Tag: Tim Tebow

Greg McElroy Begins Jets Career with Perfect Comeback Start

~ scottkacsmar ~ 3 Comments

Mark Sanchez played poorly and was pulled on Sunday in place of the backup quarterback, who promptly led the offense on a game-winning drive for the New York Jets over the Arizona Cardinals.

This scenario has been expected for many months now, but no one imagined it would have been Greg McElroy at quarterback rather than Tim Tebow.

These are the moments Tebow has built his NFL career on, but he was nowhere to be found Sunday, missing the game with a rib injury.

McElroy, on the very first drive of his career, led a game-winning touchdown march, hitting Jeff Cumberland for the easiest 1-yard touchdown pass you may ever see. He even contributed to the last drive which consumed the final 7:55 off the clock in a 7-6 win.

Rarely does a quarterback lead a fourth-quarter comeback and game-winning drive in his first NFL game, but I have started to compile a list of occurrences.

4QC/GWD in NFL Debut:

  • Bob Waters (1960)
  • Warren Rabb (1961)
  • Sam Etcheverry (1961)
  • Archie Manning (1971)
  • Clint Longley (1974)
  • Jerry Golsteyn (1977)
  • Turk Schonert (1981)
  • Dieter Brock (1985)
  • Steve Young (1985)
  • Bernie Kosar (1985)
  • Brian McClure (1987)
  • Mike Kelley (1987)
  • Jim Druckenmiller (1997)
  • Ryan Leaf (1998)
  • Jake Delhomme (1999; 4QC only)
  • A.J. Feeley (2001)
  • Brian St. Pierre (2004)
  • Ryan Fitzpatrick (2005)
  • Greg McElroy (2012)

Not sure anyone on the list but McElroy was able to accomplish it on their very first drive. If you broke it down that way, he’d be batting 1.000 in clutch drive success rate.

Is it the most impressive list? Not at all, but the win should create another quarterback controversy in New York.

Just not the one we all expected.

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The Whistleblower No. 3 – Heath Evans and Simple New York Jets’ Math

~ scottkacsmar ~ Leave a comment

Looks like The Whistleblower has the first repeat offender after Heath Evans’ latest comments on Monday’s NFL Total Access about the New York Jets’ QB situation.

After three preseason games without a single touchdown, Evans believes the Jets have the wrong QB in Mark Sanchez, and should “salvage the season, which has yet to actually start, by going with Tim Tebow.

According to Evans, “past says Tim Tebow can win football games, the past says Mark Sanchez can not.”

Whoa, Nelly! Time for a simple bit of math here. Forget the fact that Tebow’s lone playoff win, a Wild Card game over a banged up Pittsburgh team, is not better than the two AFC Championship appearances Sanchez has had. Just the regular season alone proves this to be a factually incorrect statement.

Simple math: The past says Mark Sanchez is 31-22 (.585) as a starter, while Tim Tebow is 9-7 (.563).

I know things work in reverse in the Heath Evans’ zone, such as running back carries leading to wins instead of winning leading to carries, but 58.5 percent beats 56.3 percent. At the very least, they have about the same record of winning, and both often need a lot of help to get many of their wins.

The New York Jets may very well be screwed on offense this year, but there is no secret winner on the bench ready to save the day. They need to start with the guy that at least completes over 55 percent of his passes.

After apparently having someone do the stat work for him, Heath just glossed over the actual records, and must have forgot about 2009 and 2010 for Sanchez.

Next time Heath Evans asks someone to do stat work, he can always contact The Whistleblower. I’ll save him the embarrassment of spraying “winner juice” on live TV for the wrong player.

Shout out to @SeanLDurham on Twitter for pointing out the video and comments.

Addendum: as another pet peeve, Evans mentions “QB rating” in the segment. No, not even “quarterback rating.” He said “Q-B.” It’s just passer rating, people. Why is that so hard to understand?