I wish Cassel's problem was the long ball, its not. Its the short passes where he sucks balls, which is far worse IMO.
Some of you all just make me scratch my head. Its like some people want Cassel to suck so bad that they forget what he is bad at. I, for one, was very happy to see Cassel completing those short passes and you should be too because that was where he sucked balls last year.
His inability to complete, what are normally, high percentage passes absolutely killed us last year. I don't care to debate the WR issues, we all know them.
His stats last season stack up very well to most QB's on passes 31 yards and over. He completed 41% of his 12 passes in the 31-40 yard range last season. That is better than most; including Brady, Manning and the beloved Aaron Rodgers. He also completed a higher percentage of throws over 40 yards than any of them, though he did throw less passes.
He absolutely was horrific on passes thrown 21-30 yards, 20%. That is less than every other QB I compared him to by a very large margin and his passes completed from 11-20 were 43.8%. Meanwhile those same QB's (Brady, Manning and Rodgers) completed 55.9%, 60.7% and 53.1% respectively.
Cassel doesn't need a cannon, he needs a laser and what he showed us last season was anything but. He did very well against Tampa on those short passes, that everyone is knocking him over, but IMO that is exactly what he needs to be working on.