Dojji

Would never work of course. All you need is one midcap team that thinks it's a bigcap team that goes balls to the wall for some FA they like and the whole thing goes out the window.

I don't have the foggiest idea. I was simply broaching it as an item of conversation in order to have something to talk about during a slow news week, and since Cassel had accomplished something of a legendary milestone recently. It's kind of like the argument with Ortiz, except more so than Ortiz since Papi didn't miss a full season and still put up half decent numbers while playing. I definitely am concerned about Brady's health long-term. I was before he went down with the knee injury, especially what with sitting out all preseason with that same high ankle sprain that stymied him in the Superbowl. Now with the complications from the knee injury on top of everything else, it is no longer a sure thing that we ever get "TFB" back. The difference between a younger player and an older player isn't really how often they get hurt, it's at least as much how long it takes to recover when they do get hurt and can they do so before the next injury makes things even worse. Brady's reached the stage of his playing career where his body's ability to recover is starting to slow down, and even if it wasn't for the low hit by that Chiefs d-man I'm really much less than confident than I should be that we'd have seen the old "TFB" this year no matter what. A lot of the guys from Brady's generation are slowing down. I'm thinking specifically of Peyton Manning and Donovan McNabb who while they're still above average QB's aren't really what they once were. Dante Culpepper and Matt Hasselbeck are pretty much finished as well. It wouldn't be a shock to anyone if as he heads into his mid 30's Brady followed the same trend. Sooner or later the guy who you still think of as a superstar just isn't a superstar anymore. And with a catastrophic knee injury to hurry things along in so physical a sport as football, especially with a player who relies on quick decision making and infinitesimal margins of error... well... Don't get me wrong -- we've still probably got a few years left of TFB or near TFB performances, but it definitely is time to start thinking about Life After Brady. I also suspect that by drafting QB Kevin O'Connell in the high rounds despite other holes they needed to fill on defense the Patriots more or less announced their own concerns in that regard as well.

Unless you have reason to believe he's not gonna stay that way, which happens a lot to older players who spend their time being hit. Regardless. Agreed that talking about this beyond the very speculative is pretty pointless.

Yeah. It's looking more and more like Varitek's headed straight for another painful divorce.

I believe I just accomplished something very significant -- I got a group of Habs fans to actually think. Over in HFBoards, I posited that Carbonneau gets some blame for O'Byrne's own goal because he pulled Price out of the net with the puck in the defensive zone, which creates the risk of an own goal. At first they laughed at me and still wanted to crucify O'Byrne but eventually a couple of them started talking like you know, it really is a risky play to pull the goaltender just because of a delayed penalty call when a bad bounce on a contested pass could allow a goal to score -- especially only up one goal. Of course the conclusion of the majority of them is that if a forechecker forces an own goal on a delayed penalty the rules should be changed to disallow the goal (actually I'm torn on that one, they make a good case), but I actually got a few of them to admit that if Price stays in net O'Byrne's move is not only not a disaster for the Canadiens, it's pretty standard practice when a defenseman is smothered by a forecheck and that Carbonneau probably did leave him out to dry by pulling Price when he did.

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/post/Cassel-making-us-forget-Brady-No-way;_ylt=AlmaEJL12IniIn1f4zSB1bpDubYF?urn=top,124512 Pretty balanced, if moderately satirical, take on the question I'm trying to ask. Of course, whichever of Brady or Cassel we let go we need to find a way to make dang sure he doesn't become a Jet.

Boyes seems to be in no particular danger of scoring 40 this year.

Yes, that is the sort of team a good QB needs to be able to pick apart. And so the ability to put up fantastic numbers against bad defenses does tell us something, even if not as much as putting up the same line against a great defensive team. While the more surprising story would be if he couldn't put up solid numbers against a bad defensive team, the numbers he actually put up are several steps beyond "solid" in those games.

Dunno, once you actually get to the top few teams it's probably a lot closer.

http://sonsofsamhorn.net/index.php?s=&showtopic=38483&view=findpost&p=2011387 If we go with the largest number, 6, that's 6 out f 11 games that are well above league average at quarterback and that's counting those first 3 "baby steps" games where the training wheels were still on. He's had 2 games, maybe 3, where he looks better than Brady, but those aren't his only "good" games. That's a pretty ridiculous thing to say when you're talking about a winning football team that has 3 injured backs and has most of its wins on the strength of the throwing game. You detractors really need to update your talking points. Cassel hasn't been about "managing the football game" since about Week 5.

That's his justification. Personally I think it's nonsense. I would kill to be a big league pitcher in any role, it just sounds so stuck up for a guy to throw that kind of hissy-fit just because he can't have his preferred role.

Actually I think that even if he does move on Cassel should have enough leverage to avoid bad situations like the Lions (seriously, the LIONS?) and get a job with a pretty good team if he plays this offseason right. Keep an eye on the Eagles. McNabb is struggling and the backup ain't cutting it but the staff around them is pretty talented. If their FO believes in their offensive weapons, going and picking up a guy like Cassel would make some sense for them I get this sentiment. I really do. Thing is I approached this season worrying about Brady even before he actually was lost for the season, based on a trend I was starting to see in the second half of last season where incidental injuries were beginning to accumulate and hurt his performance. That's where long, slow, painful, injury-riddled declines come from, and Brady's an immobile quarterback with an aging O-line so he's a prime candidate. He's also on the far side of 30 so it's time to start thining about such things as heirs and replacements, or at least about injury insurance. That's why that notion of Cassel and his squeaky clean injury history, escapability in the pocket and no shortage of tools, coming into his own and Bledsoeing Brady appeals to me. It puts us back on the upside again instead of having to watch a great player slowly fall to pieces

Thank you for your meaningful contributions to this thread... whatever they may be. We must be watching different games. Look, even if the defenses he was throwing against were bad, his accomplishments were still above what you'd expect. To the point that what he did made history. If the defense was worth a gooddamn we'd be something like 9-2 right now.

I think the real question is a subtler one, and that's which version of Cassel you're going to get next year after all the hooplah dies down. If he's anywhere near the version of Cassel we've been seeing, who uses all his weapons in a near-Brady-like manner, is elusive out of the pocket, runs well for yardage, and throws on the run with excellent accuracy, you don't throw that away for nothing. You can't. Because that guy is probably better than either Manning brother. If you get the more terrestrial Cassel that you guys seem to be seeing who's only pretty good, then you stick with Brady and just try to get a couple of good picks out of the successful experiment If Cassel continues to play at this level or anywhere near it for the remainder of the season, there's going to be a lot of voices clamoring to let Tom Brady go enjoy his injury-riddled decline for some other team and ride the new wave upward.

I'd say the problems we're having at LB and secondary are going to be solved through the draft rather than free agency, so I'm not sure I agree, but what I do agree on is not paying 2 QB's to be the starter. Thing is I really don't know how Brady's going to react coming off that knee injury and he was struggling with a different injury before he even ran into knee trouble, so speculating that Brady may be near the decline phase isn't absurd. With that uncertainty cutting bait with Brady and moving on to the younger model isn't totally insane -- sometimes it makes sense to leap too soon rather than too late.

There have been injuries already. Ferrence is out right now, Kobasew a bit earlier, and Sturm hasn't been playing.

When does Brady's current contract expire? How long would we be paying 2 starting QB's if we did re-sign Matt Cassel and not trade Brady?

OBP still very good. But yeah.

Not exactly. More I'm advocating that a trade of Brady be considered a potential option to inform us as we watch Cassel for the rest of the season and as we watch Brady progress with his therapy of that major knee injury. Mostly I'm just trying to shake people out of their complacency and get them to really take another look at a situation that has changed. You know what a sucker for young talent I am, and the NFL is very much a league of "what have you done for me lately?" I just want to see the possibility considered in light of Cassel's accomplihsments and at least properly analyzed before it's discarded. This isn't last year's Matt Cassel anymore. It isn't even Week 6's Matt Cassel anymore. Those versions of the quarterback are no match for Brady but this one, the one we saw for the last 3 weeks, just might be. And I'm definitely intrigued by the fact that Cassel has NOT seen the bruising and battering of being a major college player or an NFL starter up to this point and what that might mean for his longevity now compared to Brady's longevity. When you start looking 3-4 years into the future, keeping Brady over Cassel wasn't even a slam dunk in Week 6.

On the planet where Cassel is better over the last 3 weeks at using the same weapons than Brady was over the last half of last season. Frankly, Cassel has more raw tools than Brady had at the start of his run, and he's refining those tools in record time. He still doesn't have Brady's quick decisions, but he makes up for it with mobility and escapability like Brady's never had and never will, and pretty nice accuracy on the run Brady has never thrown for 400 yards in two consecutive games, and Cassel just did that and with a cherry on top -- a rushing TD in each game. Has anyone ever thrown for 400 and ran for a TD in two consecutive weeks? I know, I know, 2 weeks Someone I read this morning made an interesting point too about Cassel. Due to the nature of his playing career (or lack thereof) what we have is a guy with all the tools to be a full-time NFL starting quarterback but an absolutely pristine physical history with no significant injuries since high school. A 27 year old QB, playing lights out, a quick study who adjusts quickly to a new situation, with every possible QB tool (he's even got the deep ball to Moss going), and with no significant wear issues? I think that can compete with a going on 32 year old Brady with known shoulder, ankle and a knee ligament problem that has now officially involved multiple surgeries. Frankly I happen to think that Cassel came at the perfect time to set up a post-Brady plan, because TB isn't going to last forever and the Patriots can't afford to ride that ship down to the bottom the way they rode it to the top. Not when they have what looks like a sterling alternative.

That's right, I forgot. This is a forum full of Sox fans. Opinions of a player must never change based on actual performance, at least if the performance is good. If a player once sucked it must therefore follow that he will always suck. Logically. Definitely.

When Cassel does something that puts him on a level with hall of famers, then yes, I'm damn serious. No matter what kind of cast you're surrounded with, 2 straight games with 400 yards throwing, each game including a rushing TD, is enormous. Brady NEVER did that. Heck, take away the rushing TD's and Brady STILL never did that. I know that "if you cherry-pick the stats just right Cassel might just be an average NFL quarterback" is still virgin territory for a lot of die-hards, but take a second to look at what we've really got here and what the last 2 weeks might mean. It could all go to hell next week, but until it does, this is really getting interesting. Cassel carried the team this Sunday, and he all but carried them last Sunday too, if the defense could actually stop a 3rd down conversion sometimes. I'm not even saying Cassel really is better than Brady. I'm just saying that at this point with Cassel as hot as it is it's about time to start having the conversation.