Gameday Thread Chargers vs Broncos- Derwin’s Return (Wk 13)

[Guest]

It’s been a sad season. I don’t know what the future holds but Rivers has not looked like the same guy this year. Maybe he’s shell shocked or maybe time has caught up with him. In any case, we’ve got a lot of holes to fill. What we don’t know is what’s in his head. Does he want to come back? He’s said he wanted to play through the opening of the new stadium but that could have changed. It’s got to be a drag to have no fans in attendance and it doesn’t look like that’s gonna improve in Kroenke land.

Picking out Ekeler’s rush stats to support the OL bashing is a red herring tho. Gordon is doing fine behind the same OL since he got in shape. Averaging 5 ypc over the last few games. Is he that great or is the OL opening holes for only him?

Instead of cherry picking a few decent games from Gordon, please note that for the season Gordon is averaging 3.9 YPC versus 5.1 YPC last year, a very similar drop off to what Ekeler has experienced (3.7 YPC versus 5.2 YPC). It is not a red herring at all. The OL is putrid, which has led to a big drop off from Gordon, Ekeler and Rivers in terms of their stats. The common thread is the poor OL play.

[Topcat]

Your take is pure fiction. Rivers actually has a fairly low INT rate over his career--much lower than that of Eli Manning, lower than that of Peyton Manning and lower than that of Ben Roethlisberger, but a tick higher than that of Drew Brees. So, he is not quite the INT machine that you are making him out to be. In fact, as of right now, he is a top 10 rated QB of all time in terms of his passer rating and that formula takes INTs into consideration. Even more remarkable is that he has accomplished this as an immobile QB with a bad to terrible OL in front of him for most of his career.

Rivers is by far the most underrated QB ever to play NFL football. All we see is people saying BS about how he throws funny, does not run well, is too emotional and has never won a Super Bowl (as if being on a Super Bowl winning team were somehow an individual accomplishment and not a team accomplishment) when the reality is that he has arguably the fastest release of any QB in the league, is arguably the best QB in the league in terms of passing with traffic around him (lots of practice at passing with failed OL protection), and is arguably the best anticipatory passer in the game.

It's true Rivers has compiled a lot of impressive seasons (highlighted in blue below); however, he's also had several sub-par or poor seasons (red). He passes for a lot of yards, which bumps up his stat rating; but he also throws a lot of picks, which lose us games. Even going all the way back to 2011, when he was in the prime of his career, his TD to pick ratio was 27/20. This year--awful at 17/15. Nobody doubts Rivers's ability to throw for a lot of yards; it's the costly picks and other mistakes that have lost us so many games.

image.png

[Guest]

It's true Rivers has compiled a lot of impressive seasons (highlighted in blue below); however, he's also had several sub-par or poor seasons (red). He passes for a lot of yards, which bumps up his stat rating; but he also throws a lot of picks, which lose us games. Even going all the way back to 2011, when he was in the prime of his career, his TD to pick ratio was 27/20. This year--awful at 17/15. Nobody doubts Rivers's ability to throw for a lot of yards; it's the costly picks and other mistakes that have lost us so many games.

image.png

First, it is unclear what you are suggesting when you state, "He passes for a lot of yards, which bumps up his stat rating." If you are suggesting that all QBs that have thrown for more career pasing yards have a higher passer rating, then you are just wrong and do not have a grasp on how the NFL's passer rating formula works. One of the four components of the passer rating formula does consider passing yardage, but that component (and every component of the rating) is divided by attempts, so the analysis is always made on a per pass basis, not based upon the QB's gross production. In that way, passer rating captures the quality of the performance, not the quantity.

So, the fact that Rivers has compiled a lot of passing yards over his career makes him rank 6th in total passing yards, but that fact by itself means nothing in terms of his career passer rating. Brett Favre is 4th in total yards with 13,000+ more yards passed for than Rivers and Eli Manning ranks 8th in total passing yards, less than 1500 yards behind Rivers over his career. Yet, Rivers is ranked 10th in career passer rating, Favre is currently ranked 35th and Eli Manning is currently ranked 45th.

Second, what I posted about was Rivers' career INT rate compared to that of other veteran QBs that played most of their careers at the same time as Rivers. Rivers has attempted 7,445 passes (as of this post), so there are of course, going to be a signficant number of INTs with that many attempts. Saying that Rivers throws "a lot of picks" is meaningless given the number of attempts he has, which is currently 7th all time.

What matters is his rate of interceptions. You say that he "throws a lot of picks", but his career INT rate shows that your assertion is just flat out wrong, pure fiction. As I have already shown, Rivers' career INT rate is lower than that of Eli Manning, Roethlisberger and even Peyton Manning. It is a little bit higher than that of Drew Brees. So, either you are making a gross total INT statement, which is useless for analytical purposes or you are making an INT rate assertion which is flat out false.

Third, please note that the instances of higher INT rates for Rivers do not follow his age or any sort of normal player career arc. That pretty strongly suggests that age may not have been and may not be the issue. But do you know what was the issue in most of the seasons in which Rivers had comparatively high INT totals versus the rest of his career? I do. In every instance in this decade, his higher INT totals have corresponded with his poorer OLs.

Amazingly enough, if you provide an immobile QB with a sh!tty OL, it has a negative impact on his play. And tomorrow I will tell you that water is wet.

So I say let's get this Hall of Fame level QB a good OL and let's see if the Hall of Fame level QB still can play like the Hall of Fame level QB he has been over his career. If not, then it will be time to move on from Rivers. But at least the OL will already be in place for the next franchise QB. So, for me, it is fix the OL first, then go get the next franchise QB.

[Boltjolt]

Topcat is really gonna hate on whoever replaces Rivers. Only Charger fans would bag one of their own future HOFers.
Pretty idiotic stuff.

[Topcat]

Topcat is really gonna hate on whoever replaces Rivers. Only Charger fans would bag one of their own future HOFers.
Pretty idiotic stuff.

Once again, for the purposes of clarity, I don't hate anyone, Rivers included. I have enjoyed the many fine games he has had over the years. Unfortunately, I and a lot of others on this board, have been very disappointed with his play in many other games. Disappointed because a lot of the mistakes he has made were avoidable. Now, whoever replaces Rivers, I will root for to be successful. If there are some areas that could be improved upon, I will point these out, as will others on this board. But hopefully, we will be successful at all levels, individual, team, coaching and ownership.

[Boltjolt]

Once again, for the purposes of clarity, I don't hate anyone, Rivers included. I have enjoyed the many fine games he has had over the years. Unfortunately, I and a lot of others on this board, have been very disappointed with his play in many other games. Disappointed because a lot of the mistakes he has made were avoidable. Now, whoever replaces Rivers, I will root for to be successful. If there are some areas that could be improved upon, I will point these out, as will others on this board. But hopefully, we will be successful at all levels, individual, team, coaching and ownership.

Saying a lot of others are doing it to don't mean much. Many on this board don't understand football.

Wanting us to draft QBs they never even seen play. Like you are by touting the kid from Wake Forrest you never seen play except on a highlight video.

They also don't try,...like you have to show how bad Rivers is by pointing out he had 15 + INTs in a season a couple times.
Brees has done that and he is the all time passing yards leader. Peyton has done that and is arguably the best to ever play. Hell we once picked him off 6 times in a game.

Rivers has played 16 years and is under 200 INTs for his career against 391 TDs.

Brady isn't doing so well this year in part because his WRs save for Edelman, suck.

We all see Rivers is making mistakes probably because he is trying too hard with a bad OL but we aren't showing graphs , stats, writing squigly lines to make him out to suck.
Showing his career stats and trying to make that point like that is LAME.

Show Fouts stats and we will cringe at them.