Comparing the QBs: poise in the pocket

[eagwatcher]

I'm a stat geek, and keep fixating on Kyle Padron's numbers vs. Idaho (13-33-1int-260y) compared with Jeff Tuel vs. BYU (30-45-2int-229y) - completion percentage is very misleading in this case.

At least five times, Padron dumped the ball to avoid a sack, and wound up with a stellar 8.1 yards per attempt, while Tuel seemed tentative in the pocket, rarely went deep, and finished with only 5.5y per pass attempt.

With both the EWU and WSU O-lines a bit untested, I think pocket poise will be a huge factor Saturday.

And that's just one topic I'd like to discuss at our Live Chat Thursday at spokesman.com

- Jim

 

[EWURanger]

Kyle didn't have a great completion percentage, but I think he did a great job of playing smart and managing the game. He had good situational awareness and poise in the pocket and like Jim mentioned dumped the ball off or scrambled when he was about to get sacked. I think I remember a couple times when he muscled out of sacks as well.

 

[eaglesfootball]

+1 he handled himself really well

 

[ValhallaCoug]

I'm a stat geek, and keep fixating on Kyle Padron's numbers vs. Idaho (13-33-1int-260y) compared with Jeff Tuel vs. BYU (30-45-2int-229y) - completion percentage is very misleading in this case.

At least five times, Padron dumped the ball to avoid a sack, and wound up with a stellar 8.1 yards per attempt, while Tuel seemed tentative in the pocket, rarely went deep, and finished with only 5.5y per pass attempt.

With both the EWU and WSU O-lines a bit untested, I think pocket poise will be a huge factor Saturday.

And that's just one topic I'd like to discuss at our Live Chat Thursday at spokesman.com

- Jim

No doubt Tuel had a poor performance. But oddly enough, I feel okay about this. Tuel's most complete season is 2010, as he played less than 2 hours of actual game time last year due to injury, and we only have one game to gauge him on this season. But in 2010, Tuel always seemed to follow a poor performance with a stellar one, which is encouraging to Cougar fans. But even if he doesn't play lights out, even if he plays to his "average," that's still going to be around a 60% game for about 270 yards and 2 TDs.

Last week was not his average performance. Last week was a terrible performance. And if he happens to repeat that performance, I imagine we might see Connor Halliday get some PT. Halliday didn't do much in his two starts except pass for 783 yards and 6 touchdowns. This was against Arizona State and Utah, two of the more stout defenses in the Pac-12.

Tuel beat out Halliday for a reason, though. I imagine, after a rusty performance against BYU, he's dying to answer everyone's question why.