Calling Ron Mexico...

I've been waiting to do a sports themed blog entry for a while, so I figured I would start with the ever-controversial Michael Vick.

What makes Michael Vick a fascinating character?
-He's a news-maker
-He's controversial and polarizing
-He's the best running quarterback of all time
-He's a "coach-killa"
-He has the IQ of a zucchini
-He occasionally masquerades as Ron Mexico when he gets treatment for herpes

As a disclaimer I have to mention a few facts about my background, given that Vick attended Virginia Tech:

-Yes I'm a UVA graduate and fan
-Yes, I've never actually rooted for Virginia Tech in anything...ever, even when they are playing Maryland (unfortunately that match-up is not satisfying not matter who wins)

Do I take the UVA-Tech rivalry too seriously? I don't think so:

-I have many friends who go to Virginia Tech
-I've recently kept very quiet about the rivalry as we have gotten spanked in Football over about the last 5 years, and I am really worried that Tech may actually be better than us in basketball

So I think I can give a least a somewhat unbiased look at the issue:

Is he a good Quarterback?

I guess that depends on how you define good. I must say I don't think there is a definitive answer, but I'll look at three interesting statistics:

1) Quarterback Rating - Check out his official stat page on NFL.com, his career passer rating is 75.7. A great passer rating for a season is around 95, a good about 85, a 75 typically puts Michael Vick around 20-25th in the NFL. That means is typically worse than 2/3rds of NFL starting quarterbacks.

2) Wins and Losses - Michael Vick certainly fairs better in the wins/losses category than pure passer rating. During his tenor with the Falcons I think he is around 39-28-1, which is certainly a respectable winning percentage in the NFL. Although I wasn't able to get hard data on this, it certainly places him among the top 10 of active quarterbacks. The thing is, although I can't argue that QB is the most important position in football, I still don't think he deserves all the credit or blame for wins and losses. Great quarterbacks have lost on bad teams (Dan Fouts) and mediocre ones have won on good teams (Jim McMahon, Trent Dilfer). The thing I get annoyed with Vick apologists is they tend to give Vick all the credit for Falcons wins, but blame all the losses on the rest of the team. Note that the Falcon receivers, although you'd think would lead in the league in dropped passes for all the attention they received, were average in the league for number of drops (I feel like they need to hire a physiologist just to work with the bruised egos of the receivers as each drop they make gets replayed again and again).

3)Rushing yardage - No argument here...Vick is the greatest running QB of all time. He just broke NFL records for yards per carry and total number of yards by a QB this year. His athletic ability is almost unparalleled (I have to give Landian Tomlinson and Reggie Bush props here too) and he's clearly a cut above any other quarterback.

My take is that he is below mediocre QB in terms of decision making and passing, but potentially the best of all time at running. That puts him at a mediocre NFL QB because most offenses rely much more heavily on the pass than the run (although he was a great college player, where running QBs are more the norm). Can Atlanta eventually find a way to use his talents at the QB? I personally doubt it, but it will be interesting to see how it plays out. I also think his zucchini-level of intelligence will continue to get him in trouble one too many times, and eventually (like his brother) he will be out of football and give SNL more material like this: