I wrote about this yesterday: Fans tend to undervalue what players are capable of through an entire game and instead overvalue the big moments. There’s no doubt big moments are a part of football lore, but like clutch hitting in baseball or clutch shooting in basketball, they are overrated.

Riley has shown the capability to lead a team back in his small sample size of a game and three-quarters, but he’s rarely been in a situation where his team wasn’t behind. We’re basing possibilities on potential.

“But he’s got the look! He’s got the fire!”

Longshore, by contrast, has done something equally valuable—85 percent of the time he puts his team (except for the end of last year when the team gave up and Tenn ‘06) out in front and, usually when healthy, keeps them there. He doesn’t always screw up (remember Oregon?), he has to deal with receiver routes and drops, he plays injured. That doesn’t make him a gamer?

“But dude, NINE INTERCEPTIONS! He clearly sucks! HE DOESN”T HAVE IT IN HIM!”

Teams fail together. Not individuals. One day we might realize this.

(I’m not shilling for Longshore; the open competition will be fun)

I’ve always like Longshore and wanted to believe that he would be a Rose Bowl-type QB. In 2006, he was generally awesome. The one knock was that he was perhaps a bit weak on the road. That he need a big road win to build that ultimate confidence. I thought there was some truth in that and totally normal for a soph QB who hadn’t really played his frosh year.

The big win over A&M had me thinking he was over the hump heading into 2007. The first half of the season seemed to confirm that, including a big road win over Oregon. Then the collapse. It seems clear to me that his injury was the main issue. Although never a runner (he did show reasonable mobility in 2006), he was very immobile, mechanics suffered, etc. He looked like the late game, road wimp that some claimed.

If he’s back to 2006 health, mentally and physically, with even more experience, he should have a great 2008. But I have serious questions about his ability to stay healthy. That’s why I’m glad we have Riley. I have no problem if JT wants to start Nate. But he needs to put in Riley if Nate gets hurt. Playing Nate hurt last year was a bad deal for everyone.

"With Nate," he said, "he’ll go through the progressions (on pass plays) for No. 1,2,3, 4 and even 5.”

I am slightly more than a casual observer, and to me this just wasn’t the problem. Longshore’s much bigger problem was that he would decide who he was throwing to and never make any read of the coverage – he would never start going through his progression. He had some success with this – often the receivers would be open, and it prevented him from being sacked more often despite his immobility. At other times, he would hold the ball longer in the pocket, but it never seemed to me that he was going through a five-receiver progression – his head wasn’t moving. Instead, and this is just my observation, he was just waiting for his primary receiver (or at best a receiver on the same side as the primary) to get open. He would often end up eventually trying to force the ball to the primary receiver, long after the window to hit them had closed.

Just off the top of my head, and I don’t think this is the best example, see the interception against UCLA: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eit1ZcphBtc. It isn’t a particularly fast-developing play, yet there is no attempt to even start looking at other receivers despite double coverage. He had to see that coverage, correct?

To me, while I admit he played limited minutes in comparison to Longshore, it seemed that Riley both was better at going through his progressions, and “making plays” (to me, making plays also means hitting your fourth receiver while scrambling.) Riley thus far seems to have the ability to find the open man, but also to get some out of nothing when no one is open.

These quotes are just too overly simplistic. As much as I like Tedford, I think this is where he is over simplifying a problem in order for the media to have a simple explanation.

At the same time, I liked Dickey’s piece, the NFL factor is the huge thing hanging over all of this…my assumption at this point, is that if Tedford doesn’t think that Riley is the difference between winning the Pac-10 or not, Longshore is going to be the starter.

with Longshore only the iwoks win

Runningwolf for Propoganda Minister

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