With this draft, you never know.
The Panthers trade apparently is just a straight-up swap of their 2011 2nd for a late 3rd this year. Not to put too fine a point on it, but that’s fucking retarded. Even if the Panthers win the damn Super Bowl and the pick they send to New England turns out to be the 64th overall, they sacrifice 125 “points” of value according to the chart, which is equivalent to a late 3rd Rounder. Essentially, Carolina would’ve needed to get twice what they actually received in return for the trade to be a fair one, and that’s if their pick next year is at the end of the round. Assuming, more reasonably, that they’ll be picking in the middle of the round, they simply burned the equivalent of a late 2nd Rounder just for nothing more than the privilege of making their selection this year instead of next.
Who runs the show in Carolina? Between this draft trade idiocy and the Delhomme extension, I get the impression that he’s not up to the job.
Prior to that pick, I thought Carolina was doing well. Getting Clausen was great value at a position of need, and LaFell fills another need (although I’m not sold on him, when he was taken he was the best on the board). I thought for sure they would deal with their gaping whole on their D Line with the next pick, but they went and did something incredibly stupid and reach to grab a project WR.
Just when I think I can understand the brains trust that runs NFL teams, they throw in this kind of braindead decision. Almost every team in the NFL does it, though. But yeah, that last pick by Carolina really had me shaking my head.
As an aside, I’m getting sick of reading NFL.COM, watching NFL network, and reading the major news outlets that praise every pick by every team as if no one is making an incredibly stupid decision. Whether it is Mike Mayock or whoever is typing in the crap on NFL.com, they seem to think every pick made is a good call for their team and are great value. Everyone has a great chance of becoming a solid contributor and passing on certain players won’t come back and bite them on the ass.
Bah.
Surprisingly, ESPN’s draft grades were pretty brutal in spots. There were a couple of Fs in the first 40 picks or so, including Tebow, and the Eagles’ third pick – you know, the demon Te’O Neshal-Bezzarr – graded out as a 2.0 or something on the scouts’ grades.
I’m concerned about the fact that TWICE his shoulder has exploded on him. I’m also concerned that he played behind a monster line and had a lot of time to make his reads and throws. He’s not going to have half of that time and St Louis has NO one for him to throw to. Steven Jackson makes up like 40% of their offense. I understand they had to take him because they whiffed on Matt Ryan and Mark Sanchez and need a face to sell tickets and drum up some love.
Anyone have an idea as to what happens when a team has an RFA that hasn’t yet signed his offer, but the team wants to trade them? This was Sean Payton’s excuse as to why Jammal Brown wasn’t dealt, yet I could have sworn I’ve seen otherwise.
I had Navorro Bowman ranked 52nd on my big board. Nice pickup at 91 after trading down.
I was kind of hoping that Clausen would be a flop before, now this really seals it, since he’s drafted into the Bucs division. Is this guy actually any good?
I don’t think so. I watch less Notre Dame football than most everything else out of spite so I haven’t scouted him as well as I have others but based on everything I’ve seen he’s nothing special. I’ve said it a 100 times but this is probably the single worst QB class in the history of the NFL. Bradford most years would be a Aaron Rodgers type prospect not a Peyton Manning type the way he was treated. Clausen wouldn’t even be mentioned as a 3rd rounder and Tebow and McCoy (think Charlie Ward and Ken Dorsey) would be lucky to get drafted in classes 10+ years ago. The growth of the spread option offense is really killing QB prospects.
Clausen doesn’t have a great arm, he doesn’t have prototypical size, he’s not a good leader and he wasn’t exactly that productive in college. The only thing going for him is that he played and was coached in an NFL-style offense by an NFL level coach. That’s pretty major when most every other QB took 80% of their snaps from the gun and never needed to learn to throw the route tree. I’d put Clausen’s ceiling at Jake Delhomme, which isn’t to bad but that’s by no means a sure thing and he doesn’t have Delhomme’s intangibles right now.
From a pure mechanics standpoint, he’s actually got a pretty slow delivery. Tebow’s throw got all the talk but Clausen has his flaws there, but Clausen does come over the top and he has a pretty solid touch on the deep ball. He’s accurate enough but not special, he’s not a west coast prototype. Ideally he needs to be in a pro-style drop back / play action system. Carolina is an excellent fit for him if they can continue to run the ball and maybe add another WR target with speed.
Fox and Marty Hurney co-decide personnel issues. They have had some successes, but a lot of misses too, in the last few years. This is just a WAG, but since Fox is basically a lame duck this year, and due to missing the playoffs last season; inactivity in FA; raising ticket prices; and some strange, unanswered front office moves (owner fires both his sons without explanation); there is a lot of discontent among fans right now. Edwards is a very popular local player and it’s not impossible he was picked to generate a little excitement.
That being said, as a football decision, it seems pretty damn dumb. They do need help on the return game, but to make a trade like that for a guy they probably could get in RD 4 easily?
That was pretty damn funny, Omni. I about choked on my morning water!
Well, I was bitching before about the trade-down, but if that’s what they got out of it, it’s a total no-brainer for the Pats. Particularly since they had another pick right after. Good move by the Pats, even if I am sick of all the trade-downs.
The Packers traded their 4th round pick to move up in the third to take Burnett, so the first part of todays’ draft will be very boring.
The Rams are going to like Mardy Gilyard. Dude’s a baller and a TD machine in the kickoff return game. He was awesome for the University of Cincinnati.
I’m not a fan. By the by, where are you getting the info from? NFL.com Draft tracker and watch live aren’t working for me.
Nevermind, I see ESPN has it.
Seahawks trade a 4th and 6th for LenWhale White. “We’re getting the band back together!” says Pete Carrol.
I see “my guys” Verner, Stuckey, and Pitta are off the board. Darn. And the Bears make a nice pick getting Wooten. It will be interesting to see how he develops.
And another Northwestern Wildcat goes off the board. Kafka (who has some nice upside) goes to the Iggles, who got the pick from the Packers. Nice pick, if a bit early for him.
Eric Norwood, OLB, South Carolina and Akwasi Owusu-Ansah, CB, IUPUI, two guys I thought would be good value in the third round, are still around. Doubt they’ll drop all the way to the latter half of the 5th though.
Could someone here make the necessary Kafka puns? The guys on ESPN aren’t well-versed enough to even make a basic “Metamorphosis” joke.
And, what a great situation for Gilyard! Pretty much a free pass to a starter’s spot, and a #1 draft pick at QB.