Sam Bradford - A Tale of Two Halves

How bad is Sam Bradford in the first half of games this season? And how much better is he in the 2nd half?

My friend delves into Bradford's 2015 splits (courtesy of Pro Football Reference):

Everything is dramatically different in the 2nd half, when he is good, or slightly above average, not great, but ridiculously better than in the 1st half, when he is the worst QB in all of football.

Scroll down quite far and you'll see his 1st/2nd half splits. The most important stats:

1st half completion % - 55.4        2nd half completion % -- 69.9

1st half yards per attempt - 5.2    2nd hafl yards per attempt - 8.1

1st half TD passes -- 3                2nd half TD passes -- 6

1st half INTs -- 5                         2nd half INTs -- 5

1st half QB rating -- 62.9             2nd half QB rating -- 93.4

Look deeper at those stats, and it's really troubling. He's a horrific QB in the red zone -- 40.6% completion percentage, a QB rating of 49, 3 INTs, and worst of all, his yards per pass attempt: 1 yard.

He's also a horrific QB on 3rd down, with an overall rating of 54.0 on 3rd downs, but look deeper, and it doesn't even matter the distance -- 3rd and short, 3rd and long, he stinks.

So, this is the issue, the guy simply cannot perform in the 1st half of these games. He's wretched, beyond bad, horrible, downright putrid.

But in the 2nd half, he becomes a pretty decent QB. Why the hell is that? Why isn't anyone talking about this? Why can't Chip address this issue? Even when they had a bye week, Bradford came out and pitched a disastrous first half against Dallas, in a game when the O-line actually gave him time to throw the entire game.

Headers

Big move by youth soccer to eliminate headers for kids under 10. The ban should probably apply to kids older than 10- to like 12 or 13, but at least it's a start. And an admission by a youth sports league that the play and rules for young kids can and should be different than adolescents and adults.

Next Four Games

A friend writes about the Eagles' November schedule:

Dallas (2-5), Miami (3-4), Tampa (3-4), Detroit (1-7) -- those are the next 4 opponents.

In the previous 2 seasons, I'd expect us to go 4-0 over that stretch. I'll settle for 3-1, which would get us to 6-5 heading into Foxboro. Which leaves us 6-6 afterward, and needing to go 3-1 in the final 4 games after that to win the division.

But, this is a big but, if we go 2-2 over this next stretch of games, leaving us 5-6 heading into Foxboro, the season's probably over.

If in a parallel universe we actually win all 4 of those games, 7-4 heading into Foxboro, we should be in really good shape, as the Giants, now 4-4, play their next 3 on the road, including one in Foxboro.

I would add that we really need the Cowboys game to be one of the wins.  To bury them at 2-6 rather than tied with us at 3-5 (and they get the tiebreaker).  When they get Romo back they will be good again.

We have lost our opportunity to "blow" a game.   We have done that 2-3 times already this year (Washington, ugh.) already.  You just can't do it too many times in a season.  With parity you can lose a few you should win. We have hit our limit.

You need to get to 9-7 at minimum and 10-6 probably avoids tiebreaker.  We are 3-4.   7-2 is a stretch considering at Foxborough and the aforementioned parity.  So if you are going to go 6-3 (which .667 football) then you can't lose tiebreaker and this need cowboys game.    That said - if we lose then we must have Cowboys fall big time so only tiebreaker is Giants and we beat them to end season.

Cheers

Eagles fans the third drunkest in the NFL, new study finds.