49ers-packers is a tale of two quarterbacks
‘Rodgers must play at an all-world level’
Early this week, Rob Reischel, who contributes to Forbes magazine, checked in with a take that will not play well in the Aaron Rodgers Fan Club.
“Not many people are giving the Green Bay Packers a chance in Sunday’s NFC Championship Game,” Reischel wrote. “The 49ers routed the Packers, 37-8, back in Week 12. San Francisco is an early 7-point favorite. And the 49ers seem to have the edge at several different positional groups.”
To pull off “a shocking upset,” he added, “Rodgers must play at an all-world level. Using history as an indicator, though, the odds of that seem rather remote.”
Reischel points out that in three NFC Championship games, Rodgers is 1-2 with a passer rating of 70.5, far below his career rating of 104.2. Furthermore, Reischel wrote, Rodgers, who hails from Chico, a three-hour drive from the Bay Area, has played in four “homecoming” games (Sunday’s will be the fifth). He is 1-3 _ including a playoff loss in 2013 and last November’s ritual slaughter.
So, put the champagne on ice? You’re new here, aren’t you? This is the postseason, where everyone has a rooting interest and is pretty darned sure they know how the game is going to unfold.
But can they, given the polar opposites who will line up under center? Rodgers is a well-known and well-liked commodity. He’s fun to watch and is on the way to
the Hall of Fame.
His opposite number, 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo, is largely an unknown quantity. Put it this way: Jimmy G has started 20 regular season games in his career, only three more than Rodgers’ 17 postseason games.
Does that mean there is nothing to learn about the G-man?
You haven’t met the nice folks at Pff.com, a statistical service. About the same time Reischel was putting his Rodgers tome to bed, Pff.com’s Sam Monson took a critical look at Jimmy Garoppolo in a story headlined “(The) San Francisco 49ers are a Jimmy Garoppolo mistake away from disaster.”
Hey, tell us what you really think.
“Including the playoffs, Garoppolo has 14 interceptions and 21 turnoverworthy plays ( TWP) by PFF’S charting,” Monson wrote. “His turnover-worthy throw rate isn’t among the worst in the league, but only 13 quarterbacks put the ball in harm’s way more often, and it’s by far the worst rate of any of the remaining quarterbacks on championship weekend.”
Those quarterbacks being:
1. Aaron Rodgers (2.49 TWP%)
2. Patrick Mahomes (2.76 TWP%)
3. Ryan Tannehill (2.99 TWPP%)
4. Jimmy (3.99 TWP%)
Worse, Monson asserts, Jimmy G doesn’t mitigate his bad throws with enough BTT (Big Time Throws). He finished the season with 15.
Monson dives so deep on Garoppolo that you’d think he would need an Aqua Lung. Among his observations: Jimmy G struggles to see linebackers at the intermediate level, he has a turnover-worthy play rate of 6.9% when throwing into coverage of linebackers. Monson concludes, “The 49ers are strong favorites against the Packers, but that margin could evaporate in an instant if Garoppolo continues to misread what’s in front of him.”
So there you have it. The veteran two-time MVP in one huddle, and the upand-comer preparing for his first flight to the sun in the other.
Garoppolo