Pennington to attempt comeback

[Dave Gray]

^ You usually keep 3 QBs on a roster, no?

[masterfins]

Actually I'd love to see Pennington back again for the Dolphins...only as a QB coach. 

If the Dolphins do in fact hire Daboll, I'd like to see them give Pennington a shot as a QB coach.  Pennington worked with Daboll when they were with the Jets and Miami wouldn't be taking Daboll if Pennington didn't give him an endorsement.  I think Pennington would make a fine QB coach at some point, why not let him cut his teeth here in Miami where he already has a good relationship with both the QB and the Offensive coordinator?  Sure, it would mean learning on the fly for Pennington, but there aren't many smarter guys than Pennington and Daboll can do most of the work while bringing Pennington along.  It's not a definite that they even bring in a QB coach to work with Daboll, so it's not like they don't believe he can handle the OC and QB coaches duties.  Why not let Pennington come along for the ride and learn as much as he can.  Makes sense to me.

I disagree with a couple things you are saying.  First, Henne needs an experienced QB coach.  Pennington may, or may not, be a good QB coach, the point is the Fins can't afford to find out at this point.  As for Daboll doing double duty as OC and QB coach I'm against that too.  Last year shows that the Fins need some major work in the OC dept., so it would be crazy to bring in a new guy without prior OC experience and expect him to excel when splitting his duties.  It would be hard enough for an experienced OC.  I would rather just see Daboll as the QB coach.

[masterfins]

^ You usually keep 3 QBs on a roster, no?

Yeah, and how'd that work out last year??

[Dave Gray]

Yeah, and how'd that work out last year??

I don't understand the connection.  We didn't suck because we had 3 QBs on the roster.

It's 'cause the ones we had playing were crappy.

[tepop84]

hennes time is up in miami, they aren't bringing in qb coachs to help him.

[Phishfan]

 As for Daboll doing double duty as OC and QB coach I'm against that too.  Last year shows that the Fins need some major work in the OC dept., so it would be crazy to bring in a new guy without prior OC experience and expect him to excel when splitting his duties.  It would be hard enough for an experienced OC.  I would rather just see Daboll as the QB coach.

I don't get what you are trying to say. Daboll has experience.

[masterfins]

I don't understand the connection.  We didn't suck because we had 3 QBs on the roster.

It's 'cause the ones we had playing were crappy.

The point I was trying to make was that Pennington was basically one play and done for the year, so it was a waste of a spot.  When you are looking to add a player in the middle of the year you don't have the pre-season time to work with and develop a third player.  Keeping an aging, injury prone player like Pennington would be a mistake, IMO.  I'd rather see an undrafted free agent or late round draft pick as the third QB.  The second QB has to have some experience, as he will probably be called upon to play.

[Dave Gray]

^ You can't use a sample size of 1.

Yes, Pennington got hurt in his last year with us.  But when he started before, he won 11 games.

I'm not a doctor, so I can't speak on the probability of injury.  If a guy gets injured, he goes on IR and opens up a roster spot anyway, right?  If you think it's not worth it, that's fine -- I won't argue.  I'm not sure that it is.  But I think that there is room for him.  Your 3rd QB likely isn't going to play anyway, so it's really not ALL that risky.

[jtex316]

^ And, if you're down to your 3rd QB, you're screwed anyways. Not many 3rd string QBs pick up the pieces mid-season and take the team to the promised land.

[masterfins]

^ You can't use a sample size of 1.

Yes, Pennington got hurt in his last year with us.  But when he started before, he won 11 games.

I'm not a doctor, so I can't speak on the probability of injury.  If a guy gets injured, he goes on IR and opens up a roster spot anyway, right?  If you think it's not worth it, that's fine -- I won't argue.  I'm not sure that it is.  But I think that there is room for him.  Your 3rd QB likely isn't going to play anyway, so it's really not ALL that risky.

To repeat one of my arguments, if the third spot opens up in mid-year it's really useless as far as developing a player goes.  During the season the coaches aren't working on developing the third string QB.  Whereas, during the off season and during preseason they do work with the third string QB's more.  IMO an older previously injured player is more likely to be re-injured.  IMO having Pennington is like having only two QB's. As for a sample size of one, you are aguing that because he won 11 games one year he deserves to be on the roster.  That's not a good argument as far as i'm concerned.

[Pappy13]

The problem is that he will take up a roster spot.  If the Fins want to draft a late round QB to try and develop there won't be a spot for him.

And that's only part of the problem.  Your #1 QB takes most of the "live" snaps.  Sure the other QB's get a lot of practice snaps when just throwing to receivers and stuff, but actual 11 on 11 drills are minimal and your #1 gets most of those.  So if you have Penny taking the majority of snaps in pre-season getting him ready for the year and then he gets hurt in the 1st game of the year, you've cost your starter a whole pre-season's worth of reps.

There's absolutely no way in hell that I let Penny be my #1 QB next year.  Maybe I let him be the insurance policy because yes in that case, if he gets hurt it's no big deal, you haven't wasted a lot of time getting him prepared to play anyway.

[Jim Gray]

My initial anti-Pennington post was in response to someone suggesting he should be our starter.  

I think you are suggesting him for the 3rd spot.  I think of that spot as a holding place for a recently drafted "project"; but if there aren't any, I guess it would be okay.  It might make more sense to have him in the number 2 spot, ready to play if needed.  My biggest objection to having him as a 2 or 3 would be money.  I'm not sure what his salary is, but in 1999 is was close to $6M.  That's a lot to pay for a backup.  Even if you renegotiate, he's a 12 year vet and the league minimum would be more than I would want to pay.

In the end, I would rather have Miami look in another direction.  My reasoning is simple.  We are looking for a franchise QB.  There are no obvious choices, so we are going to have to try and find one.  Our best chance of doing that is to use our QB roster spots on guys who "may" be the QB of the future.  Since Pennington doesn't fit that criteria, I wouldn't bring him back.

Final thought - Since we are still some distance from competing with the Jets and Pats, I would rather lose, and lose big while we try to find real answers to the personnel problems we have.  Short term solutions that provide short term benefits keep us from addressing the issues that have plagued the team over the past few years.

 

[StL FinFan]

I say let him compete for the job and if can win it, he deserves it.

[masterfins]

I don't get what you are trying to say. Daboll has experience.

You are correct, my bad.  Before making the post all I read about Daboll was that he was the former Jets QB coach in the OP's opener.  Like others, sometimes I should read more and post less.

[Jim Gray]

I say let him compete for the job and if can win it, he deserves it.

With the talent we have, Brett Favre could win the job.  We might even make the play-offs; but would we be moving in the right direction?  I don't see how starting Pennington in hopes of playing .500 football is the answer.  Maybe it's just frustration and desperation on my part, but I'm sick of being mediocre.  I'm sick of watching the Pats strut around.  I'm sick of the loud mouth Jets and their loud mouth coach.  What we are doing with our personnel isn't working.  Since we aren't 1 or 2 players away from competing against the top teams in our division, I think the time is right to rebuild our skill positions on offense.