Originally posted by HessianDud:
Originally posted by 76Razor:
haven't read through all the posts. but has anyone mentioned the one thing Alex did yesterday that does not show up on stats? KEEPING HIS TEAM POISED WHEN ON THE FIELD! Last year (and beyond), if we were to start off a game as bad as we did, this team would have been blown out. Alex kept his poise, got his team to calm down and settle in. He took what the defense gave him and correctly audible into plays that took advantage of the lion's d. No stat will ever show that, but if you watched the game, you can see that he had full command of that offense and the players in that huddle.
boom! headshot.
the QB position is about a lot more than numbers. Does Alex need to improve? Absolutely. But he's doing a lot of other things that a QB needs to do in order to help his team win, but they don't show those things on ESPN so a lot of fans don't know what to think about them.
I'm going to eat crow again here. Plenty of it to go around today.
People -- I've been the biggest Alex critic in the house. You know me (well, you used to know me as billbird2111 before I made a stupid bet with Rubberneck). But I never thought Alex would be any good. I turned against him YEARS ago.
Alex had some "Alex moments" in yesterday's game. The sack and fumble? Lack of pocket awareness? High passes -- including one that got picked? The old Alex was on full display yesterday against the Lions.
Except for one eensy, teensy thing: Games like that, in the past, would have destroyed Alex Smith. It would have destroyed his confidence from the get-go. One mistake would multiply into a highlight reel of one blunder after another. You know this to be true. We've all seen it happen before. We've seen Alex play some horrific games.
Not anymore. Not this season. Something is different with the kid -- and I'm going to put this all on Harbaugh. Quite simply? It doesn't matter if he makes a mistake. The defense picks him up. If he throws a pass destined for pickoff -- the receiver breaks it up. We've seen this time and time again this season. And Alex Smith bounces right off the field and gets right back at that line of scrimmage and keeps chuckin.
I haven't seen this out of him before. Nobody has. One killer of a mistake isn't translating into a highlight reel of blunders. It's one mistake. That's all it is. It doesn't mean we're in for a horrific afternoon of Alex Smith football. Alex moves on. And that's the big change. He couldn't "move on" before. Now he is.
Dammit! Alex Smith is pretty darn good, ladies. It's about time we backed our man the way Harbaugh is. I'm man enough to stand up and say I was flat wrong about Alex Smith.
I hope others can do the same -- because this kid is going to lead us into the playoffs -- guaranteed.
And I thought I'd never see that day.