Packers, Finley leaning towards long-term deal, agent says

[Brandon494]

Because in the NFL, with split second decisions to make and safeties to look off, you cannot take the time to locate an objectively open receiver, target him (adjust feet, measure his movement relative to you) and throw. When you take that kind of time, you look exactly like Tim Tebow. Tebow is fantastic when he has an open pocket, can spot someone open, track him for a step or two while resetting his feet, and then throw. You will also only complete 50% of your passes because not many are that open and DBs will follow you to the ball.

In other words you could call this telegraphing the pass. The shame of it is that the route broke so wide open that it wouldn't of mattered if Rodgers did telegraph it. But because he was not where he was supposed to be when he was supposed to be, he was not where Rodgers believed he would be.

It might have been different had Finley been on a very short route, where Rodgers could just flick him the ball as in a checkdown.

Rodgers had not played for 21 days and was not sharp that game even missing Jennings early in the 1st quarter, Finley might have broke the route but Rodgers was not pressured on the play and should have made the throw.

[Brandon494]

but who knows if Finley would have even caught it anyway.

[Brandon494]

"I felt like we had a pretty good rhythm," Rodgers said. "We moved the ball pretty effectively. We just had some drops and some uncharacteristic turnovers. … We just had some chances and didn't make the most of them."

None was more critical than Rodgers' misfire to Finley on third-and-five from the Giants' 39-yard line in the third quarter. With the Packers trailing 20-13, Finley ran a slant route and was wide open for a first down at about the 25-yard line. Rodgers threw him a fastball that sailed wide and off Finley's fingertips. Rodgers was sacked on fourth down, and the Packers never had an opportunity to tie the game again.

"I missed my spot a little bit," Rodgers said. Finley added: "It was out in front of me. I put one hand out. I tried to get it. I have to catch that ball …. It was one of those plays I couldn't make."

[ThunderDan]

In hockey you get a Coach's time out. He calls the players to the bench and settles them down with a short spech. That has to wait till the half in the NFL. maybe te rules should allow a HC Time OUt ...one per half?

The rules allow 3 time outs per half already.

[pbmax]

I agree with most of what you wrote. But about this 'sitting in a zone' that's not what happened is it? Finley supposedly broke of a five step to a three step and 'throttled down' 1) a shorter pattern at a slower speed should put him approximately in the right spot, with the throw perhaps too fast or too high, no? But not off target. 2) I don't recall - did Finley actually stop in his pattern? If he did, everything I wrote goes out the window and Finley is completely to blame.

You could be right, though shorter and slower could mean he is too close to the LOS or not inside enough depending on his footwork, speed, etc. If he was careful, he might still be in the same QB sight line.

But I took the mention of "came into the open" comment by McAdoo to mean he found the hole in the defense faster than the route would have anticipated. He turns and hesitates, which I take to mean if he kept running at full speed, he would be well past the spot Rodgers was looking for him (as he is slanting to his left, if he turns early and keep running, he is covering more ground laterally than Rodgers would expect) and he would run the risk of running past the open spot in the coverage.

So he throttles down to not further deviate from the route and to preserve his open spot. At a slower speed and a different depth, Rodgers glances back to his right and sees Finley roughly where he expects and lets it fly, anticipating Finley to be moving at a normal rate of speed from the spot he would normally be at it. But the throw is not correct for his actual position and speed. Finley cannot correct fast enough.

Its anyone's guess why he heaved the ball pretty fast.

But as I said, Finley made it incumbent on the QB to adjust to him. And the QB had played the entire game as though he did not have time to do this. And with Finley being mainly worried about what Finley does, it would make sense that he has trouble seeing that the QB does not always have time to adjust to receiver, even if he is wide open.

[pbmax]

Rodgers had not played for 21 days and was not sharp that game even missing Jennings early in the 1st quarter, Finley might have broke the route but Rodgers was not pressured on the play and should have made the throw.

It was not his most accurate game. But that route to Jennings was a perfect example of how they need to be on the same page, regardless of how open they are. Jennings sat down in another hole in the coverage and Rodgers threw it like he was going to break the route back to the endzone like it was a post-corner. Since they did not agree on where to be, pass incomplete.

Who is at fault? Hard to say, but on that one I think both adjusted from the initial route and each made a different adjustment. The pocket he was throwing from was endangered enough that I would prefer the QB to get the ball out on time and in rhythm rather than hesitate and adjust.

When the game is going like this, you need to cut out the improvisations and play it straight. Then step by step you can put the on the fly adjustments back in.

[pbmax]

"I felt like we had a pretty good rhythm," Rodgers said. "We moved the ball pretty effectively. We just had some drops and some uncharacteristic turnovers. … We just had some chances and didn't make the most of them."

None was more critical than Rodgers' misfire to Finley on third-and-five from the Giants' 39-yard line in the third quarter. With the Packers trailing 20-13, Finley ran a slant route and was wide open for a first down at about the 25-yard line. Rodgers threw him a fastball that sailed wide and off Finley's fingertips. Rodgers was sacked on fourth down, and the Packers never had an opportunity to tie the game again.

"I missed my spot a little bit," Rodgers said. Finley added: "It was out in front of me. I put one hand out. I tried to get it. I have to catch that ball …. It was one of those plays I couldn't make."

Neither Rodgers not Finley are telling the whole story there, are they? In film room, does Finley get by with "it was a play I couldn't make"?

The question is when this stuff happens, what do you do? The oline is in a fitful state because of shuffling starters (swapping Clifton and Newhouse probably wasn't helping because each guy gets beat in different ways). Rodgers has some rust and is slightly off target due to tight and unclean pockets. Receivers are getting jammed good on the line.

You can yell at the QB to be more accurate. I put the odds of this working at near zero, unless you want Tebow back there focusing on one receiver and tracking him until the delivery will be perfect. This would look like Rodgers early in 09 or maybe 08.

Or you can tell the receivers to dump all in route adjustments that are not called by the QB. So that even in a murky and collapsing pocket, the receiver is where the QB expects him to be. Because the one thing the QB should be able to control are his feet and with that, his clock.

[Lurker64]

Actual fact..I'm a former math techer...It's worthless or worth nothing. $ZERO$ comes to mind.

Well, graphing calculators I totally agree with you are more or less worthless for anything beyond "automating the plotting of functions, for whatever reason" (though Microsoft Excel does a darn good job too.) But technology in the classroom can actually benefit mathematical education greatly. I taught multivariable calc for engineers when in grad school, and the curriculum used computers extensively since it allowed you to skip all of the tedious techniques of integration stuff (since engineers can just safely feed that stuff to their computer algebra program of choice) and instead we devoted roughly half the semester to vector calculus (div, grad, curl, that sort of thing) which was both more interesting for the student as well as being conceptually much tougher stuff.

I just don't think you can do anything useful in the classroom with a TI-89. Mathematica is an entirely different story.