Aaron Brooks!!! (1 Viewer)

[chank]

I still have my Hebert and Brooks jerseys hanging in the closet. Good (as we as bad lol) memories.

 

[Goatman Saint]

While I agree with some of the statements about Brooks, one of the main problems was the whole coaching staff at that time. Great for street ball and doses of brilliance, but little to no consistency or professional coaching knowledge. With a different coach, maybe he could do better. Also remember that first year especially the saints had absolutely dominating lines both offense and defense which covered up a lot of holes. Once Roaf, Turley, Naeole and all left, the offense got worse. The defensive line with glover, hand, Howard and Johnson was a thing of beauty also. If anything that team underachieved.

 

[Kris]

Try again.. Brooks was our best QB since Archie.. A lot of fans let ABs lack of intangibles change their view of him strictly as a QB.. He was a quality QB he just was a terrible leader of men and that's where the distinction needs to be made

Not even close. Brooks had the strongest most accurate arm of ANY Saints QB. His guidance was flawed, meaning he didn't study the game well enough or couldn't think fast enough to beat a blitz. Well timed blitzes undid the Saints cause he couldn't make a team pay for blitzing. That is the reason he was out of football while still young enough and healthy enough to play. The league learned the formula for tearing him up and he couldn't learn how to make them pay enough for blitzing to discourage the blitz. He might beat one blitz but they could rely on the next five getting him to fall apart. There is a reason he couldn't make a team while still healthy. That is NOT the best QB the Saints had between Archie and Drew. Hebert was better and Blake was just as good. Kenny Stabler was better as a raider, though not as a Saint.

His leadership was horrible, but it was his inability to beat the blitz that put him out of the NFL.

Brooks was light years better than Hebert and most of the Fans treated him worse than Walsh.

See above. If that was true then tell me why he was out of football young and healthy??????? guess the NFL as a whole knows less than you.

Kris

 

[parlorcitysaint]

As memory serves, Jeff Blake was having a pretty good start to his season before he got hurt....

Brooks completed the season respectably, then held out for a new contract the following year.

Then pretty much pooped the bed.

If that's not enough, he's Michael Vick's cousin.


Good Riddance!

 

[krushing]

During his early years he was a good QB who could throw an out route as good as any QB I've ever seen. During his last couple years, he was embarrassing. It was like he degressed mentally. He just never said the right things or acted like someone you want to be the face of the franchise. I didn't really think Bobby did either. I thought Sam Mills and Deuce were better representatives of the team and the city even though they were not QBs. I don't think it's a race thing. I don't think this region would like Jay Cutler either. We expect a leader who makes us proud like Duece, Mills, Archie and most all Drew.

 

[boutte]

Every one remembers the backward pass. What I remember is all those rocket passes at the receiver's feet. As terrible as he became (yes terrible, awful, pathetic all describe him at the end) he still had a knack for the 4th quarter comeback.

 

[marccooper]

Aaron Brooks was a better leader of men than Jim Haslett. Unfortunately, Haslett was the coach and got to do most of the leading. Haslett's method of leading was excuses, trying to change players to fit schemes, relying on new annual gimmicks to give fresh hope ('we are going to pound the ball', and the next year 'we are going to open things up and throw downfield'), putting players in when hurt to ruin their reputations, and running off successful coordinators for stooges who were loyal because they knew no other team would want them. Brooks probably could not have been a great leader, but he might have been a lot better with a head coach who didn't poison the character of every player he came into contact with. I high doubt that Joe Montana, Peyton Manning, Jim Brown, or Jim Thorpe could have been successful with Jim Haslett as their head coach for basically their entire career. When Aaron Brooks finally left the Saints he was a lot older, beat up, and picked the worst destination to make another run, a Raiders team with historic dysfunction and the worst offensive line of the decade. Aaron Brooks had no chance. Jim Haslett took all his chances away.

 

[MG3n2K5]

4 Things come to mind thinking of Brooks years:

1. Outside his first season those defenses were bad, real bad, on par with our defense last season bad.

2. He really tried to do too much because he felt any possession without a score would equate to a lost. He was right but the things he did because of it only made things worse (ie backwards pass).

3. He mentally checked out after that stretch in 2003 after he tried (unsuccessfully) to play through that injury while Delhomme was available. He never recovered from the boos he received during that stretch.

4. We fired McCarthy & kept the defensive coordinator, still boggles the mind to this day. I do wonder how he would've turned out if he ever had a decent defense.

 

[robsmith32]

he had the talent to be great.. didn't have the coaches to recognize or direct the talent.
and i really don't think he ever really recovered from that shoulder injury that brought up the hold delhomme controversy.. prior to that shoulder injury, he was ahead of every qb not named brady in td/int ratio. and right there with brady. if he missed a wr, it was cause it was overthrown, after that hit, he underthrew miserably. and never was corrected.
and they made matters worse, when they let a good center walk, to move a great guard to center that wasn't as good at center.
that was the cause of so many turnovers, cause bentley and brooks was so often on different pages. Prior to that, he wasn't mishandling many snaps.

 

[krushing]

Aaron Brooks was a better leader of men than Jim Haslett. Unfortunately, Haslett was the coach and got to do most of the leading. Haslett's method of leading was excuses, trying to change players to fit schemes, relying on new annual gimmicks to give fresh hope ('we are going to pound the ball', and the next year 'we are going to open things up and throw downfield'), putting players in when hurt to ruin their reputations, and running off successful coordinators for stooges who were loyal because they knew no other team would want them. Brooks probably could not have been a great leader, but he might have been a lot better with a head coach who didn't poison the character of every player he came into contact with. I high doubt that Joe Montana, Peyton Manning, Jim Brown, or Jim Thorpe could have been successful with Jim Haslett as their head coach for basically their entire career. When Aaron Brooks finally left the Saints he was a lot older, beat up, and picked the worst destination to make another run, a Raiders team with historic dysfunction and the worst offensive line of the decade. Aaron Brooks had no chance. Jim Haslett took all his chances away.

Agreed! Haz was a terrible leader. No question about that. To me Haz and Brooks just fit together.

 

[Zack Lee]

I think Haslett's coaching staff did a terrible job as far as developing Brooks as a QB. When we first got Brooks the potential was very obvious. But he never evolved past that stage.

this. Starting from the very beginning. He had more than enough talent to do it but after he took over for the playoff run, the job was given to him. He thought he had arrived and lost the competitive edge. I can't say that he would have made it otherwise but the did mess him up.

But had he been any worse or not shown any flashes, we would have went with Jake and probably not been in the market until beyond the year when Drew was out there...so for that, thank you AB.

Oh, and thanks for Hope when there was none too.

 

[porculator]

Whenever I think of that offense I think play-action to Deuce, Brooks firing a rocket off his back foot down the middle to Horn, who jumps and catches it in his stomach for no particular reason and falls down. Bonus for a touchdown and Joe's amazing dance.

 

[ndcc]

1. Credit where credit is due. We could have IMPLODED after Jeff Blake went down, but Aaron Brooks stepped up and got the job done. He also led us to our first-ever postseason victory. That was something that none of our prior QB's could do.

2. AB, when healthy, was a pretty good QB. In fact, in 2003 he threw 24 td's with 8 int's (3:1 ratio, which is "gosh darn good")!

3. AB was the first QB in NFL history to rush for 100 yds. in a game AND have over 400 yds. passing in a game ...in the SAME season.

Look... Aaron Brooks had a lot of shortcomings. But all told, he brought more up-side than he brought disaster (overall). And just as a sidebar, if you watch the River City Relay, it was Aaron Brooks' key block near the end that allowed Jerome Pathon to get into the endzone untouched. Watch at the 0:30 mark of this video:

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/06LdqVfMBho" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Glad we have Drew Brees: The greatest QB in Saints history, and has an outside shot at being the greatest of all time after his career is over.

WhoDat! :evilgrin:

 

[gravynola]

I remember after a loss to the vikings i believe, duece said ab called a play that didnt exist in the huddle. I remember i would buy cheap tickets outside right after kickoff for $10 or $15 and by the time i got to the terrace, the crowd would already be booing. Lets end it on a good note, i remember when the rams were good they were up by 18 at the half and we rallied and scored 25 points in the 3rd . We went on to win

 

[marccooper]

Agreed! Haz was a terrible leader. No question about that. To me Haz and Brooks just fit together.

Yep, the only different is that at the time they came together Haslett was supposed to be a responsible leader and Brooks was supposed to be a very young backup QB taking direction from Haslett. It's very hard to blame Haslett's failure on Brooks, because Haslett could have turned back to Blake, to Delhomme, etc if he did not like Brooks, used Brooks differently if it made sense, and Haslett was the one who felt he could develop Brooks. Brooks had no way to move forward without Haslett, and was a young impressionable kid who needed coaching. Clearly Brooks isn't Joe Montana or Peyton Manning, but if you took Brooks and developed him under Cameron and Harbaugh, and developed Flacco under Haslett, I think the results could quite easily reverse.