One of the problems I see is the cookie cutter approach most teams take towards the position. If you want to be drafted high, you need to be well over 6' and be able to throw a ball through a brick wall while the ability to win games is almost an afterthought.

And it seems NFL coaches rarely cater the offense to the guy's skills. They attempt to turn great runners like Donovan McNabb and Michael Vick into pocket passers. Doug Flutie was unbelievable in Canada and had a good NFL career when he got the chance, but nobody seemed comfortable with him because he was short and scrambled a lot--much better to have somebody tall who'll run the plays you send in, even if he's not very good at it.

NFL coaches also love to talk out of both sides of their mouth regarding QB play. On the one hand they say how much experience is needed to master the complex offenses, yet when the starter goes down very few teams admit to simplifying the offense for the newcomer, which would be the logical approach.

The Flutie situation in Buffalo was a good exmple of the problems evaluating QBs. Flutie kept getting benched in favor of Rob Johnson who seemed to have all the tools they look for 6'4" strong arm etc but he froze up under even the slightest pressure and got sacked. This problem never showed up in practice he was great there just in the actual game.

Especially at quarterback, the idea is not to pick between the tall choaker and the short guy who can win, the idea is to go on a quest for a QB who can win the whole thing. Flutie was fun and was a great guy, but even when given a chance he couldn't consistantly play at a high level. The rational choice is to play Rob Johnson until you are sure that he can't be THAT guy, then discard him for another potential franchise quarterback. The answer is not to play Flutie, a career mid-70's rated passer with a roughly 1TD/int ratio, and hope for 8-8 and a week division.

Enormous, very fast defensive ends who live for the strip-sack are the death of very creative offensive schemes.

The post above could have been written by an NFL GM, because it accurately shows the odd mindset that predominates the picking of starting QBs. In every other position, the better performer starts. But that rule is often suspended when it comes to QB because, the argument goes, there's always the chance the tall, cannon-armed guy will magically turn into "THAT" guy. So, you have to start him over obviously better performers until he's stunk up the joint so badly nobody else wants him and your window of opportunity has closed. (Which pretty much sums up the Rob Johnson era in Buffalo.)

During the '99 season Flutie was 10-5 as a starter but was replaced for the playoffs in favor of Johnson, who threw only 10 completions in 22 attempts in their playoff loss to the Titans. The next year, Flutie was 4-1 as a starter, but the Bills still started Johnson whenever he was healthy, even though his record was 4-7.

Tom Brady stands as an example of what you can discover when you don't go with conventional wisdom. Brady was a late-round pick and started as a third-stringer in an era when many teams don't even carry 3 QBs. With most teams he'd never have made it onto the field. But NE fans are certainly happy he did.

Sundown:

Tom Brady stands as an example of what you can discover when you don't go with conventional wisdom. Brady was a late-round pick and started as a third-stringer in an era when many teams don't even carry 3 QBs. With most teams he'd never have made it onto the field. But NE fans are certainly happy he did.

Right, as opposed to Eli Manning who was a number 1 draft pick for whom the Giants mortgaged their future, and for what?

I'm not gonna defend Rob Johnson. In 99' Flutie was 55%, 19TD/16Int, with a 75 rating. Those numbers are pretty average - a bit worse then how Eli manning is doing this year. Warners numbers that year: 65%, 41/13, 109. Why would you want to invest a lot in a guy with average stats with no upside?

The Brady thing shows just how hard it is to find somebody who can really play QB. As great as his story is, he is still your standard 6' something pocket passer.

The upside in 1999 for the Bills would have been going to the Super Bowl, which they quite possibly could have accomplished had they started their best quarterback in the playoffs. That was the year they lost on the Music City Miracle--a low-scoring game where Johnson went 10-22 with something like 130 yards passing. Can you name any other team who benched a guy who was 10-5 as a starter? Their "future" was THAT YEAR in the playoffs. And they threw it away. Then they proceeded to do the exact same thing the next season, though that was more defensible for the reasons you state--they were hoping to find their QB of tomorrow.

But the Bills are just one example of this phenomenon. The Broncos last year benched Jake Plummer as they were coming up on the playoffs for the unproven guy of the future Jay Cutler. It's doubtful they do much in the playoffs with Plummer playing, but Cutler certainly didn't do anything for them. The Ravens couldn't wait to get rid of Trent Dilfer following their Super Bowl win because they wanted somebody better. And they finally got somebody who was--but it was years later in the form of an aging Steve McNair who isn't their QB of the future, either. And in the meantime, their vaunted defense got old and they ceased being real contenders.

With free agency and the fact the average NFL career is only 4 years, the window to win it all is very small. If you have a playoff-caliber team you need to work at winning right then, as opposed to worrying about who might be your QB 5 years from now, when the entire rest of the roster will have turned over, along with quite possibly the coaching staff and front office, as well.

It's a long way to go from losing a wild card game to going to a superbowl. Anything might happen, but you can't say with any certainty a QB that couldn't lead a team to a division title would somehow guarantee an AFC title.

Jake the snake is an even worse example - He was given plenty of time and opportunities to start, and some real specimens for wide receiver. He was a liability. He was a loose cannon, and he lost as many games as he won. You just never knew who he was going to throw it to, and there was no way he was going to beat Indy. I'm not defending the timing of the move or the play of Cutler. Making the move probably cost Denver a wild card berth... but did they really want to go to Indy and lose again anyhow?

Jake Plummer was 40-18 as a starter for the Broncos.

Yeah, he can win some regular season games. In 4 years he went to the playoffs 3 times, and lost to Indy bad twice and had a terrible game against Pittsberg. There's no reason to think he had much of an upside, and somehow magically last year he'd be able to beat Indy in the playoffs when he'd already lost to them in the regular season.

Remember this whole time he was usually playing with one of the better defenses in the league, and always a top notch O-line and run game. When the line and backs give somebody that sort of time, they should be able to put up better then average numbers - if not for yards and TD's, at least for % and low ints. The point of the league is not to be ok and make the playoffs, especially for a team like Denver. The point is to build a team that can win it all, and it takes a reliable QB to do it. Not necessairly the "IT" guy, but somebody who can be counted on to pass it to a guy wearing the right colored jersy, and Flutie/Plummer are just not that guy.

I repeat: Jake Plummer was 40-18 as a starter for the Broncos, including playoffs. The entire team played poorly against Pittsburgh in the 2006 AFC Championship Game. Last year, the Broncos lost to Indy 34-31 in the regular-season -- hardly a blowout -- at a time when the offense had been sputtering badly. The following week they beat Pittsburgh in Pittsburgh, 31-20. Their best o-lineman, left tackle Matt Lepsis, went down with an ACL. RB Tatum Bell was hurt most of the season and the vaunted run game wasn't what it had always been. The receiver corps included just two returning Broncos, Rod Smith and Stephen Alexander, and Smith was hurt most of the season. In short, while it's understandable why many fans didn't like Plummer -- too many risky decisions that didn't pay off, though they tend to overlook the risks that did -- last season wasn't Plummer's fault. And don't forget: it's hard to win the Super Bowl. Thirty-one teams don't do it every year. Plummer got them thisclose. The teams they lost to in the playoffs -- Indy, Indy, Pittsburgh -- were pretty good themselves.