Chad Pennington/Dolphin Play Calling Rant

The addition of Pennington brings stability to the most important position on the football team and it also gives them a veteran presence and leadership. As well as a good mentor for Henne and Beck. But it also works directly against the strength of this football team. The strength, of course is running the ball. Having a very accurate yet, weak armed, QB does little in the way of keeping the defense honest the way a canon armed erratic QB would. Even when the opposing D has to respect Pennington's abilities they can still sneak closer to the line of scrimmage and play without the risk of getting beat deep and bottle up the run. Even if he is "on" it will not open space for Ricky and Ronnie to run wild. It was evident that Jets D was stacking the run daring Pennington to beat them. Then when he was off early it seems the idea of a power running game was foresaken in favror of trying to get Pennington going. This is a very bad idea because even when Pennington is in his "groove" it will not alleviate any of the difficulties of running the ball on Sunday in a real NFL game. The only shot they have is to run, run, run, run, run, despite the results, and then sneak in a play action pass or 2 at an opportune time. Like on a 1st and 10 or a 3rd and 2. Passing to open up the run, as was what the Fins did from the end of the 1st quarter on, will only work if you have a rocket armed Tom Brady or Peyton Manning under center, with quality WR's who can read a D and get open. Otherwise you have to run, early and often, to open up some throwing lanes and to purposely draw the Def in even closer then they already are. Chad Penningtons as the Dolphins QB will pay dividends in the locker room and on the practice field but will actually work adversely in their favor on Sundays. They should be running the ball over and over, early and often not caring if at the half they have 22 attempts for 33 yards. In the long run that type of committment to the run will pay off.