QB or not QB

Watching Aaron Rogers, especially given the Raven offense's abysmal play on Sunday, makes me pine, like most, for better QB play. Aaron's a field general, a chess master and a pinpoint technician. All the things I wish Joe was but isn't. And the worst part is that I'm not sure whether we'll ever truly know if that's Joe's fault (i.e. he's just not good enough) or if Cam is holding him back to the point of failure. Either way, no matter where the blame lies, the facts are the facts. And the fact is that these are things you won't see Joe Flacco do (regardless of play call), that you should:

1) Call an audible - Last game was a perfect example. The Seahawks played mostly dime while mixing in some nickel and other formations. There were times when Seattle's defense had only five guys in the box with less than third down. If Cam's not going to be smart enough to call running plays, Joe's got to be smart enough to check into them.

2) Wear a wrist band - Apparently, wrist bands are simply fashion statements and have no use of any kind. That must be why every other QB in the league wears one, from Aaron Roger to Christian Ponder. Why do you need a wrist band when papa Cam can spoon feed offensive genius from the sideline?

3) Review game photos - I know you all think most QB's look at pictures from the previous drive while sitting on the sideline but that's a vicious rumor. That's not what the Mannings, Brees, Rivers, Ryan and others are looking at. Everyone knows, and you can check your DVR, that they're actually looking at porn, stills from Tosh.O and old Calvin and Hobbs comics. If you learn from you're near past, how can you be expected to repeat it.

4) Throw a guy open - Receivers must have a minimum of 5 yards separation so that by the time Joe decides to throw and releases the ball, the coverage is just not quite there to break up the pass. Anything less and it's an assured pass defense, if not an interception. What do you expect, this isn't the NFL.

5) Use a dummy snap count at the line (not including hard counts) - If I'm not mistaken, getting the other team to show their hand before the play goes off is illegal. I mean, that feels like cheating, doesn't it? I feel dirty just thinking about it.

6) Adjust protection to pick up a blitz - First you'd have to read the defense and/or recognize the blitz. Enough said.

7) Move off the primary read to a receiver not named Rice - Most plays are designed to have multiple reads. If the first receiver is covered as the QB moves through the progression, a well designed play will have a secondary option coming open and so on and so forth. However, in Joe's mind there are apparently only two options: a) primary receiver and b) Ray Rice. Could you imagine if Ray Rice wasn't Ray Rice? We'd be in a lot of trouble.

The fact is, if Joe were more of a leader/man/player/gamer/all around righteous dude, it wouldn't matter what poor play Cam called, because that bad play call would never see the field. The offense has to start and end with Joe Flacco. And, unfortunately, more often that not, it ends with him.