JaMarcus is Officially Out of Touch

By MikeBullock  |   Tuesday, November 03, 2009  |  Comments( 9 )

Oakland Raiders
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Most of you should be familiar with Jerry MacDonald, a great guy who runs a blog for the Contra Costa Times covering the Raiders. A better source for up to date Raider information doesn’t exist.

Needless to say, frequent visits to Jerry Mac’s blog are essential to anyone writing about the Raiders who doesn’t live in the Oakland metro area. While checking it out yesterday, this jumped out:

“I did a pretty good job,” (JaMarcus) Russell told reporters. “When it all boils down to it, you had a chance at the end to try and win. Didn’t do too much damage with the interception. No matter what happened, I think we came out and fought despite the score and just kept pushing and just came out short in the end.”

Let me repeat that initial quote for the cheap seats: “I did a pretty good job.”

When?

When has JaMarcus ever done a “pretty good job” for the Raiders? Let’s examine this.

In his career to date, JaMarcus has 322 completions on 616 attempts for a 52.3 completion percentage averaging 22.8 attempts per game and 3796 total passing yards. His career average yards per game is an abysmal 140.6, worsened by the fact he was drafted as a big armed QB who could reignite the Raider’s vaunted vertical passing attack.

He’s tossed 17 touchdowns, while completing 21 passes to men in opposing jerseys. To add further insult to turnover injury, he has fumbled 22 times, losing 14 to those same pesky guys in the opposing jerseys.

So, in his short time span, JaMarcus himself is responsible for 35 turnovers. To paint that properly, there are entire teams that haven’t turned the ball over 35 times since Russell took his first snap.

Good job, JR.

While these stats are alarming, one could make the excuse that he’s young and still finding his way behind a porous offensive line, commanded by questionable play calling and confused blocking schemes.

But, this is the NFL, excuses are what losers make.

The real red flag, however, is Russell’s nonchalant attitude towards the whole thing. While no one can really determine what’s going on inside his head, from the outside it appears he leveraged a fluke NCAA bowl game into his one “paycheck of a lifetime” and now he’s just putting in his hours until his contract ends, so he can collect all the money and head off to run a chain of White Castles somewhere Louisiana.

Paul Hackett can teach this guy every trick in the book, but if Russell’s heart isn’t in it, his head never will be. Without mind and body, you cannot excel as an NFL QB. Based on ““I did a pretty good job,” it’s pretty obvious neither Russell’s head nor heart is committed to excellence.

Next time, we’ll take a look at what Raider fans deserve to see on the field, going back in time to examine QBs of the past.

Stay Tuned.
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CommentsComments: 9  |  Sign Up  View all comments
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No.1
neil b		11:39 AM
11/03/2009
He did a "pretty good job" of taking us to the cleaners. Question............Now that the Raiders are looking at all the stuff ...
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No.2
neil b		11:46 AM
11/03/2009
From Jerry Mac..... "Raiders issue two statements less than two hours apart, detailing their refusal to condone such actions and ...
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No.3
Raidehz		12:12 PM
11/03/2009
No funds ($0.00) has been gave to Al Davis or Amy Trask or the Oakland Raider organization from me for almost a decade. I take ...
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