Ramsey/Brunell: a closer look

I need to weigh in here.

At this point in his career, we all know what Ramsey is. There's no more time for him to develop, in my eyes, he is what he is at this point. And I think he's a tough guy, a good leader, someone the rest of the team responds to. But he's inconsistent. He shows flashes where he makes good throws, and has games where his throws are on the mark. But then he has games like this past weekend where he just flat out misses a WR and it gets intercepted. And he still holds the ball too long, and ends up fumbling on occasion. We can't have turnovers, that's how you lose football games. I'm a Brunell supporter at this point.

On the flipside, Brunell seems to be managing the game well. He has zip on his passes and I trust him to make better decisions. I think he'll show a lot of improvement over last year now that he'll be getting the reps in practice. I do get concerned that he's telegraphing his passes though, I see him staring receivers down. He's not perfect, he won't lead the league in passing, he won't make the pro bowl, he won't do anything special. But I don't think he'll turn it over as much as Ramsey does, and that's the bottom line.

It will shake out well for us, despite our emotional attachment to Ramsey. He'll be traded in the offseason for a 1st rounder because his cap number is so low. At that point, Campbell will at least be ready to be Brunell's backup. Hopefully he's ready to start.

Matty, we argued about whether Gibbs had faith in PR for about 2 days and your opening post contradicts everything you argued for in your posts 5 weeks ago. I guess you now see what I saw all along. Gibbs never had faith in PR but gave him a shot at the starting job anyway, and PR never did anything with that shot to give Gibbs any faith in him.

I believe that Gibbs gave Ramsey a fair shot to take the starting job and claim it as his own.

I think Gibbs wanted to have faith in Ramsey, but like you said Ramsey simply didn't hold up his end of the bargain.

Actually Gibbs said that Santanna Moss might be returning kicks at sometime.

I requested on the Redskin.com thread to Dan Snyder (in his specific thread) that he consider seeing if Brian Mitchell could suit up and return kicks for us.

So despite a very shaky preseason by Ramsey and a very solid one by Brunell, Gibbs should just overlook that and stick by his word. For what? Word doesn't win football games.

Ramsey had his chance to take this job. He had the entire offseason of OTA's, minicamps and training camp. He then had the preseason to convince the team he could be the man. He did nothing to squash the concerns the coaches had about him. He's turning the ball over, he's indecisive, he just doesn't look like a QB that has a firm grasp of the offense, and for someone who's in year 2 of the system and has worked as the starter all offseason, his performance has been very subpar to say the least.

At this point I don't see any sort of arguement for Ramsey that makes sense. Ramsey has been shaky, Brunell has been solid. Looks like an easy choice to me. People want to say look at what Brunell did last year... well HELLO look what Ramsey has done THIS year, not much!

Like I said, I think the only mistake Gibbs made was sticking by Ramsey for so long this preseason. Don't get me wrong, I was behind the decision at the time. But looking back it's easy to see that it should have been a formal open competition for the job. But Gibbs did exactly what we wanted, he stuck by Ramsey and gave him every chance to claim the job. He simply didn't do it... how can that not be any more clear? Gibbs DID stick to his word, he gave Ramsey a fair shot to claim the job.

I'm sorry but a 65 QB rating with 4 INTs in a little over 6 quarters of work in the preseason is not going to win you a lot of support from your coaches, let alone a firm grip on the starting job. Then in 3 series of work against the Bears he coughs it up twice and throws another head scratcher of a pick.

Bottom line, Ramsey had his chance to claim the starting job. If you can honestly tell me he did enough to be the unquestioned starter for this team, I'd really love to hear it.

Matty, just after the game you said Ramsey should probably start and you didn't seem to indicate that it should be any other way. Gibbs didn't stick to his word since he said Ramsey was going to be the starter for 2005...he was for about 15 minutes. We can have a good debate about who should be the quarterback, but I can't see room for debate on Gibbs going back on his word (without parsing phrases in a Clinton-esque fashion).

I don't understand the "toss away Mark Brunell's 2004 performance" talk around here. Okay, let me get this straight.....forget about Mark Brunell's performance in 9 regular season games last year. Concentrate on his mediocre performance in three quarters of regular season play and four preseason games against backups?

What has Ramsey done this year? You're absolutely right in saying "NOT MUCH." He was in for all of fifteen minutes before the "loyal to a fault" Gibbs yanked him.

Look at the post-game poll in which the overwhelming majority of people were originally saying that Ramsey should be the starter. Ever since Gibbs announced that Brunell would be starting, people have "flip-flopped." I understand the faith in Gibbs, but I would like to see people stop bashing Ramsey and acting like Brunell is Peyton Manning and admit that they SOLELY changed their minds based on what Gibbs decided to do.

what i don't get is everyone defending brunell keeps pretending last year doesn't matter, but somehow this preseason does...

I'm not saying last year doesn't matter, but to me right now is what really matters, and right now Brunell is the better QB.

It will shake out well for us, despite our emotional attachment to Ramsey. He'll be traded in the offseason for a 1st rounder because his cap number is so low. At that point, Campbell will at least be ready to be Brunell's backup. Hopefully he's ready to start.


We'll be lucky to get a 3rd for him.

I can't believe that we are talking about Campbell starting some games. :doh:

Probably not Ramsey?? How about definitely not Ramsey, and the jury is still out on Brunell.

We've seen what Ramsey can do, how about we give Brunell a shot, people are writing him off based on last year.

You say history means something, well how about looking at Brunell's entire body of work and not just an injury plagued struggle with a new team and an outdated offense.

Ramsey isn't the one, agreed.

Brunell's entire body of work is mediocre at best. He's got a decent career passer rating of 83.9, but he's never scored more than 20 TDs in a season. The season he threw for the most yards (1996), he had 19 TDs and 20 INTs. Overall he's got 151 TDs and 92 INTs. That means that for every 1.6 touchdowns, he's lobbing it to the other team. Hardly mistake free.

Is Brunell the worst QB in the league? Of course not. He had some pretty good years in Jacksonville. Then they bounced him. All QBs have their streak - hell, look at Kurt Warner. Jacksonville dropped Brunell for a reason - Leftwich was better.

Brunell's stats last season are absolutely abysmal, his preseason was mediocre even against backups.

But hey, if the old guy can win games, that's fine with me. Put head-banging Gus Frerotte back in there if he can win games, I don't care.

Right now I have 0 faith in Brunell and his ability to lead this team to the Super Bowl, the playoffs, or even past .500. If he shows me something, I'll take it - so far I see nothing.

Matty, just after the game you said Ramsey should probably start and you didn't seem to indicate that it should be any other way. Gibbs didn't stick to his word since he said Ramsey was going to be the starter for 2005...he was for about 15 minutes. We can have a good debate about who should be the quarterback, but I can't see room for debate on Gibbs going back on his word (without parsing phrases in a Clinton-esque fashion).

I don't understand the "toss away Mark Brunell's 2004 performance" talk around here. What? Okay, let me get this straight.....forget about Mark Brunell's performance in 9 regular season games last year. Concentrate on his mediocre performance in three quarters of regular season play and four preseason games against backups?

What has Ramsey done this year? You're absolutely right in saying "NOT MUCH." He was in for all of fifteen minutes before the "loyal to a fault" Gibbs yanked him.

Look at the post-game poll in which the overwhelming majority of people were originally saying that Ramsey should be the starter. Ever since Gibbs announced that Brunell would be starting, people have "flip-flopped." I understand the faith in Gibbs, but I would like to see people stop bashing Ramsey and acting like Brunell is Peyton Manning and admit that they SOLELY changed their minds based on what Gibbs decided to do.

To a point I have flip-flopped.

I supported Gibbs' decision to stick by Ramsey, even though he was struggling I was thinking well there must be something that Gibbs sees in him to keep sticking with him. Maybe he's close to turning the corner.

Now it's obvious he isn't close to turning that corner. Gibbs has decided to pull the plug before things get ugly. He stuck by Brunell last year way too long and he's not going to repeat that.

Now I'm supporting Gibbs' decision to make the switch.

Looking at the big picture, and keeping emotion out of it, Brunell is the better option right now.

I don't know why there's this view that people can't change their minds.

Winning in the NFL and in life is all about adapting to change and making adjustments on the fly.

Sticking to a plan is great, but when circumstances dictate a change in plans, sticking to your plan just for the sake of sticking to it is not a smart thing to do.

Hey guys,
What an interesting debate we are having here and it all stims from the fact that neither one of our QBs will step up and "make plays consistently". Yes study those words in quotes closely. Mark doesn't make plays, and Patrick doesn't make them consistently. Gibbs is going with the lesser of two evils at this point. I don't like Brunell... there I have said it. I would rather have J. Campbell in there if Ramsey can't play, but I understand Gibb's decision and believe it is probably a good one at this point. I would love to see Jason get the start in Week 4 against Seattle. I mean let's all face it, Mark is just holding the job until Jason is ready now that he has put Patrick on the bench. Word to Jason..... get ready, your time is coming very soon!