FanPost

To defend a certain Chad

Cut him? Get him off the team? etc etc?

 

I feel obligated to defend ochocinco on this blog for a couple reasons

 

  • Ocho is a product of a two TE system. A system he has NEVER been a part of in his entire career. It will take a lot of time for him to adjust to it. But this is the weaker of my points.
  • He is playing behind Welker and Branch, and Brady's favorite targets are Welker, Branch, Herndo, and Gronk. How many targets do you really expect him to get?

Let me further extend this point. When Chad came in, what were all of our expectations? That we have a deep-ish threat? Did some of us have visions of Brady and Chad making magical connections because of what they did in the pro bowl or something? Lets be honest here. He came in in a different system, behind the players I listed above, as well as the players Brady loves to target. I never expected Chad immediately be very good with us.

 

Some expected Chad to at least be incorporated at this time. Truth is, Brady would rather have Welker and Branch. Is this is because of the lack of production by Ocho? Untrue. When targeted, its clear Ocho looks to have gotten better. If Ocho started instead of Branch, I am pretty sure that he would be putting up good numbers. But as of now? Brady prefers Branch over Ocho because of not only the history between the two in terms of production, but also because he has more experience in the offense.

 

I just think we are overreacting on this. We expect more of ocho, but I think we hyped up the trade too much, and expected him to have a big role in the offense. As of now, I don't think even Price would play that much either considering the points and such I made above. Its the system, and is the players, and ocho is a victim of it. Why did we trade him? Well if we run 3 WR sets, shotgun situations where we have to spread them out even more, he would come in hand I would think. Unfortunately, we hardly do that because our 2 TE offense is too efficient (which I can't complain about) and we now decided to run the ball more often (about time!!!).

 

So as of now, just keep ocho in the back of your head saying to yourself "he'll eventually get the offense" while we comfortable sit back and watch Tom Brady do his thing and the offense to score points efficiently. Because once he gets more of the offense, I expect to see MUCH more 3 WR sets to balance out the 2 TE sets, and it should be fun to watch.

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