Om Field: The Jimmy Clausen Files

[Om]

The Jimmy Clausen Files
March 11, 2010

There is no more relevant a subject in the Redskins universe today than the quarterback position. And no wonder.

Incumbent Jason Campbell has been tendered but is far from a lock to be the opening day starter. The Redskins head into 2010 with a new coaching staff and general manager, and possess the number four overall pick in April's NFL Draft. It comes as no surprise that speculation is at full boil as to whether or not they will use that pick to select a quarterback.

We previously looked at Oklahoma QB Sam Bradford, who at the time was considered the odds-on favorite among mock draft gurus to become a Redskin. Since then, Bradford has risen up many of those draft boards and is now widely considered as the potential number one overall pick to St. Louis.

Notre Dame QB Jimmy Clausen has emerged as a candidate to take his place.

With six weeks to go before the draft appears to be a distinct possibility to assume the title Washington Redskins Quarterback before the summer heat arrives. If you are a serious Redskins fan, you may have already scouted Clausen a bit. But if for whatever reason you have not, or not to your satisfaction ...

For your consideration and one-stop shopping convenience, here is a compendium of statistics, scouting reports videos and more to help you fill in the gaps. For those stout of heart enough to wade through the entire piece, my thoughts on Clausen are at the end.

Bon appetit...


More...

 

[Elephant]

Notre Dame! They belong to no conference, lose to mediocre and sub-par teams, and did not beat a single ranked team in his senior year, the season he had his best stats.If he could have had the numbers he had in a conference like the Big Ten, I would have said go get him! He put up some impressive stats against sub par to average teams. Of their 6 wins in his senior year, he only beat 2 teams with winning records. They lost 4 games to teams that weren't ranked. Tell me those defenses were good enough to stop an above average QB.

This has Brady Quinn written all over it! He is above average, but top 5? I just don't see it. But, then again, who am I to say? I am just a outspoken member of a pro football team message board.

 

[China]

OK, I don't quite get the ratings thing.

CAREER: 695 for 1110 (62.6%), 8148 yds, 60 TD, 27 INT, 137.25 Rating

2009: 289 for 425 (68,0%), 3722 yds, 28 TD, 04 INT, 161.43 Rating
2008: 268 for 440 (60.9%), 3172 yds, 25 TD, 17 INT, 132.49 Rating
2007: 138 for 245 (56.3%), 1254 yds, 07 TD, 06 INT, 103.85 Rating

The maximum rating for NFL QBs is 158.3. So I assume this is the college QB rating, or there is something wrong with his 2009 number. The maximum college QB rating is 1261.6.

That makes a rating of 161.43 seem, well, low.

But, apparently, nobody gets over 200, so the college rating system seems a bit off.

From Wiki:

In NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision (formerly division I-A), the career record for passing efficiency is held by Tim Tebow of Florida Gators, who had a career mark of 170.8 between 2006 and 2009. The single-season record belongs to Colt Brennan of Hawaii, who amassed a passer rating of 186.0 over the 2006 season, while the freshman record belongs to Michael Vick of Virginia Tech, whose rating during the 1999 season was 180.4.

 

[Aston Gambino]

Fantastic collection of stuff here, Om. I for one have not done much scouting on Clausen, so I especially appreciate all this.

Learned quite a lot too. Like the fact that one can have a QB rating of 303.67 in a single game, or that he only threw 4 INTs all of last year.

The videos were enlightening as well. Seems to throw a nice deep ball, even under pressure. Also like how he buys himself more time when things break down, a skill that will likely be a requirement for any Washington QB who places any value on his own well being.

Most of the videos highlighted either long bombs or touchdowns from red zone situations, but I was especially pleased to read multiple scouting reports praise his accuracy from 15 yards and in, which would crucial when running the WCO.

I think you hit the nail on the head with your take. Nobody, not Elway, Marino, Manning, Brees, or Montana came out of college ready to carve up NFL secondaries. Natural ability will only take you so far, and what separates the great ones from the Jamarcus Russells of the world is constant dedication to perfecting the craft.

If he has that drive that the great ones have, I think the kid has an incredibly bright future, cause you're right, he does look like a QB, and a fearless one at that.

 

[Aston Gambino]

If he could have had the numbers he had in a conference like the Big Ten, I would have said go get him!

Just for the sake of conversation, if you had to pick one, would you choose Jimmy Clausen or Daryll Clark, and why?

 

[riggins44]

Ratings are like statistics...they can be produced to back whatever side of fence you're on. I'm not a big ratings fan. This is not an endorsement of Clausen either.

When I look at Clausen's record I also take in to account his HC. Guy was a great coordinator in NFL, but seemed to a bad college HC. I'm not sure Clausen had the best talent around him.

I wonder what Tom Brady's ratings were his senior year? A guy can have great college stats, but they won't translate to the NFL. Then you have a guy like Brady that is 6th rounder that lights things up.

If we take Clausen, Colt McCoy, or whoever...I've got to put my trust in Shanahan and our scouts.

 

[Aston Gambino]

Ratings are like statistics...they can be produced to back whatever side of fence you're on.

I can agree to that to a certain extent. You got take it all with a healthy grain of salt.

Same goes with the win-loss record. Phillip Rivers was 8-5 during his Senior year at NC State.

 

[riggins44]

I can agree to that to a certain extent. You got take it all with a healthy grain of salt.

Same goes with the win-loss record. Phillip Rivers was 8-5 during his Senior year at NC State.

I know what you're saying and agree completely. Ratings should be nothing more than one of many tools to evaluate a player.

Here is Heath Shuler's record.
YR COM ATT PCT YDS TD INT
1993 184 285 64.6 2354 25 8

Remember Kiper had a spat with Colts about why they didn't take Shuler in draft versus Marshall Faulk.

 

[Billfishead]

First of all OM, Great piece of work. Outstanding job.

I would have to say that after absorbing your work on Clausen, that I am no longer a nay sayer. It puts him in a different light in my mind. The only thing that stands out in a negative way, is what appears to be his tendency to throw off his back foot on the long ball. That is correctable.

I still say we go OL with our first pick, but if the FO says Clausen is the man. Then I will bow to their knowledge.

Of course unless their proven wrong. LOL

 

[LoyalSkinsFan]

I am sooooooo torn. On the surface of things, I would go whole-heartedly into the draft preaching OT, OT, OT. But, the prospect of landing a "franchise quarterback" certainly seems to trump that. I had thought that Clausen would be more of a late 1st, early 2nd round kind of guy....but, after reading more and thinking on it I can see how it would be tempting to pull the trigger early in the 1st. It's a crapshoot for me, really......but, hopefully not so for Allen and Shanahan. I figure we take either Bradford or Clausen, whichever is there at 4....or, we go OT.....or, we trade down for picks and get an OT and QB later.

Then again......

Aaaargh!!

HTTR

 

[LoyalSkinsFan]

Oh, and I have to say, in watching the video on Clausen, he sure can SLIDE better than JC. Already, it's an improvement.....

HTTR

 

[Boone]

What Aston said
Thanks for putting this together brother. I'll confess, I have very little insight on Bradford OR Claussen. I'm totally down with selecting one of them if Shanahan and company don't think Campbell will ever be the answer. I'll place blind trust in their ability to make the call on QB vs. other position, and if they go QB, which one they take.

What else can we really do other than believe, particularly if it's a QB where history shows any selection there is truly a crap shoot?

 

[Elephant]

Just for the sake of conversation, if you had to pick one, would you choose Jimmy Clausen or Daryll Clark, and why?

I have to admit, I know very little about Clark. If I am reading this question correctly, you ask me that to question my assertion that if Clausen played in the Big Ten, I would pull the trigger. If so, it was less an endorsement of Big Ten QB's as it was a rejection of the quality of the defenses Brady Quinn...er...uh...I mean Jimmy Clausen faced this past season, defenses like Washington St, Washington, Nevada, Purdue and the like.

I think it is important to take into consideration that Notre Dame had an easy schedule of mediocre teams and still only went 6-6 with Clausen at the helm. Except for Pittsburgh, the rest of their schedule was average or worse. Stanford ended up ranked toward the end of the year with a tough win against the Irish, and I will credit Clausen with a good game, but there was no defense on either side of the ball that day. This schedule against weak defensive teams was perfect to build stats against.

 

[the Omniscient]

Just curious, but does anyone know why his personality is questioned? I have heard rumors that he rubs teammates the wrong way, etc... The only thing I saw in the article that relates to these rumors is in the 'NFL Minute' section where they stated "Questions concerning his leadership and personality are rampant."

 

[servumtuum]

Just curious, but does anyone know why his personality is questioned? I have heard rumors that he rubs teammates the wrong way, etc... The only thing I saw in the article that relates to these rumors is in the 'NFL Minute' section where they stated "Questions concerning his leadership and personality are rampant."

The one thing I've run across is vague references to a tendency toward being arrogant in his demeanor which may be simply an expression of self-confidence perhaps a bit overdone but apparently has been noticeable enough to elicit comments.

Like Boone and others have stated-I 'm going to let Allen/Shanahan make the call on this and rely on their experience, so far I'm liking the careful and deliberate approach they seem to be taking toward the whole FA/draft thing so I'm comfortable enough to trust their judgement.

After ten years, that's a welcome change when it comes to my state of mind concerning the Skins.


Note to the esteemed owners: While typing this I had used a "word/word" combination in the following line "a tendency toward being arrogant" with the initial word being one used to describe a overdone-to-the-point-of-annoying self-confidence followed by a slash and the word "arrogant". The word starts with a "c" and ends with a "y" and contains a "k" and is five letters in length. Much to my surprise, upon previewing the post, it was rendered "***y/arrogant". This is reminiscent of an annoying little bit of software I've encountered called Net Nanny which scanned for letter combinations which were deemed at some point to be "offensive" whether they stood alone in the form of the offending word or were, as in this case, part of a larger word which is not considered by the general population to contain any offensive qualities whatever. Since this is the first time I've encountered this I'm wondering if this might be an unexpected glitch or is it an embedded risk in some type of filtering software associated with the site content? Just wondering.

 

[Om]

serv,

vBulletin allows us to tag certain words to replace with asterisks. In our initial setup phase we just slapped a bunch of the more obvious ones in there, and have been slowly refining the list ever since. Apparently c-o-c-k got thrown in there. That little oversight has been corrected. Clearly, if Jimmy Clausen turns out to be a cocky mother****er, we need to be able to say so.

As to whether he IS or not, I'm doing some more digging to see what kind of specific mentions I can find on the subject. It may turn out to just be unsupported fan talk, but if not, and there are actual documented instances of cocky mother****erness, we shall endeavour to bring them to light.

 

[LoyalSkinsFan]

I'm getting all cockeyed from this speculation.

(Just testing)

HTTR

 

[Om]

Or it could just be the smog.

 

[Aston Gambino]

I think it is important to take into consideration that Notre Dame had an easy schedule of mediocre teams and still only went 6-6 with Clausen at the helm. Except for Pittsburgh, the rest of their schedule was average or worse. Stanford ended up ranked toward the end of the year with a tough win against the Irish, and I will credit Clausen with a good game, but there was no defense on either side of the ball that day. This schedule against weak defensive teams was perfect to build stats against.

That's fair, and you're right, the schedule should be taken into consideration, but, as with any other stat, shouldn't be the end-all-be-all in predicting a college QB's success in the NFL.

Take Tebow, for instance. What he lose, like 2 games, total? In three years playing in the SEC, arguably the best conference in the country? Despite this, he's still considered a second or third rounder, and for good reason.

Phillip Rivers faced only 3 ranked opponents in his Senior year, losing all 3 times, yet he was still a (well-deserving) top 5 pick.

And by the way, I'm a huge Penn State fan, been watching Clark for years. He's probably the best QB they've had since Kerry Collins, but as a pro I'd compare him to Byron Leftwich. Great arm, slightly mobile, but struggles with accuracy. I only mention it because even as a hard core Penn State fan (who naturally hates Notre Dame), I'd still take Clausen in a heartbeat.

 

[Elephant]

I hear ya AG. You are correct to bring up players like Phillip Rivers, but for every Rivers, there is a Colt Brennan.

My whole argument during this off-season has been, neither he nor Bradford are worth the risk with such a high pick.

Latest indications suggest we may be in a position to have one of the coveted DT's fall to us setting up a possible trade down.

By the way, I am not so sure I wouldn't rather have Tebow than Clausen, much less rosk since Tebow is a 2nd or 3rd. I am not sure about Bradford because of his shoulder. What I don't understand is how the experts can have an injured QB climb the ranks without having any type of pro day.
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