LA Times ranks Carson Palmer what?

With the perfunctory hat tip to Lance, upon whose blog I found the gem I'm about to lay on you, I give you the LA Times' 2008 NFL quarterback rankings.

1. Tom Brady-okay, I can live with that. You don't break records and go 16-0 without the proper accolades shortly to follow.
2. Peyton Manning-Probably should be ranked 1b. Consistenly in the discussion of best QB in the league.
3. Tony Romo-erm...a little high? Top 5 maybe.
4. Drew Brees-Probably top 5 as well. Heck of a good quarterback.
5. Brett Favre-What would a quarterback discussion be without an overreaching mention of the good ol' boy good timin' gunslinger? Would you include a quarterback that had QB ratings of 70.9 in 2005 with 20 TD's and 29 picks and a rating of 72.7 in 2006 with a TD/INT ratio of 1:1 with 18 each before his comeback year last year in the top five? Oh, I forgot how much we're all in love with him right now for unretiring and forcing his way out of Green Bay. Of course you would!
6. Ben Roethlisberger-Whale of a good year last year, pretty darn good game manager. As much as I hate to admit it, after last year's performance this may be pretty close to where I'd slot him.
7. Matt Hasselbeck-Good quarterback that most times gets lost in the shuffle. Definitely top ten, though it might be hard to figure a good spot for him.
8. Jeff Garcia-Continues to get it done at a high level, though his job seems to be in jeopardy year in and year out no matter where he hangs his helmet. He probably deserves the #8 rank just on virtue of how hot his wife is.
9. Carson Palmer-wait, what? Ninth? Are we doing these based on talent level and expected results or uniform number?

Spitballing off of a conversation recently had on the messageboards at CincyBengals.com, let me entertain you all with the expected results of a conversation between Bengals owner/GM Mike Brown and the GM of any team in the NFL not calling New England or Indianapolis its home.

Mike Brown: Hi (insert appropriate GM's name here), how have you been? ~ Good, me too. Hey, I was wondering if you'd be willing to make a trade. We want to unload Carson Palmer and his $118 million contract... ~ Hello, are you there?

Sounds are heard offscreen of rapid, frenzied knocks at Mike Brown's front door. Brown, shaking his head at the perceived dropped call hangs up the phone and exits the scene stage left. Opening the front door, Brown says:

Mike Brown: (insert appropriate GM's name here)? (insert correlating NFL team's starting quarterback's name here)? How did you get here so fast?

End scene.

You see, what most media lemmings/stat mongers fail to realize is this: Carson Palmer felt the need to put the ball in the paint every single time he stepped on the field last season because of a vertiable smorgasboard of unfortunate circumstances.

Exhibit A-His offensive line was in flux for most of the year and even though the Bengals allowed/incurred a franchise-low 17 sacks in 2007, many of those were avoided by Palmer running for his life and forcing a pass where he really had no business doing so because he was getting pressured all year. The man was hit or pressured on, oh I don't know, maybe thirty percent of his drop backs? That is a large part of why he threw a career high twenty interceptions.

Exhibit B-He had virtually no running game to speak of because team management continued to trot a banged-up Rudi Johnson out week after week until they were no longer competitive, when Kenny Watson was clearly the better choice last year.

Exhibit C-The Bengals lost the time of possession battle by an average of nearly three minutes on average throughout the 2007 season. This is partly due to the colander defense and partly due to the anemic run offense. When you hold the ball less, you run less and pass more. More attempts in more desperate situations with less football team supporting you equals more interceptions and a lower passer rating.

Exhibit D thru Z-Oh yeah, the Bengals had the 27th-ranked defense in the league last year in the event that tidbit passed you by. In the New England game, where he threw one of his twenty interceptions due to a wrong route by one Chad Johnson, the Bengals went in with three healthy linebackers. For a team that likes to show a 3-4 look from time to time to have to remain in their base package is bad in the first place, but for said team to lose one of the three LB's they had so they couldn't even run their base package? Yeah.

~

I really honest-to-goodness wonder if the vast majority of quarterback rankings go down like this:

"Hey, let's flip a coin to determine whether Brady or Manning goes 1 or 2, the loser takes the 2nd rating, and why don't we just draw names from a hat? Okay, which name is next...Michael Vick? Aw man, we never changed out the names in the hat! Eh, it's all right. Okay, Vick is number 7. And hey, that works for the 'rank by uniform number' method too! We are SO on fire today!"

And yet they get paid and folk like Kirkendall, David and myself don't.

Sincerely,

A Pragmatic Bengals Fan