Kyle Allen

[Boone]

Kyle Allen is still a very young and inexperienced QB. All I see on Twitter and elsewhere is that 'the one thing we know is that we don't have our franchise QB on this roster'. We probably don't, but the idea that a late round or UDFA QB cannot become a long-term starter in the NFL, or that because a young QB struggles with turnovers early in his career has no future - I just don't get those arguments.

This has nothing to do with Dwayne Haskins, so let's leave him out of it for the moment.

I hear all kinds of things said about Allen. He's a turnover machine. He has no arm. He can't throw it more than 40 yds. I think all of those things are wrong. He definitely has given up the ball far too frequently, but again, *most* young QBs do, even the ultimate greats. Allen doesn't have special arm talent, but his arm is plenty strong enough to play at this level. The stuff about not being able to throw the long ball are just false.

I like Kyle Allen. I think he's got a great temperament, good attitude, I think players like playing with him, and he's a smart, coachable, fearless kid. He's an accurate passer, he's got mobility and decent pocket awareness. IF - and yes, it's an if (and a big if) - he can reduce the turnovers and play like he did yesterday consistently and continue to improve, we may have something there. I even think it's possible, again, assuming he plays more like he did against Dallas throughout the rest of 2020, that we don't draft ANY QB in next year's draft. I don't really care about conventional wisdom. I'm rooting for the guy.

 

[SilentThreat]

I WANT Allen to be the guy.. I want ANY QB we have to be the guy because it means we have the guy... I don't care about where he came from, what his name is, or whatever argument is made to counter a player's ability to play the game.

I've seen a different offense. At the beginning of the year I didn't think Allen would increase our win total more than 1 or 2 games. I was wrong. I now believe, that had Allen played from the first snap of the game, we're 4-3 RIGHT NOW. I also was adamantly against benching Haskins and playing Allen because I had little to no faith that Allen COULD be the guy, and I wanted to just make sure Haskins wasn't. I again was wrong... I want to see Allen the rest of the year to see what urgency we need to draft a QB. I'm not sold on Fields. He is the sexy no. 2 pick right now but for some reason I don't think he is successful HERE. I think if he's drafted by Atlanta he may end up being more successful. I am extremely intrigued by 2 or 3 guys at the top of 2021 draft that do not play QB and am finding myself more and more wondering if Allen can prove to be good enough... to allow us to look elsewhere. Of course if we find ourselves in position to draft Lawrence that might be different, but i dont know.

 

[Boone]

I think we'll have to see how the rest of the season goes. He almost got us the Giants win despite the mistakes. I have eyes. He's not Murray or Mahommes. But we don't need him to be. If he can develop into a young Alex Smith type (and I think that's how you project him), and we continue to build around him, we can contend. But it's going to be up to him to show he's improving and cleaning up the mistakes. I don't know if he can do it, but I don't think it's an impossibility just because he was an UDFA.

 

[Win4us]

Allen seems to check down quite a bit and is somewhat limited in arm strength. With that said, imho he could definitely play a season or 2 while the rest of the team gets built up and look for the QBOTF within that time frame. The rest of the season will show if he’s needing an immediate upgrade or not. Best case scenario for the team is he thrives and locks it down

 

[SilentThreat]

Allen seems to check down quite a bit and is somewhat limited in arm strength. With that said, imho he could definitely play a season or 2 while the rest of the team gets built up and look for the QBOTF within that time frame. The rest of the season will show if he’s needing an immediate upgrade or not. Best case scenario for the team is he thrives and locks it down

I think Allen has an arm, he just doesn't have a lot of time, in either stop, to sit back there and let plays develop downfield. The bomb to Terry looked effortless.
In fact, Scherff is in his lap and Allen can't even step into the throw... that ball was 47 yards in the air off his back foot with no pocket.

 

[Bulldog]

We can’t waste any more time with Haskins after 2020.

We need to bring in a legit blue chip prospect that can come in and learn the playbook and get on the field and not throw up all over himself.

If the idea is to start Allen and then go back to Haskins in the offseason then we can write off 2021.

Can Haskins improve? I suppose so but at what pace? And what’s the ceiling?

At some point the juice isn’t worth the squeeze.

Haskins was not a pick by a GM like the Ravens or Steelers have

He was picked by the owner.

In that regard the ‘he’s a high first round pick’ argument falls flat.

Spanos made Beathard pick Ryan Leaf at #2 overall.

Was still a bad pick.

We moved on from the disgruntled Trent Williams and cut guys like Josh Norman that were showing up to get paid.

One last holdover issue to deal with - the qb we took because he went to Bullis.

 

[Knightingale]

My thoughts on this whole mess are very much like ST's.

I don't much care whether it's Allen or Haskins going forward, but I was/am in the camp of people who wanted to see what Haskin's ceiling was. I wanted to see if the young kid could develop and grow into the role, and I was more than willing to take my lumps as a fan just to see if he had that sort of potential. Moving to Allen seemed like a step back to me. Not in the win column, or in the running the offense column, but in the 'Do we know whether we've got our future Franchise QB' column.

I'm admittedly pretty disappointed in the way that Haskins seems to have handled the benching tbh.

Allen feels like the second coming of Kirk Cousins to me. I don't doubt he can be a quality QB, but I don't feel he's transcendent. He's not going to lift this team to greatness, and maybe that's okay.

The bigger issue for me is that he might be competent enough to get us through a couple of decent years, but it also means that those years we won't draft high and won't get the chance for that elite QB in the draft.
At least this year if we'd have rode Haskins and crashed and burned we'd have been drafting high. Instead we're going to be stuck on the merry-go-round again with a 4 to 6 win season.

 

[DieselPwr44]

Kyle Allen is like the majority of QBs this team has had over the last 25 years:
Just good enough to beat the dregs of the league and be competitive vs the mediocre but can't compete with the upper tier.

In other words, a waste of the team's and the fans(what's left of them) time.

His only positive is that he makes the staff comfortable because he's a known quantity to them...so he's got that going for him...which is nice........

 

[SilentThreat]

My thoughts on this whole mess are very much like ST's.

I don't much care whether it's Allen or Haskins going forward, but I was/am in the camp of people who wanted to see what Haskin's ceiling was. I wanted to see if the young kid could develop and grow into the role, and I was more than willing to take my lumps as a fan just to see if he had that sort of potential. Moving to Allen seemed like a step back to me. Not in the win column, or in the running the offense column, but in the 'Do we know whether we've got our future Franchise QB' column.

I'm admittedly pretty disappointed in the way that Haskins seems to have handled the benching tbh.

Allen feels like the second coming of Kirk Cousins to me. I don't doubt he can be a quality QB, but I don't feel he's transcendent. He's not going to lift this team to greatness, and maybe that's okay.

The bigger issue for me is that he might be competent enough to get us through a couple of decent years, but it also means that those years we won't draft high and won't get the chance for that elite QB in the draft.
At least this year if we'd have rode Haskins and crashed and burned we'd have been drafting high. Instead we're going to be stuck on the merry-go-round again with a 4 to 6 win season.

My only response to that is that I don't think you necessarily NEED 1/1 in order to find a QB. I do think you need to invest, and I'm not in the camp of "oh look at Tom Brady, or Russell Wilson." Those tend to be outliers. There are QBs picked all over the first round that are effective. Now I will buck the trend here and say "throw that crap out." Where you draft a QB does not make a QB, we all know that.. Instead, how you evaluate a player coming out, and your ability to draft them period is what makes a difference. Just because Justin Fields goes 2 does not mean he's better than "X" QB, it just means that a team who scouted him, rated him higher. That rating could be incorrect. I actually am excited to see what THIS particular group can do with this coming draft.

 

[Boone]

I think Allen has an arm, he just doesn't have a lot of time, in either stop, to sit back there and let plays develop downfield. The bomb to Terry looked effortless.
In fact, Scherff is in his lap and Allen can't even step into the throw... that ball was 47 yards in the air off his back foot with no pocket.

The ‘he doesn’t have a strong arm’ argument which seems to be applied to white QBs almost exclusively is similar to labeling black QBs as athletic but unable to read defenses.

Allen’s arm strength is fine. And ‘arm strength’ in and of itself is probably an overrated attribute - just ask Jay Cutler and Jeff George.