Week 7 of our season long tracking of Sam Darnold’s progress brings a setback
Authentic Morris Claiborne Jersey , as Darnold struggled badly against the elements and against the gaffes of his own teammates in the Jets’ loss against
the Minnesota Vikings. Darnold moves back down the lists as his rookie year is
shaping up like many rookies before him; a bit of a rollercoaster ride.A few
things to keep in mind. All rankings herein are limited to rookie quarterbacks
with at least 250 passing attempts in their rookie seasons. Prior to the 2018
season there have been 72 rookie quarterbacks with 250 or more passing attempts
in the post merger era. Rate stats (like completion %) reflect actual current
numbers for Darnold. Counting stats (like touchdowns or yards) reflect prorated
numbers for Darnold assuming he continues to perform at the same level all
season. Let’s get to it. Below are a bunch of quarterback metrics, listing the
all time rookie leaders for each and showing where Sam Darnold fits assuming he
plays at the same level all season.YardsAndrew Luck4374Cam Newton4051Jameis
Winston4042Carson Wentz3782Peyton Manning3739...8. Sam
Darnold3547TouchdownsPeyton Manning26Russell Wilson26 (Tie 1)Sam Darnold23Andrew
Luck23Dak Prescott23 (Tie 3)InterceptionsPeyton Manning28Jim Zorn27Terry
Bradshaw24Jeff Komlo23Sam Darnold23 (Tie 4)Passer RatingDak Prescott104.9Robert
Griffin III102.4Russell Wilson100Ben Roethlisberger98.1Dan Marino96...29. Sam
Darnold74.3 Yards/AttemptBen Roethlisberger8.88Robert Griffin III8.14Dak
Prescott7.99Russell Wilson7.93Matt Ryan7.93...18. Sam Darnold7.02Completion
PercentageDak Prescott67.8Ben Roethlisberger66.4Robert Griffin III65.7Teddy
Bridgewater64.4Russell Wilson 64.1...34. Sam Darnold56.1Touchdown PercentageDan
Marino6.8Russell Wilson6.6Jim Plunkett5.8Ben Roethlisberger5.8 (Tie 3)Steve
Bartkowski5.1Robert Griffin III 5.1 (Tie 5)Marcus Mariota5.1 (Tie 5)Jake
Plummer5.1 (Tie 5)...14. Sam Darnold4.5 (Tie)Interception PercentageDak
Prescott0.9Robert Griffin III1.3Nick Foles1.9Charlie Batch2.0Derek Carr2.0 (Tie
4)...51. Sam Darnold4.5As the season wears on the sample gets larger and the
results more stable. The picture is becoming a bit more clear each week. The
numbers are starting to look decent to good but not great in many categories for
Darnold. One thing that may be a bit concerning is that Darnold ranks below
league average in every major category this season. Although rookies often
struggle, most of the rookies that go on to have excellent NFL careers manage to
be at or above league average in at least one major statistical category in
their rookie years. It’s not a foolproof standard, there have been exceptions,
but if Darnold does not manage to at least make it to league average in at least
one statistical category by year end it is not a particularly good omen for his
career. Still plenty of time for things to change. We’ll track these numbers
throughout the year and see how this unfolds. Mike Pereira was in his customary
spot next to Troy Aikman in the Fox Sports broadcast booth for the Bears-Vikings
game on the final week of the regular season, ready to chime in when needed on
any close calls on the field.Instead, he got one in the booth when Aikman
declared the officiating for the game to be "nauseating.""I turned away because
I didn't know if he was going to throw up on me or not," the former NFL
officiating guru turned TV analyst said with a laugh. The weekend before, New
York Jets coach Todd Bowles wasn't laughing after his team was flagged 16 times
for a team-record 172 yards in an overtime loss to the Packers.Bowles, who was
fired the next week, got a parting gift from the NFL in the form of a $25,000
fine for angrily blasting the officiating after the game — which featured a
penalty about every five snaps."I thought we were playing two teams
Womens Jordan Jenkins Jersey ," Bowles said. "I thought we were playing the Packers — and the striped shirts."Nothing terribly new about that. Complaining
about officials is a time-honored tradition that goes back to the days coaches —
and fans — saw things only as they actually happened, without the benefit of
super slow motion replays that at times get more study than the Zapruder tapes
of the Kennedy assassination.Never mind that NFL officiating crews get it right
a lot more than they get it wrong — the NFL said that in 2017 officials made the
correct call between 95 and 97 percent of the time. The wrong calls get
magnified by incessant replays, and they get discussed long after the whistle
blows a play dead.That was the case more often than the league may want to admit
during the just concluded regular season, when players sometimes got just as
angry as coaches about calls on the field.Consider:— The reaction by Eagles
safety Malcolm Jenkins last month after teammate Kamu Grugier-Hill emerged from
a pileup on the opening kickoff against the Cowboys with the football and the
only other players in the pile were Eagles.Somehow, though, the ball went to the
Cowboys after replay officials ruled there was "no clear recovery" of the
football. Dallas would go on to win a crucial late-season division matchup 29-23
in overtime."Whoever is watching that in New York should stay off the bottle,"
Jenkins said.It didn't take long for Jenkins to be fined for insinuating replay
officials at league headquarters were drinking.—A season that began with Packers
linebacker Clay Matthews accusing the NFL of "going soft" after getting a string
of roughing-the-passer penalties — one on a sack that some coaches around the
league called "textbook — ended with a string of calls that were both confusing
and, at times, maddening.—The Chargers were the beneficiaries of two false start
calls at Cleveland and Pittsburgh that, well, weren't called. Both led to
touchdowns.After fourth-year down judge Hugo Cruz was fired by the league in
October for a series of errors, including not calling the false start in the
Cleveland game
Avery Williamson Jersey , Chargers coach Anthony Lynn said: "I think that's the first time I've seen an official get fired during the season. Maybe
it's happened before and I just don't know, but they have jobs to do. We have
jobs to do. Coaches get fired during the season and players get fired during the
season. That's accountability — it happens."Lynn was choosing his words a lot
more carefully than did Bowles or Jenkins.The good news is that changes to the
catch rule worked, and there weren't any huge outcries over what a catch really
is the way there were a season earlier. And despite Matthews' early complaints,
new measures to protect the quarterback seem to be working without taking away
the physical part of the game that attracts so many fans.But games continue to
be held up for replay reviews that are far from instant. The flow of the game is
way too often interrupted so calls can be reviewed, and then reviewed some
more.Replay was supposed to fix everything. But it can cause its own set of
problems, too."I think replay has created some messes," Pereira said. "Replay,
more than anything, has generated conversation about officiating."Pereira, the
first former official to be hired as a TV analyst, said he now watches games
more as a fan than he did as vice president of officiating for the NFL, and
understands better now fan frustration about officials. Today's officials are
the best of the best
Youth Doug Middleton Jersey , he said, but are taught to make calls based on what is in front of them and not how they might play out in living rooms
across the country."They don't think about whether it's a good fan experience,"
he said. "They just think about getting the call right because they're graded on
every game and on every call."And there can be so many calls available to them.
Some players — even an owner or two — joke that the rulebook would stretch from
one end zone to the other. Truthfully, there are hundreds of rules that have
addendums and tangents, plus various points of emphasis the league stresses each
season. There have been suggestions about adding another on-field official, but
perhaps condensing the rules would be wiser.The number of flags thrown in the
league hasn't changed much in recent years, with NFL officials calling around
4,000 penalties each year. But there are wide discrepancies between the league's
17 officiating crews on how many penalties they call each game.Four of those
officiating crews were headed by rookie referees this year, and they were all in
the top eight for flags thrown. One crew, headed by rookie referee Shawn
Hochuli, called an average of 20.4 penalties a game, while at the other end
veteran Bill Vinovich's crew called an average of 13.1 penalties a
game
Youth Jamal Adams Jersey , still a relatively high number.That's in part, Pereira says, because officiating has become more of a science than an art.
Newer officials tend to call all penalties they see, where those more
experienced might not toss a flag for, say, holding, if it takes place away from
the play and has no effect on the outcome.It might be time, he said, to revisit
why some fouls are called and why others aren't."Let's be frank about the
situation," Pereira said. "Ninety percent of the ire raised by fans and coaches
is based on what they call, not what they don't call. I'd rather see the
tendency go toward fewer calls."Fewer calls might mean fewer complaints, though
the one constant is that officials are always going to be a target of angry
fans. That's especially true in the NFL
Color Rush Morris Claiborne Jersey , where the action is fast and getting faster, and calls have to be made instantly.The league's 121 officials are the
best of the best, having proven themselves from high school fields through
colleges and then into the select fraternity that is the NFL. But even they
aren't going to get everything right — though the NFL proudly points out they
are so good that only 37 percent of calls reviewed by replay are overturned."The
fact remains 98 percent of what they do is right, but the focus is on the 2
percent that is wrong," Pereira said. "Whether we like it or not we speak more
about the 2 percent."____AP Pro Football Writers Dennis Waszak Jr. and Rob
Maaddi, and Sports Writers Joe Reedy and Genaro C. Armas contributed.
