This is a great article! And I have to agree with 99% of it, the only part that I disagree with is the Joey Harrington part. Let?s face it, Joey will always just be an average player, he doesn?t have what it takes to be a team leader. How many seasons has he played football? You would think by now that he would have already had that ?take charge? kind of attitude. We don?t need our quarter back tossing 5 yard passes, (my 10 year old can throw those kind of passes) he needs to gain some enter strength and throw that ball! I am tried to stay optimistic about his skills but, its has become to difficult. My project is that Jeff Garcia, will finish out the 2005-2006 season.

nice article - agreed. the whole joey part is very debatable depending on what side of the fence you are standing on.

for the sake of arguements, the same could have been said about drew brees last season and a number of other quarterbacks who developed after their first few seasons in the league.

you could be right about garcia though and at least the lions now have that option.

I agree, this was a well written, well thought out article. But I have to say that I am tired of hearing fans blame Joey for the short passes. It would be like blaming Kevin Jones for always running between the tackles (if that were the case). ally, Joey is a signal caller, not a play caller. If he is required to do something during a play and does it, whose fault is it if things don't work to our advantage? For instance, if the play is called on third and ten, and three of our receivers run 5-8 yard patterns and only one runs past ten yards, but is double covered, who should Joey throw to? If he throws to one of the receivers running the short patterns and that receiver fails to get the first down, who can we blame? Joey? He did what he was supposed to. The receiver? Could be because he should know to extend the pattern beyond the sticks. Hey.....here's an idea......how about blaming the ultra-conservative offensive coach? Namely Mariucci. If the Lions don't have plays in the offensive play book that have more than one receiver running a deep pattern, then that's what needs to get fixed, not the quarterback position.

And if you think Joey hasn't got the arm to throw deep, I hope you aren't thinking Garcia does. Jeffs arm is NOT....I repeat, NOT capable of throwing a ball with any zip on it more than 30 yards away from him. Not 30 yards downfield, 30 yards away from his current position on the field. Harrington has a much stronger arm, but hasn't had as much opportunity to showcase it.

Now, Joey's leadership skills are another story. I fully agree with you on this one. He needs to chew bubble gum and kick rectum.......and he's all out of bubble gum!

Excellent article, keep up the good work.