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Josh Freeman - what's his future hold? (1 Viewer)

RUSF18 said:
Grahamburn said:
Plenty of former Tampa Bay Buccaneer quarterbacks have gone on to greener pastures, Super Bowl wins, and even Hall of Fame careers. I'm fully expecting Freeman to shine in Minnesota.

I don't know that they had a choice, but the Bucs' front office deserves what they get if this kid blossoms in another city.
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I see this comment a lot, but honestly, forget about all the whispering and missing team pictures for a second...

What more could they have done with him from an on-the-field standpoint? His numbers were atrocious and were on a sharp decline. He has weapons around him. How much longer could they have trotted him out when he's completing 45% of his passes that would justify benching him? Two weeks? 6 weeks? Give him the rest of the season? I'm asking honestly.

He has physical talent and maybe he does put everything back together in Minnesota. Then they need to make the potentially franchise-defining (and possibly crippling, if it goes the wrong way) call on how much money to give him. But I think it's very likely that Freeman was upset that TB wasn't committing to him long term as he saw all these other pending FA QBs getting massive amounts of guaranteed money, and maybe being upset about being a lame duck QB, he went the wrong way with his preparation and conditioning and this serves as new motivation.
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That's pretty much what I've been saying. I don't think the Bucs had a choice. Josh's performance on the field was horrendous.

It remains to be seen if part of his decline was due to Greg Schiano's and/or the front office's handling of him. If he plays like 2010 Josh or early season 2012 Josh in Minnesota it will be easier to pinpoint where the real problem really was.

The Bucs kept Schiano and ditched Josh, so it seems clear the organization thought the issue was with the quarterback.

 
I'd buy Freeman, esp in 2QB's leagues and dynasty leagues, if you can get him cheap. Think the change to a new coach is going to be what he needed.

 
I've seen everyone play devils advocate: Freeman has sucked and will barely be better than ponder/cassel. I've seen people say everyone in the offense will get bumped and kyle rudolph and jennings will get a nice boost but no one has talk about the pieces coming together. Let's say the change of scenery helps him, ADP, keeps them honest and he cleans up his act. What happens if we see albeit slight regress 2010 Freeman? he has done it before. What happens to Jennings than?

TM;DR If we get the 2010 Freeman what happens to Jennings? WR2 with upside?

 
Freeman to shine? Not sure ANY QB can shine in two weeks time with a team... Especially a head case like Freeman. Schiano being a d-bag does not make Freeman better, just makes TB Brass morons.

Freeman needs to get his head in order for ANY kind of success. He is a mediocre upgrade over an already putrid qb roster.

 
This is painful to watch

Playing Freeman was a terrible decision tonight. I'm surprised he didn't get someone injured.

 
Freeman would have had an awesome game if his receivers were 13 feet tall??? Lets give him the benefit of the doubt...

 
That game was almost historically bad. He has the third worst Y/A of any QB with 53+ attempts. He's tied for third lowest completion percentage on 53+ attempts. It's only the fifth time in NFL history that a QB has had 53+ attempts, a sub-50% completion percentage and no TDs.

 
In all fairness, why didn't they run more screen passes to slow down the rush? I mean he was just getting nailed back there. I realize they stacked the box, but geez...

 
Gawain said:
That game was almost historically bad. He has the third worst Y/A of any QB with 53+ attempts. He's tied for third lowest completion percentage on 53+ attempts. It's only the fifth time in NFL history that a QB has had 53+ attempts, a sub-50% completion percentage and no TDs.
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Yeah, but on the bright side it can only get better from here. :unsure:

 
Simply awesome tweet:

Kevin Manahan@KevinCManahan

The U.S. wants to send Josh Freeman to Syria -- where he can overthrow an entire government

 
Must be that damn playbook why all those throws were 10 feet too high. Stage 1 of the NFL drug program must not be that stringent.

I got to imagine some heads are eventually gonna roll in that organization because of Freeman (and this performance). Would be interesting to know what's going through the minds of Cassel and Ponder right now. I bet we'll soon hear one of them privately/publicly demanding for trade/release.

I wouldn't want to be Leslie Frazier right now.

 
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Sandeman said:
One of the worst QB performances I've ever seen. He's garbage.
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I'm not his biggest fan, but calling him "garbage" simply isn't accurate. In just over four years in Tampa, his TD/INT ratio was 80/66 on a team which was eleven games under .500 during that span. Hell, a 173/220 TD/INT ratio got Joe Namath into the Hall of Fame.

Put this one on Frazier and the rest of the coaching staff. He clearly wasn't prepared to play. Let's see how he looks 3 games from now... 6 games from now, and next year after having a full offseason to digest the offense.

 
Raider Nation said:
Sandeman said:
One of the worst QB performances I've ever seen. He's garbage.
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I'm not his biggest fan, but calling him "garbage" simply isn't accurate. In just over four years in Tampa, his TD/INT ratio was 80/66 on a team which was eleven games under .500 during that span. Hell, a 173/220 TD/INT ratio got Joe Namath into the Hall of Fame.

Put this one on Frazier and the rest of the coaching staff. He clearly wasn't prepared to play. Let's see how he looks 3 games from now... 6 games from now, and next year after having a full offseason to digest the offense.
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I hope for the Vikings sake that they draft/sign another decent/quality QB in to at least compete with him, if not start over him.

 
He's garbage. Inaccurate, cant read defenses and can't throw a timing route.

Tonight's performance doesn't change what I've seen and said about him his whole career. :shrug: The only folks that think he'll be a decent/good long term NFL starting QB were/are the ones that read the box scores.

He can perhaps have a career as a backup QB. :shrug: Not the worst gig in the world.

 
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Raider Nation said:
Sandeman said:
One of the worst QB performances I've ever seen. He's garbage.
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I'm not his biggest fan, but calling him "garbage" simply isn't accurate. In just over four years in Tampa, his TD/INT ratio was 80/66 on a team which was eleven games under .500 during that span. Hell, a 173/220 TD/INT ratio got Joe Namath into the Hall of Fame.

Put this one on Frazier and the rest of the coaching staff. He clearly wasn't prepared to play. Let's see how he looks 3 games from now... 6 games from now, and next year after having a full offseason to digest the offense.
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Based on his play tonight, and earlier this year, he is garbage. Might have had a decent few years, but he never had the "it" factor and he's lost his confidence completely. He's a project now and in today's NFL, there's not a lot of patience for projects.

 
Accuracy issues can be fixed, unless your name is Tebow. This kid is a physical specimen with a ton of talent. Just saying it's silly to write him off at this juncture, that's all.

:shrug:

 
Raider Nation said:
Accuracy issues can be fixed, unless your name is Tebow. This kid is a physical specimen with a ton of talent. Just saying it's silly to write him off at this juncture, that's all.

:shrug:
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I won't write him off as an NFL QB. Physically gifted guys like Jason Campbell and Leftwich have/had long NFL backup QB careers.

He has no future as a NFL franchise QB. His issues go well beyond simply accuracy.

 
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Raider Nation said:
Accuracy issues can be fixed, unless your name is Tebow. This kid is a physical specimen with a ton of talent. Just saying it's silly to write him off at this juncture, that's all.

:shrug:
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Case Keenum played better than Freeman. Of course it's only one game, but jeebus. Freeman has had plenty of NFL starts to not play this horrid. It's not like playing QB in a new offense in two weeks was like having to write War and Peace with Dvorak. This is his 5th year in the league. He's just not good.

 
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drummer said:
Raider Nation said:
Accuracy issues can be fixed, unless your name is Tebow. This kid is a physical specimen with a ton of talent. Just saying it's silly to write him off at this juncture, that's all.

:shrug:
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Case Keenum played better than Freeman. Of course it's only one game, but jeebus. Freeman has had plenty of NFL starts to not play this horrid. It's not like playing QB in a new offense in two weeks was like having to write War and Peace with Dvorak. This is his 5th year in the league. He's just not good.
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Keenum has been practicing in Houston's offense for two years. Hardly a valid comparison.

 
Raider Nation said:
drummer said:
Raider Nation said:
Accuracy issues can be fixed, unless your name is Tebow. This kid is a physical specimen with a ton of talent. Just saying it's silly to write him off at this juncture, that's all.

:shrug:
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Case Keenum played better than Freeman. Of course it's only one game, but jeebus. Freeman has had plenty of NFL starts to not play this horrid. It's not like playing QB in a new offense in two weeks was like having to write War and Peace with Dvorak. This is his 5th year in the league. He's just not good.
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Keenum has been practicing in Houston's offense for two years. Hardly a valid comparison.
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And still played better in one start than Freeman, who by now should be able to at least function with a new offense, being that he has 59 or so career game starts.

Playing QB should be a lot easier for Freeman than Keenum. It wasn't that Freeman didn't play well. Freeman was horrific, like historically horrific. I've seen UDFA scrubs just signed off the street and thrown into games against a equally bad team play better than Freeman.

 
The dream for the Minnesota Vikings went something like this: Josh Freeman steps in as the starting quarterback on a Monday night in New York, dazzles after freeing himself from a toxic situation in Tampa Bay, and the Vikings’ entire season clicks back on track.The reality was far more pitiful.

Minnesota’s call to rush Freeman onto the field backfired in spectacular fashion, aided by an absolutely mind-numbing display of playcalling, in a 23-7 loss to the Giants. Freeman, who signed just two weeks ago and was named the starter only a few days later, finished 20-of-53 — a 37.7 completion percentage that was the worst showing by an NFL quarterback with more than 40 attempts since Eli Manning, Monday’s victorious quarterback, posted a 36.6 mark in 2007.

“I definitely need time,” Freeman said in his postgame press conference. “You come in with goals and expectations … it’s frustrating, it’s disappointing, but at the same time, I see a lot of areas that are manageable and we can definitely get better at.”

“His performance was up and down,” said Vikings coach Leslie Frazier, painting an even rosier picture than he really needed to. “His numbers aren’t the greatest, for sure.”

Freeman was awful. And he never had a chance to succeed in this game, despite matching up with the league’s 32nd-ranked defense.

When Freeman opted to sign with the Vikings, he justified that choice by saying that Minnesota gave him “an opportunity to pump the brakes” after his fall in Tampa Bay. “It’s been a crazy couple of weeks,” he added.

Surely, Freeman, three years removed from a breakthrough 2010 season, wanted to find a place he could battle for the starting job. Even he may not have expected it to happen so quickly, and the argument for patience in hindsight was on full display Monday.

Freeman consistently overshot his receivers — that is, when he was not being blasted by the Giants’ pass rush. Minnesota still asked him to throw more than 50 times, compared to just 13 rushes for Adrian Peterson. The Vikings’ inability to spring Peterson (who finished with 28 yards) and a second-half deficit forced their hand a bit, but if there ever was a game to ease a quarterback in and let him play it safe, this was it.

Instead, the Vikings continued their string of desperate moves: Signing Freeman, starting Freeman, then asking him to win them a game on the road. There was no logic behind at least the final two decisions, and Minnesota paid for them in the Meadowlands.

“They had a lot of people at the line of scrimmage and made it hard for us to get our run game going to take some of the pressure off the quarterback position,” Frazier said. “We put together a good plan we thought would help him be successful in this ballgame, and it didn’t work out.”

For all the early frustrations, the Vikings still trailed by just three at halftime. Freeman nearly coughed up a pick-six to end their first possession of the third quarter. After the Giants fumbled the ensuing punt, he did throw an interception and followed it up moments later by nearly depositing another one into a defender’s arms.

Add in a couple of special-teams miscues — a fumble by Marcus Sherels inside the Minnesota 5-yard-line, another by defensive tackle (yes, defensive tackle) Sharrif Floyd on a kickoff return — and the Vikings were a lost cause. Special teams actually accounted for their lone score of the night, too, with Sherels taking a punt back for an 86-yard score in the first half.

Which of course means that the Freeman-led offense generated nothing on the scoreboard itself. Freeman’s interception killed Minnesota’s best chance, on a drive inside the Giants’ 25-yard-line, and it was perhaps his most inexplicable moment in a nightmarish outing. With pressure coming up the middle, Freeman tried to muscle one downfield to Kyle Rudolph. Instead, Antrel Rolle tipped the ball away and picked it off.

“As time moves on, we’re going to develop that chemistry,” Freeman said of his relationship with his new receivers. “A lot of those plays that were just a hair off are going to start hitting for us.”

Minnesota really has no choice now but to stay the course with Freeman, at least for a bit. In signing him and handing him the reins to the offense, the Vikings made quite clear how they feel about Christian Ponder and Matt Cassel. Plus, let’s be honest: This Vikings team simply is not very good. Neither Freeman nor Ponder nor Cassel nor Joe Webb nor Brett Favre was going to change that Monday. Freeman is capable of much more than he showed against the Giants, even if Minnesota ultimately has dug itself too deep a hole

Down the road, after Freeman has time to settle in as a Viking, learn the playbook and grow some rapport with his receivers, there might be a future with this marriage. At the very least, Freeman brings more to the table than the underachieving Ponder or aging Cassel.

Monday night, though, he and his new team were doomed to failure. Minnesota could not have anticipated its Week 7 flying off the rails so aggressively. But Freeman was not put in a position to succeed, either. The eventual result, then, was rather predictable: A Freeman flop, another Vikings loss and plenty of questions about what’s to come.
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Deep in the back of my mind I thought there might be a chance that Freeman was just sandbagging the Bucs so he could leave. Now, I'm buying the rumors that he is just not the same dude. Something happened off the field that has messed his head up.

 
Raider Nation said:
drummer said:
I've seen UDFA scrubs just signed off the street and thrown into games against a equally bad team play better than Freeman.
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Who would some of those guys be?
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Shaun Hill was one of them. Guy hardly took an NFL snap before he was a 3rd string QB in playing in a horrid offense, and won his first start after Trent Dilfer went down.

The next season, even though Mike Martz tried hard to keep him away from the offense, he took over for JTO, and won games running a Mike Martz offense.

 
that article is wrong. what does Freeman bring to the table that Cassel or Ponder don't? Freeman was on pace to have a historically bad season in Tampa and everything tonight looked even worse: the accuracy obviously, the decision making and the whining. incredibly bad. the only reason I can see Vikings to keep playing him is if they are punting the season, planning on cutting Freeman after the season and think he will help them get a higher draft pick. I mean, Ponder took them to the playoffs and Cassel was decent in his 2 games so I find it bewildering to think that writer thinks Freeman actually helps the Vikings more right now.

 
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