Chargers sign Roscoe Parrish

[JPS]

Okay, but it's hard to turn a 7 yard pass into anything when the defense KNOWS you aren't going to throw the ball more 10 yards past the line of scrimmage. Everyone could see that defenses were sitting on the short routes.

Very true. God those teams stunk.

[Albillny]

I'll miss him, he was fun to watch. Good luck Roscoe.

[San Jose Bills Fan]

I don't know, is it just me but this AJ Smith is really starting to get under my skin. I'm starting to think that he's paying attention to what we're doing and he's sabotaging Buddy to some small degree. I guess that he still can't get over that whole Ralph/Butler thing. Piss on him.

 

With that being said, my most vivid memory of Roscoe is on that MNF game when I pulled Moulds in favor of Parrish on my fantasy team and promptly got my ass stomped. Moulds went off and Parrish disappeared. Ah, just another fine decision making on my part with my Buffalo roster. Now that I think about it the past remnants of administrations of yesteryear have been nothing but albatrosses. I say purge 'em all!

You're definitely onto something.

 

First of all, Buddy left on bad terms… as do many people when it comes to AJ Smith.

 

Then the Merriman thing happened.

 

Then the Meachem derby.

 

Now Roscoe.

 

I agree that there's some competitive antagonism going on here.

 

 

[Mr. WEO]

He's the 3rd best PR in modern NFL history behind only Devin Hester and Rick Upchurch.

 

http://www.pro-football-reference.com/leaders/punt_ret_yds_per_ret_career.htm

 

 

That's great, but the yards per return isn't much of a metric then. Look at what constitutes the "3rd best PR career in modern times" consists of:

 

In '07, his best year returning punts, he returned 27 (16th in the league) for 16.3 per. He had only 2 fair catches.

 

In '08, he returned only 21 (19th in the NFL) for 15.3 per, and was up to 10 fair catches.

 

In '09, he had only 24 returns for an laughable 5.5 yards per and a whopping 13 fair catches.

 

 

He's 10th in PRs amongst active players, 97th overall.

 

He's 6th amongst active players in total PR yards, 51st overall.

 

To me, all of this reveals a guy who had 2 good years as a PR, but his yards per return were clearly protected by the fact that he returned relatively few punts (The top returners were routinely running back twice as many as Roscoe those years).

 

Also, it is very clear that after '08, Roscoe had lost all interest in being a punt returner. '09 shows a guy who obviously quit on special teams. He clearly fancied himself more of a receiver than return man.

[Wayne Cubed]

That's great, but the yards per return isn't much of a metric then. Look at what constitutes the "3rd best PR career in modern times" consists of:

 

In '07, his best year returning punts, he returned 27 (16th in the league) for 16.3 per. He had only 2 fair catches.

 

In '08, he returned only 21 (19th in the NFL) for 15.3 per, and was up to 10 fair catches.

 

In '09, he had only 24 returns for an laughable 5.5 yards per and a whopping 13 fair catches.

 

 

He's 10th in PRs amongst active players, 97th overall.

 

He's 6th amongst active players in total PR yards, 51st overall.

 

To me, all of this reveals a guy who had 2 good years as a PR, but his yards per return were clearly protected by the fact that he returned relatively few punts (The top returners were routinely running back twice as many as Roscoe those years).

 

Also, it is very clear that after '08, Roscoe had lost all interest in being a punt returner. '09 shows a guy who obviously quit on special teams. He clearly fancied himself more of a receiver than return man.

 

This is a great point.

 

And again this is why certain stats don't tell the entire story.

[bigc14120]

Back when Mullarky drafted him, duribility was the concern, and that turned out to be true!!!Roscoe had skills, but could not stay on the field season after season.

[Bufcomments]

Trentative wouldn't even throw the ball. I'm not trying to paint Parrish as a star or anything, but those guys really sucked, and it's hard to judge a receiver when the QB is so bad.

 

As an aside...

People lose their mind, but I consider Rice to be slightly overrated, because he had 2 consecutive Hall of Famer's throwing him the ball. Some will say "he put THEM in the HoF", but they made all their receivers look good.

on your second point about Jerry rice....

 

I would argue that Montana and Young owe their careers to Rice, but its takes two to tangle right?

[Geno Smith's Arm]

on your second point about Jerry rice....

 

I would argue that Montana and Young owe their careers to Rice, but its takes two to tangle right?

 

I already mentioned a response to that in my post. They used all their receivers very well...

[Deadstroke]

Farewell little guy

 

@ProFootballTalk: Chargers agree to terms with free-agent WR/KR Roscoe Parrish on a one-year deal, per league source.

 

I liked him from day 1...it was a poor usage issue and then lately health problems. Too bad. I wish him the best!

[KD in CA]

 

I understand not liking him as a player, but playing most of his active career with Lossman and Trentative, had a big impact on his stats.

 

Yet Lee Evans and Josh Reed managed to catch 2-3 times as many balls in those years with the same team.

 

I never understood the Parrish lovefest here for a guy who did nothing but return punts for a few years. And Mr. WEO is spot on about how overrated people here have ranked him as a punt returner, and how little real impact that has on a game.

[Kelly the Dog]

That's great, but the yards per return isn't much of a metric then. Look at what constitutes the "3rd best PR career in modern times" consists of:

 

In '07, his best year returning punts, he returned 27 (16th in the league) for 16.3 per. He had only 2 fair catches.

 

In '08, he returned only 21 (19th in the NFL) for 15.3 per, and was up to 10 fair catches.

 

In '09, he had only 24 returns for an laughable 5.5 yards per and a whopping 13 fair catches.

 

 

He's 10th in PRs amongst active players, 97th overall.

 

He's 6th amongst active players in total PR yards, 51st overall.

 

To me, all of this reveals a guy who had 2 good years as a PR, but his yards per return were clearly protected by the fact that he returned relatively few punts (The top returners were routinely running back twice as many as Roscoe those years).

 

Also, it is very clear that after '08, Roscoe had lost all interest in being a punt returner. '09 shows a guy who obviously quit on special teams. He clearly fancied himself more of a receiver than return man.

He averaged 12 yards per return for his career. That's a ridiculous number. It's not his fault that the team could not force punts from the opposition, and he played on a team with a better defense there is no reason whatsoever to believe he wouldnt have the same stats with twice as many returns. In fact, the relatively low number of TDs in his career, 3, in 135 returns, makes the average even more impressive because they were not skewed with huge numbers on a relatively few returns.

[Peter]

Um, let's see . . . which of the three is presently a member of a team . . . .

Yet Lee Evans and Josh Reed managed to catch 2-3 times as many balls in those years with the same team.

 

I never understood the Parrish lovefest here for a guy who did nothing but return punts for a few years. And Mr. WEO is spot on about how overrated people here have ranked him as a punt returner, and how little real impact that has on a game.

Edited April 5, 2012 by Peter

[Mr. WEO]

He averaged 12 yards per return for his career. That's a ridiculous number. It's not his fault that the team could not force punts from the opposition, and he played on a team with a better defense there is no reason whatsoever to believe he wouldnt have the same stats with twice as many returns. In fact, the relatively low number of TDs in his career, 3, in 135 returns, makes the average even more impressive because they were not skewed with huge numbers on a relatively few returns.

 

 

The bolded part is obviously untrue. After his "best" 2 years, he had more returns than '08 and had dropped like a stone to 5.5 yards per return. 5.5!! THAT is a ridiculous number. That is a perfectly clear picture of a guy who quit as a PR. He lost interest. Concluding his numbers would have been the same if he had twice the returns has no basis in fact.

 

And 12 yards per carry is with 3 feet (one step) of 6 other active punt returners. Big deal.

[Kelly the Dog]

The bolded part is obviously untrue. After his "best" 2 years, he had more returns than '08 and had dropped like a stone to 5.5 yards per return. 5.5!! THAT is a ridiculous number. That is a perfectly clear picture of a guy who quit as a PR. He lost interest. Concluding his numbers would have been the same if he had twice the returns has no basis in fact.

 

And 12 yards per carry is with 3 feet (one step) of 6 other active punt returners. Big deal.

So in your twisted world he only gets the extra number of returns in his one bad year and not his five good ones? Got it. Nice argument.

 

The point obviously is you said he didnt have a lot of returns. It's a stupid argument when he had enough returns to qualify for the NFL league leaders for all the years he played the whole year and the two he didnt, he was injured in or he would have qualified. The reason he didnt have a lot is because teams didnt punt against us a lot during all of his years compared to other teams, and they started to punt short and high so he didnt get a chance to return them after he burnt a lot of teams.

 

3rd best all time isn't all that good.

[Best Player Available]

The bolded part is obviously untrue. After his "best" 2 years, he had more returns than '08 and had dropped like a stone to 5.5 yards per return. 5.5!! THAT is a ridiculous number. That is a perfectly clear picture of a guy who quit as a PR. He lost interest. Concluding his numbers would have been the same if he had twice the returns has no basis in fact.

 

And 12 yards per carry is with 3 feet (one step) of 6 other active punt returners. Big deal.

He "quit"? You seem to have a lot of inside info. Source? Or is it a over active imagination that a punt returner is the only player on the field when a team punts to him?

[Mr. WEO]

So in your twisted world he only gets the extra number of returns in his one bad year and not his five good ones? Got it. Nice argument.

 

The point obviously is you said he didnt have a lot of returns. It's a stupid argument when he had enough returns to qualify for the NFL league leaders for all the years he played the whole year and the two he didnt, he was injured in or he would have qualified. The reason he didnt have a lot is because teams didnt punt against us a lot during all of his years compared to other teams, and they started to punt short and high so he didnt get a chance to return them after he burnt a lot of teams.

 

3rd best all time isn't all that good.

 

He had two very good years, one good year. '10 and '11 were a total of 10 games--a wash. '05 he had 14 returns all year.

 

You claimed that he would have had the same yardage no matter how many more carries had, yet in '09 he had a similar number of carries as in his record years of '07 and '08--yet he could only muster 5.5 yards per carry--from 15? And now you blame it on more clever punting? Did "they" not decide to "punt short and high" the Hester? Jackson? Why not?--they burned more STs than Roscoe ever did for big returns.

 

He "quit"? You seem to have a lot of inside info. Source? Or is it a over active imagination that a punt returner is the only player on the field when a team punts to him?

 

It's not a secret. A guy goes from the "best in history" instantly to a guy how averages 5 steps after the catch and triples his FC's. Unless you also believe the teams targeted only Roscoe with their new punting technique (which would require an over ctive imagination), there is only one conclusion to draw.

[Kelly the Dog]

Did "they" not decide to "punt short and high" the Hester? Jackson? Why not?--they burned more STs than Roscoe ever did for big returns.

 

Of course they did for Hester and for Roscoe. And it shows clearly, with one aberration in Hester's career. Hester had two straight years of being a huge threat, then three of the next four years his FC's skyrocketed. Roscoe had two straight years of being a huge threat. And then his percentage of FC's skyrocketed. I don't even know who you mean by "Jackson". If it's Desean Jackson then yes, him, too. Last year he had 17 returns and 12 FC. If you don't remember teams kicking it high and short or toward the sidelines for Roscoe you weren't watching the Bills games closely.

[Best Player Available]

He had two very good years, one good year. '10 and '11 were a total of 10 games--a wash. '05 he had 14 returns all year.

 

You claimed that he would have had the same yardage no matter how many more carries had, yet in '09 he had a similar number of carries as in his record years of '07 and '08--yet he could only muster 5.5 yards per carry--from 15? And now you blame it on more clever punting? Did "they" not decide to "punt short and high" the Hester? Jackson? Why not?--they burned more STs than Roscoe ever did for big returns.

 

 

 

It's not a secret. A guy goes from the "best in history" instantly to a guy how averages 5 steps after the catch and triples his FC's. Unless you also believe the teams targeted only Roscoe with their new punting technique (which would require an over ctive imagination), there is only one conclusion to draw.

I would need to see special teams play, the year that Roscoe quit. But if a remember correctly it was way less than stellar team play, it was in fact pretty bad. By your logic Brad Smith one of our supposed good kickoff returners should have been taken behind the field house and shot after week 16 and before he cleaned out his locker last year. Did he ever once come out of the endzone? I digress, but Actually I would have zero problem with trading Smith.

[Mr. WEO]

Of course they did for Hester and for Roscoe. And it shows clearly, with one aberration in Hester's career. Hester had two straight years of being a huge threat, then three of the next four years his FC's skyrocketed. Roscoe had two straight years of being a huge threat. And then his percentage of FC's skyrocketed. I don't even know who you mean by "Jackson". If it's Desean Jackson then yes, him, too. Last year he had 17 returns and 12 FC. If you don't remember teams kicking it high and short or toward the sidelines for Roscoe you weren't watching the Bills games closely.

 

If they did it for Hester, it didn't work nearly as well as it seems to have worked against Roscoe. In '10, Hester had 33 returns for anwhopping 17.1 per--and 9 returs for over 20 yards, 5 for over 40 and 3 for TDs. In '11, he had 28 returns (yes, 15 FCs), and 16.2 per, 9 for over 20. So for the "three of the next four years his FC's skyrocketed" (actually, they were no different than they were in '06 and '08)--so did his yards per return, and big return numbers. How do you explain that with your better punting theory?

 

Desean Jackson also lost interest as a PR guy--especially when his contract renewal talks were in the balance. But he was actually being used as a WR by his OC.

 

 

 

 

I would need to see special teams play, the year that Roscoe quit. But if a remember correctly it was way less than stellar team play, it was in fact pretty bad. By your logic Brad Smith one of our supposed good kickoff returners should have been taken behind the field house and shot after week 16 and before he cleaned out his locker last year. Did he ever once come out of the endzone? I digress, but Actually I would have zero problem with trading Smith.

 

Well, if we were discussing kickoff returns, or if punt returning had some major rule change that affected ALL punt returners, I might agree with you. But I will say that Brad Smith, who has only really been valuable as a kick returner so far in the league, needs to be told by someone (Chan maybe?) that he needs to run the ball out of the endzone after a kickoff. Smith as a "wildcat" option, as has been shown on another thread, was a dud.