Chris Tabor named ST Coach.

[Sez.EJ]

comparing suckage with suckage (Cribbs and Momass) is not the way to sway opinions. Saying he is a better route runner than Momass..still makes him one of the worst route runners in the league.

It's kind of like saying a Chevette is better than a Yugo.. The Chevette may be better than the Yugo..but it's still a really sucky car.

[Legacy Fan]

Nobody is trying to sway your opinion. I'm just reminding you that your assessment is incorrect. This isn't a campaign trail for me.

[Flugel]

Originally Posted by Legacy Fan

"You keep saying that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

Until you acknowledge that Cribbs was targeted about 1/10 of what a typical receiver is during his tenure at the position, you can't bitch about his production. Well I guess you can, but it makes you look like a dummy.
You do remember when at the end of 2009 he was our Peyton Hillis, moving the pile from the direct snaps, allowing "the Ghost" to rack up the big plays? Or were you too busy bitching about his WR "production"?

Coincidentally, do you know exactly when teams started finding it much easier to stop Hillis? When Cribbs was sidelined with 4 disclocated toes. There goes the ONLY WR on our roster that was capable of drawing flags on the New Orleans secondary and the ONLY WR that beat KC deep for a TD when Eric Berry was busted cheating up into the box. Even when he came back, he was a fraction of what he was. Nobody is going to get a great jump off the line of scrimmage with 4 dislocated toes; not even MIKE HOLMGREN.

It's hard for me to say ANY WR sucks when they've gained a step on an inside slant and DA throws the ball 1 step behind the WR. Then what inevitably happened way too many times was the WR would turn all the way around to try to strip the cover guy he had the step on from the football. Guess what fans would bitch about? Another pass the WR got his hands on that he couldn't catch. That's the glass half empy. The glass half full is thank God the WR knew enough to become the defender in preventing the INT.

When Wallace played, we had a TON of deep passes sailing out of bounds so they don't flag those if Cribbs or anyone else is beating someone deep. The deep pass Cribbs beat Berry on for a TD was a post pattern (outside coming in toward centerfield). That wasn't the only ideal opportunity the threat of Hillis gift wrapped for our WRs in single coverages. This is a 2 way street. If we can't totally blame a QB for not having favorable matchup choices, we can't blame WRs for throws behind them or deep passes going out of bounds when/if WRs gained a step.

Nobody wants to admit this because they already told me all preseason there's no such possibility of Cribbs improving as a receiver. BUT when Hillis was commanding extra DBs in the box - Cribbs was our best deep threat. After he drew the flad on New Orleans - they couldn't sneak that extra DB in the box. Consequently, they never did STOP Hillis; and we could we burn clock watching Hillis running all over them. Looked to me like they really missed Scott Fujita too.

I've always felt that if we wanted Cribbs to be Hines Ward; then he needs to practice for the position Hines Ward plays. Pittsburgh once had the same dilemma when they wanted him to change Ward from standout STs guy to WR. He looked MORE like Randel El trying to be a WR when he multi-tasked. Who here thinks Brad Smith would make a terrible WR if they needed him to do just that? In Chicago, now that Hester is back to returning kicks/punts, their best WR is the kid from Vanderbilt and then Johnny's Knox. There's WAY too much to learn to be a great WR in a division that has alot of exotic blitz packages requiring QB & WR adjustments that our young players have not always made the right adjustments to. Even when DA made the right adjustment - he'd make the wrong throw so where are we going with that hot mess? In 2009, KC was begging Brady Quinn to throw at single coverages because they couldn't stop our running game. He threw 2 INTs to guys giving us gigantic cushions so that ended the reality of throwing the football. I don't even think we always knew what we had in Braylon because the QBing got so crappy, unpredictable and unreliable. Plus, he was a short bus poster boy 80% of the time. That didn't help!

[Riceloft]

For comparison sake, here are the target #'s and catch rate's for our skill players this year:

Watson: 103 targets, 67% catch rate
Hillis: 77 targets, 79% catch rate
MoMass: 73 targets, 49% catch rate
Stucky: 64 targets, 64% catch rate
Robiskie: 49 targets, 59% catch rate
Cribbs: 39 targets, 59% catch rate
Moore: 26 targets, 62% catch rate
Royal: 12 targets, 42% catch rate
Bell: 10 targets, 70% catch rate

TE's: 141 targets
WR's: 225 targets
RB's: 87 targets

[Enigmatic Evil]

So Cribbs is basically a 60/40 threat to make a play when he's targeted? Hmm... Much better than the 50/50 MoMass... Even Robo's catch rate is a lot better than I was expecting.

That stat break down makes it obvious how great our need for a legit WR is.

[Riceloft]

A 60% catch rate is fairly common for the top WR's in the league. Various factors are involved and not broken down in these stats, including how catchable the balls were.

For reference:

Brandon Lloyd: 153, 50%
Greg Jennings: 125, 61%
Mike Wallace: 98, 61%
Roddy White: 180, 64%
Andre Johnson: 138, 62%
Hakeen Nicks: 128, 62%
Dwayne Bowe: 133, 54%
J. Maclin: 115, 61%
Miles Austin: 119, 58%
Austin Collie: 71, 82%
M. Colston: 132, 64%
Wes Welker: 123, 70%
Reggie Wayne: 175, 63%
Braylon Edwards: 101, 51%
DeSean Jackson: 96, 49%

[Flugel]

Originally Posted by Riceloft

For comparison sake, here are the target #'s and catch rate's for our skill players this year:

Watson: 103 targets, 67% catch rate
Hillis: 77 targets, 79% catch rate
MoMass: 73 targets, 49% catch rate
Stucky: 64 targets, 64% catch rate
Robiskie: 49 targets, 59% catch rate
Cribbs: 39 targets, 59% catch rate
Moore: 26 targets, 62% catch rate
Royal: 12 targets, 42% catch rate
Bell: 10 targets, 70% catch rate

TE's: 141 targets
WR's: 225 targets
RB's: 87 targets

Great job with that Riceloft! I'd be interested to know how many times the ones headed off to cribbs sailed out of bounds. I think the backs catching short swing pases are equivalent to the quick pitches of yesteryear; so they should be higher. I think your deeper route targets are the ones that should have the lower 5.