Grade Jason Campbell

[GTripp0012]

Speaking sabremetrically for a second:

I emailed the guy who created the QB projection system (which uses college stats; games started and comp. % to project relative NFL success). His system projected JC to have Palmer/Manning like production in his prime, and that obscenely high projection caused him to write an article titled Will Jason Campbell save the Redskins?

He mentions that his system also projected Campbell to be producing about "4 DPAR per game above replacement (replacement=average NFL backup, DPAR=points (scored minus costed) credited to an individual player adjusted for defenses he faced)" in his second season, or translated to conventional terms: a hair below the production Brunell gave us this season.

I don't have the final DPAR numbers from what amounted to be Campbell's best game as a pro Saturday, so it'd be unfair to judge his season without his best game, but I'm estimating that he will nearly double his season total. If he does, he will have averaged about 2.5 DPAR/G for the year, well below his projection.

What really impressed me was his running skills. All the scouting reports said he had mobility, something we had in Brunell. Campbell not only showed he had pocket presence and escape like that, but that once he encountered defenders, he is still a threat to go around or through them to get yardage. That was very impressive, and obviously an element of the position that Brunell didn't give us.

On the whole, I thought he'd get it a lot sooner, and one game is hardly enough to be certain that he did get it. But on the same side of the coin, he only had 7 starts, so it's tough to see improvement with any certainty.

His Giants game gets a solid A, but the season on a whole gets a C+ from me. He didn't complete enough passes, which is all a QB can control when it boils down to it, until that last game to warrent higher than a C, but I moved him up to a C+ because of his mad running skillz and his intangibles.