Crazy thought, but is Aaron Rodgers underutilized?

[eire5199]

It's hard to imagine a discussion like this after a guy just had a monster season and won the NFL MVP, but when you see that Rodgers only ranked 16th in the NFL in number of pass attempts it makes you look twice.

Some food for thought...

http://www.packerpedia.com/rodgers-underutilized.html

 

[13 Times Champs]

If the defense plays better he will get more chances. They won't be able to put enough lights on the Lambeau Field scoreboard.

 

[SpartaChris]

The best way to describe this article is ridiculous, stupid and pointless. Retarded is also a good description. He has one of the best seasons ever recorded in NFL history and he's "underutilized?" So what if he could have thrown for 6,000 yards and 59 TD's. Individual accolades are great, but not nearly as important as wins and losses. Records are meaningless if you're losing.

The article is best summed up by this sentence:

The single biggest reason Rodgers ended up attempting fewer passes than lesser quarterbacks like Mark Sanchez and Andy Dalton was simply because the Packers didn't run that many plays. Last year, they were actually 28th in the league in the number of offensive plays run from scrimmage, a shocking statistic considering the fact they led the NFL in scoring.​

We didn't run that many plays because we didn't NEED to run that many plays, thanks in large part to how good Rodgers played last season.

And this one:

Of course, the fact of the matter is this whole discussion means very little considering how well the offense performed last year. The Packers led the league in scoring with 560 points, good for second best in NFL history.

I have no doubt in my mind that the TD record and possibly even the passing record could/would have been broken by Rodgers last season if he had played rather than being pulled when the games didn't matter or were well enough in hand to let the backup take over. But the fact is we didn't run more offensive plays because we didn't need to run more offensive plays. Can't say the same about the other teams.

 

[13 Times Champs]

The best way to describe this article is ridiculous, stupid and pointless. Retarded is also a good description. He has one of the best seasons ever recorded in NFL history and he's "underutilized?" So what if he could have thrown for 6,000 yards and 59 TD's. Individual accolades are great, but not nearly as important as wins and losses. Records are meaningless if you're losing.

The article is best summed up by this sentence:



We didn't run that many plays because we didn't NEED to run that many plays, thanks in large part to how good Rodgers played last season.

And this one:



I have no doubt in my mind that the TD record and possibly even the passing record could/would have been broken by Rodgers last season if he had played rather than being pulled when the games didn't matter or were well enough in hand to let the backup take over. But the fact is we didn't run more offensive plays because we didn't need to run more offensive plays. Can't say the same about the other teams.

That was a stupid **** article.

 

[eire5199]

I thought it was kind of a fun out-of-the-box type of thing that you only see during the dead time of the offseason.

I think it's kind of surprising how many fewer passes Rodgers threw compared to some of the other QB's in the league. An interesting stat, to say the least.

 

[13 Times Champs]

I thought it was kind of a fun out-of-the-box type of thing that you only see during the dead time of the offseason.

I think it's kind of surprising how many fewer passes Rodgers threw compared to some of the other QB's in the league. An interesting stat, to say the least.

I wish I could get a paycheck for writing nonesense. I do it for free.

 

[I_am_smoked_cheddar]

It's not the # of attempts fellows, it's the completion/attempts ratio that counts. When your that good you don't miss as often.

 

[Powarun]

I believe the overrated comeback argument is similar to these statistics. Our offense was playing too good to make too many comebacks. Also playing Rodgers for all those passes means he is at higher risk of getting sacked, Rodgers is one of those QB's that will gamble themselves so that they would rather get sacked than turn the ball over, and that isn't good, since Rodgers does get sacked quite a bit in previous seasons. And lastly if Rodgers did that I could see us still argueing with Brees's fans who padded their stats more.

 

[VolvoD]

Yes, he IS under utilized. I think he should be the QB AND the punter...that way the defense NEVER knows when its a fake punt attempt! Think of the options....

 

[JTheGreat]

Even though teams play us for pass they still focus on the run a little bit, being 16th in the league for attempts is perfect. It shows that we have a little balance to our offense, if he was number 1 in attempts, surely he would have more yards but he would also probably have more ints and incompletions. When peyton was in indy his last year, I think he broke the record for attempts, but he threw alot more ints and incompletions and had an off year.

 

[AmishMafia]

I thought it was kind of a fun out-of-the-box type of thing that you only see during the dead time of the offseason.

I think it's kind of surprising how many fewer passes Rodgers threw compared to some of the other QB's in the league. An interesting stat, to say the least.

Eire, did you write this article?

I didn't think it was all that interesting or logical. By the way, you must have set some kind of record for time between posts. Prior to the 2 above, your only other post was nearly 7 years ago.

 

[P-E-Z]

No he is not.

 

[P-E-Z]

Hit post to soon lol..... Rodgers got a lot of short fields due to getting turn over from the defense.

 

[FrankRizzo]

Here's a little something better from Football Outsiders:

a. How good GREAT was Aaron Rodgers last year?
He threw just six picks, but he's even lower in a stat Football Outsiders calls "adjusted interceptions."
Two of his picks were catchable balls that bounced off the hands of his receivers before being picked off, and Rodgers didn't throw a single "dropped interception" (a pass that would have been a pick except the defender dropped an easy catch).

 

[Deleted member 6794]

Even though teams play us for pass they still focus on the run a little bit, being 16th in the league for attempts is perfect. It shows that we have a little balance to our offense, if he was number 1 in attempts, surely he would have more yards but he would also probably have more ints and incompletions. When peyton was in indy his last year, I think he broke the record for attempts, but he threw alot more ints and incompletions and had an off year.

Actually the Packers were 14th in the league in pass attempts (Rodgers was 16th, but Flynn threw 49 passes last season as well), but that doesn´t mean we had a balanced offense (8th highest percentage of passing plays in the league with 60,57% and 3rd highest percentage of passing yards with 75,18%). This just means we didn´t have as many plays in total as other teams, and there are two reasons for that: first of all the offense didn´t need a lot of plays to score points and the defense couldn´t stopped anybody.

 

[peteralan71]

Last season, I ran the same type of analysis in the mid-late season based against Drew Brees, since it was clear that he would set the record for yards, although he had an outrageous number of attempts. I came up with the same numbers, roughly as have been presented in this article. The reason that he is "underutilized" is for his own health. We need to keep the other defenses on their feet a little. We already are kind of one-dimensional in that we pass way more than we run, and if Rodgers were to pass as often as Stafford, he would REALLY have defenses coming at him and injury would presumably be more likely. I'm ok with how much he is utilized now.

 

[Future12]

Can't believe someone actually said that. Aaron was up there in passing yards last year. He doesn't have a lot of attempts because of the play-action deep play they always run and get a lot of yards. He throws deep a lot and his receivers make a lot of big plays. Attempts is hardly a stat to even discuss.

 

[I_am_smoked_cheddar]

Can't believe someone actually said that. Aaron was up there in passing yards last year. He doesn't have a lot of attempts because of the play-action deep play they always run and get a lot of yards. He throws deep a lot and his receivers make a lot of big plays. Attempts is hardly a stat to even discuss.

You are correct, and needed to be noted.

 

[Kitten]

I'm not a big fan of the article, it didn't make sense to me but to answer the question, any player can be underutilized. Even someone like Aaron Rodgers. It's situational and circumstantial. As someone pointed out, you have to consider we had the worst defense in the league so Aaron being underutilized may not of been his fault directly but it was rather circumstantial.

 

[DevilDon]

He had a nice tackle on Urlacher, pure effort. Maybe a new two way player in the making?