Culpepper Without Moss

As one who advocated the Moss trade long before it actually happened, though I am a Packer fan, I feel obliged to continue defending that move by pointing to a recent article by Charles Robinson. The whole article is about how Daunte Culpepper will fare without Moss. He quotes some relevant statistics:

While there are few who will suggest Culpepper can't be a good player without Moss, there remains uncertainty over whether he can maintain last season's type of production. Critics were quick to point out Culpepper's last supposed offensive slump when Moss suffered his hamstring issues. But even those criticisms seem slightly off-base. Consider:

• Of the three games Minnesota lost with Moss out or playing as an injured decoy, the defense had surrendered 54 points by halftime, forcing the Vikings to abandon the run and Culpepper to play in constant passing situations.
• In the three losses, Culpepper completed 64 percent of his passes and threw for 763 yards, along with six touchdowns and only two interceptions. Meanwhile, Minnesota's committee of running backs contributed averages of 15 carries per game for 71 yards and scored four total touchdowns.
• Two of the three teams that beat the Vikings were Indianapolis and Green Bay – two playoff teams that had to go toe-to-toe with Minnesota's offense and had to kick game-winning field goals in the final seconds.
• In the two wins without a healthy Moss, Culpepper was still remarkably good, completing 74 percent of his passes for 416 yards, along with three touchdowns and one interception.

Let's look at those three losses. The stat of 763 yards in three games is 254.3 yards/game. The last time I checked, that's a pretty good number. Only 7 QBs (including Culpepper) had better than 254.3 yards/game last year. A two touchdown per game average is awesome, only Daunte (full season) and Peyton Manning had a higher average, with Favre and McNabb just behind. I won't attempt to estimate his QB rating. But, Culpepper goes from being the second best QB in the league to maybe the 5th or 6th best without Moss, and this is considered a slump?

And, of course, Robinson's first point is glaring: the so-called Viking defense put Culpepper in a deep hole all three games. So one would expect something of a drop off in performance. That won't happen this year.

Of course, a quarterback is more than just statistics. Nate Burleson said, "If you watch those games, watch the film and don't just look at some numbers, you would see that Daunte became even more of an incredible player than he was before. He carried us."

Everyone fixates on Moss. There's no question he is a great reciever, one of the best in the game right now. But he can be replaced. Perhaps not fully, but replaced none the less. Culpepper will do fine, and as I've said before, any small decline in offensive production will be more than compensated by greatly improved defense.

Now, let me get back to staring dejectedly at my cheese.