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Photo
courtesy of bleacherreport.com
Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Andy Dalton is already being compared to
Joe Flacco.
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Could Andy Dalton's Future Look a Lot Like
Joe Flacco's Present
bleacherreport.com
When trying to come up with an ideal trajectory for the career of a
young quarterback, the best-case scenario is to see a bit of Tom Brady
or Peyton Manning in his future—a Super Bowl ring, maybe more than one;
a host of broken records in his name; a sure-fire first-ballot Hall of
Fame enshrinement; an unprecedentedly high payday. These are the stuff
of quarterback dreams, something everyone who plays the position at the
professional level someday hopes to achieve.
However, that's not the case for the vast majority of NFL passers. Take
the Cincinnati Bengals' Andy Dalton, for example. It doesn't look like
he's going to become the second coming of Manning, but that doesn't
really matter—not when Joe Flacco's present-day success seems to be in
his future.
"Flacco?" you ask, wondering why on earth that would be the career path
that Dalton would best follow. Well, it's simple: Because his first two
years in the league seem to almost completely match up with what Flacco
did in his first two seasons.
And, after all, in his fifth year in the league, Flacco help lead the
Baltimore Ravens to a Super Bowl win. Dalton wouldn't mind that, at all.
In Flacco's five years on the job, every season his Ravens have made it
to the playoffs. So far, in Dalton's two, the Bengals too have made it
to the playoffs. While they haven't yet won a postseason game—the
Ravens had five playoff wins in those first two years of the Flacco
era—there are a lot of reasons to think that Dalton will travel the
same path that Flacco forged, even if the scenery is a bit different
along the way.
Flacco's rookie year was 2008, when his primary receivers were Derrick
Mason and Mark Clayton and Todd Heap was tight end. That year, the
Ravens went 11-5, though Flacco's performance wasn't the biggest factor
in their success—that credit would mainly go to their defense. However,
Flacco didn't disappoint as a rookie.
He completed 257 of his 428 passes for a completion percentage of 60.
He had 2,971 yards, 14 passing touchdowns, 12 interceptions and took 32
sacks. He had one fourth-quarter comeback to his name and engineered
two game-winning drives.
Notably, though Flacco is considered one of the biggest-armed
quarterbacks in the league, his average yards per attempt were 6.9.
Flacco's second year showed the kind of improvement that's required of
any quarterback hoping to hold on to his job for longer than just a
season or two. His pass attempts increased to 499 and his completions
went up in turn, to 315. His completion percentage rose to 63.1, his
yards jumped dramatically to 3,613 and he threw 21 touchdowns—seven
more than in his rookie year—though his interceptions stayed the same
at 12.
His sack total increased by only four, to 36, while he had again just
one fourth-quarter comeback and two game-winning drives. His yards per
attempt went up slightly, at 7.2, with Mason again his primary target
and Heap his safety-valve tight end. This time around, however,
Clayton's numbers dipped with the team having drafted running back Ray
Rice; he added 702 receiving yards to his 1,339 rushing.
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