HOly crapola. It took me 25 minutes to read all the posts and catch up with everything. Had "Server Busy" about 10 times because the board's getting flooded.
Talk about exciting! I knew this day was coming. I was out in front, with some others, hoping that we would get Schaub.
I had taken verbal "beat downs" from several people saying that I have no proof that Schaub is the QB I think he is.
I'm in the same boat as Porky on this: I have watched Schaub play, albeit in the preseason, but I can say that he looked commanding in all phases of the game--He has the zip that Carr has (I don't buy the "He doesn't have a big league arm" stuff), he actually goes through his progressions very naturally and seems to know where the open man will be, and his mechanics are a lot better than Carr's.
To get an NFL-ready QB via swapping TWO spots in the first round, keeping us at a Top 10 draft pick status, and then losing a 2nd rounder is not bad. We were going to draft Kolb or Stanton and those guys would be gone by round 3...so we would have spent a 2nd round pick on a college QB who would need the 2-3 years that Schaub has already served in order to learn the ropes.
We will trade Carr and get some sort of pick for him. Even if it's a 4th rounder...that's still a "pick," and remember that we picked up Charles Spencer in the 3rd--I think this FO can now draft in rounds 1-5 and deserve our confidence based on last year's successes.
This was the SMART deal. Garcia had a fluke season. Plummer is on the downhill side of his career and only cares about himself to the point of sulking and "reitiring" because he didn't get to go where he wanted--That's a guy that you don't want leading your huddle, OK? Ramsey is the love child of Jay Fiedler and Heath Schuler.
Schaub, as did Tom Brady, has waited for his turn to start. Schaub, as did Tom Brady, has had to wait patiently behind overrated starters that stood on their paths to starterdom.
This gets the monkey (Carr and his baggage) off the Texans' back, and it gives the team a new identity and a fresh start. There was no way AJ was going to be a happy camper going into camp with DC at the controls. Ditto for Dunta. Ditto for the other guys who have been patient for the past 3 seasons or so. It was imperative that we moved DC and then to also acquire an NFL-ready QB to go into camp with.
Atlanta, IIRC, transitioned to a WCO and asked Vick to become the pocket passer. He did well for a few games, then he had to go "highlight reel" about midway through the season. Schaub; therefore, is already a little accustomed to the WCO. He showed, to me, that he can sit in the pocket and make fairly good "reads" and go through progressions with efficiency and effectiveness.
We don't have a lot of "real" NFL games to go by when it comes to judging Schaub. What we DO have to go on is this: We passed on Garcia, Plummer, and Ramsey when that whole circus began a few weeks ago--Our FO was patient, dropping out of the "arms race" as quickly as we had entered it. I speculated that we were dropping out because we wanted Schaub, and I speculated that we hadn't heard anything because the FO was in hyper-secretive and ultra-stealth mode trying to get the details worked out. I predicted a 3-way trade between Houston-Oakland-Tampa Bay whereby Carr would go to Oakland. I was off by one team (Tampa Bay)...and it appears that Atlanta and Oakland MIGHT be in the mix for Moss/Carr. That remains to be seen, though.
All I know is this: The price is definitely "right" to me, and if we can get Leach-Green-Dayne on the field this season, with Schaub at QB and AJ-Walter-Daniels-Mathis catching the ball, then we ought to be very excited about our offseason because we haven't even drafted with our Top 10 pick yet! We can grab a fairly good RB or WR or OT or DB and come out smelling pretty fancy for a change.
The FO just got ballsy, folks. I railed against the non-ballsiness of this FO, and now they have come through!
Great job, Rick.
Now if we can just ask people to be respectful of the Carr family I'd be even happier. They are headed into a new chapter in their lives, and they handled their tenure here pretty well when you consider what David had to go through and what we had to go through. It'd be nice if people would remain civil about this whole thing.
