Thursday, September 17, 2015

What Lambert is/will be depends on what you focus upon

Clearly, the worst of Greyson Lambert last Saturday against Vanderbilt was bad. He threw some of the sorriest passes I've seen in a major college football game (that were not interceptions, at least).

We know about the 0-fer he put up in the first half, so there's no point rehashing that as the Dawgs finish prepping for South Carolina the day after tomorrow.

The food I do want to feed you for thought is, what about the best you've seen from Lambert thus far? Does the apogee of a player count less than his lowest point? Granted, we haven't really seen any down field passing as of yet, but we have seen some precision passing. While we've seen some happy feet lead to some proverbial worm-burners, we've also seen Lambert stand tall in the pocket, deliver a strike with some zip on it, and take the hit (see: Lambert to Blazevich last Saturday).

I'll give you an example of what I'm talking about with regard to true on-field potential. By that, I'm not talking about the big body and big arm potential of someone like Jamarcus Russell or Ryan Leaf.

If you take Matt Ryan (now far from a 'young' QB in the league) and compare him to a true elite QB (Brady, Manning, or Rodgers probably comes to mind, but whoever you like), you'll find that Ryan generally stacks up pretty well for about 80% of a football game. The thing that has kept him from being mentioned in the same breath as those guys (aside from a Super Bowl win, of course) is that he seems to just disappear or have a WTF moment for about 3 or 4 offensive series. Serieses? Series. So, we know Ryan is easily capable of being elite, but he just tends to mix too much trash in with the good stuff.

All that is to ask again, being that Lambert is young and new to this Georgia offense, will the well-thrown balls and smart decisions become the norm as the season progresses, or are the one-hoppers and tap dancing in the pocket going to be a constant part of his game. If it's the former, then Richt and Schottenheimer's faith is well-placed. If it's the latter, then they'll have no choice but to give Ramsey and/or Bauta a shot at the title.

Bottom line, though, is that the operative word is still "if." The sample size is far too small at this point to draw any conclusions, but I think this Saturday's prime time contest will go a long way toward leading us to a valid one.

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