure you get my point.
And then, finally, regarding the losses themselves. In a sport where roughly half of all games are decided by 7 points or less, more or less. Or where almost a quarter of al games are decided by 3 points or less, you're in a better position to tell me than I am to tell you just how unlikely a 7 game losing streak is. How many of those games might have been coached well enough to win (theoretically, if we could measure such things) and instead they were lost on one execution error or one referee's decision or one truly fantastic play by a member of an opposing team. One game? Two, maybe? If they were execution errors, there's really know way for us as fans to know if or how hard the coaches might have been working with the players in question to eliminate such a problem. If it's a referee's decision, there's obviously very little no coaching control over how those calls get made. Statistically speaking, does it follow that 7 losses in a row has to be on the coaching where a couple strings of two or three losses in a row could be explainable by other circumstances? I'm not sure it does.
