Posts tagged NFL

Reads Listens Views 2/21/2014

February 21, 2014 0 Comments read Reads Listens Views

"+4 Wand of Instant Inferno" or as I call it, "Bruce Ellington Abstract" Photo by Dvanzuijlekom. — “+4 Wand of Instant Inferno” or as I call it, “Bruce Ellington Abstract” Photo by Dvanzuijlekom.

This Week’s RLV: 2-hr couch session on rookie QBs, Lil’ Darlin’, David Fales Developmental Gem?, 2 Muggs and my ugly mug.

Listens – Speaking of Infernos . . .

[youtube=http://youtu.be/Ns02jzH8Ccw]

Michael Brecker may look more like a Philadelphia-area accountant than a musician, but if you ever heard the Saturday Night Live Band from the 70s or listened to Cameo’s “Candy” then you know different. He’s a musician’s musician and one of the greatest saxophonists in history.

Welcome

A 261-page online publication that provides 1029 pages of play-by-play notes from my evaluation database and 10 percent of your purchase is donated to fight sexual abuse. Pre-order 2014 now.

If you’re new to the Rookie Scouting Portfolio blog, welcome. Every Friday, I post links to things I’m checking out when I’m online. You may not like everything listed here, but you’re bound to like something. It’s also my chance to thank you for reading my work and encourage you to follow the RSP blog and buy the Rookie Scouting Portfolio publication.

For those of you new to the Rookie Scouting Portfolio, the publication is available every April 1 for download. You can learn more about the RSP here. If you want to see samples of the play-by-play notes I take to write the analysis, you can find them here. And to download past versions of the publication (2006-2012) or to pre-order the 2014 RSP, go here.

If you don’t have time to look into details, then I’ll say this about the RSP: Once you look through the RSP, there will be no question in your mind that I do the work, that I have a plan about the work that I do, and that you get more than your money’s worth.

In addition to the RSP and the post-draft publication that comes with it a week after the NFL Draft, 10 percent of each sale is donated to Darkness to Light. This organization is a non-profit devoted to preventing and addressing sexual abuse through community training in schools, religious groups, and a variety of civic groups across the U.S.

Here is what the RSP donated to D2L this year. According to D2L, the RSP’s 2013 donation amount was enough to train 250 adults in communities across the country.

Listens

Where Bloom and I meet in the cosmos. Photo by David Stillman.

Last Night’s On The Couch: Two-hour quarterback therapy covering these topics and more:

Deconstructing the myths of Johnny Manziel.
Teddy Bridgewater and why the sum of quarterbacking is greater than its parts.
Which team takes the chance or passes on Derek Carr?
What does the choice of quarterback tell us about the personality of the head coach?
Sorting out the upsides of Carr, Aaron Murray, and David Fales in the context of current pros.
Break-downs and expectations for Brett Smith and Logan Thomas.
Which quarterback in this class is acting like Justin Beiber?

Good times. Hopefully you find it informative. If you want more, I was also recently on with the 2Muggs crew – not to give them second-billing, it’s just a few days older. In that podcast we have a good time talking about these topics:

The how and why behind the RSP Publication.
What makes Sammy Watkins special and is he more than speed?
Where does Mike Evans fit within this class and is he a special prospect?
Is Isaiah Crowell in a similar situation at this point of the draft process as Christine Michael last year?

Reads (Football)

Combine Day 1: Around The Podium – Cecil Lammey on location giving you good info – (Ryan Boser, see the quote about Marcus Wheaton).
How Scouting Opponents Supplemented For My Lack of Physical Ability – Can’t way to read this one from Ryan Riddle.
The Read Code of The NFL Locker Room – Fine story by Mark Schlereth that is worth reading if you are a week behind.
How Sports Illustrated Botched The Michael Sam Story – recommended by Chase Stuart after he wrote this fine piece on the same subject.

Reads (Non-Football)

This dwelling dug underground is called a “yaodong” and it’s one of many homes created in unexpected places around the world. See below.

Table of Exercises For Getting Fit Without Any Equipment – One of my weird early-middle age obsessions: having a workout routine I can do in the space of prison cell.
James Ellroy Interview – I love the movie LA Confidential. This is the writer of the novel. Terrific writer, who hates The Wire. I love the show. Fascinating read.
Norton Lecturer Herbie Hancock on The Wisdom of Miles Davis – More of a listen/view. Looking forward to checking this out one day.
Communities in Unexpected Places – A well-done photo-driven piece.
Why The Brains of Dogs and Humans Are More Similar Than You Think
Superpower Vision Lets Cats And Dogs See In Ultraviolet

Listens – “Lil’ Darlin'”

[youtube=http://youtu.be/FMibKxQWRnw]

This is a technically difficult gem because it’s hard to swing with this kind of patience.

Embracing The Craft of Player Evaluation

February 16, 2014 0 Comments read 2014 NFL Draft

Tony Romo is a perfect Rhorsach for football fans. Photo by Football Schedule. — Tony Romo is a perfect Rorschach for football fans. Photo by Football Schedule.

Player evaluation is an imperfect endeavor. Understanding one’s limitations is a huge step towards getting better at it.

The most compelling thing about the NFL Draft is that no matter how hard it tries, it cannot escape its humanity. It’s this human element that makes player evaluation – and evaluating what good evaluation is – so difficult.

Evaluating human behavior is a craft. It’s not science. It’s not intuition. It’s not history. And it’s not life experience.

It’s all of these things layered with perspective and applied with doses of humility, pride, and appreciation of the perfection of imperfections. It’s limitations and imperfections that are the root of character.

Maurice Jones-Drew and Ray Rice weren’t deemed big enough to carry the load. They are two of the toughest backs in football and proven bell cows.

Larry Fitzgerald, Anquan Boldin, and Brandon Lloyd are too slow to play wide receiver if looking solely at the speed data. However, what they do to catch a football despite these limitations is like a gorgeous birthmark on a model’s face.

Frank Gore is a former physical freak-turned-mortal whose sight, decision-making, and patience make fans wonder “what could have been” if he didn’t suffer two knee injuries that took away his immortality. Tony Romo and Brett Favre have embodied the sum of human failings, but often supplied its most inspiring heights.

I joke that Romo and Favre are often the dividing line among fans who embrace humanity and fans who think we’re better off eliminating humanity and evolving into androids.

Self-loathing aside, it’s the humanity in these players’ games that shine the brightest to fans – the production despite imperfection and the feats that for a briefest moment stretch beyond limitation. Likewise, player analysis is a willingness to both embrace and stretch beyond the humanity inherent in the process.

Every human being has characteristics of their personality that, depending on the situation, will have positive or negative expression. If one looks hard enough, this is true of scouts, writers, and draftniks when they evaluate prospects.

We all have several of these traits, but there is often a few predominant traits that are easier to notice. One of mine is persistence-stubbornness.

A positive side of its expression in my work is that I’m often thorough and steadfast with my analysis. A negative side in my work appears when I’m stubborn about process to the point that I can miss the forest while examining the trees.

I am also drawn to the underdog or the troubled soul. It’s part of my personality imprint.

I’m less likely to judge players with checkered pasts. Before I developed more life experience and caution, I was more likely to give trouble a second or third chance to the detriment of my analysis.

I’m not alone. There are scouts, writers, and draftniks drawn to players that I call bright and shiny objects – players who possess eye-popping physical skills, but lack the refined play of a consistent, reliable starter.

These folks see potential and have the vision to see how it will blossom in a positive way. But they are sometimes to their detriment a slave to it the way Bill in Kill Bill had a thing for blondes.

Other people latch onto one thing about a player. It might be the overriding characteristic that makes a player successful despite flaws in his game that others nitpicked to death.

At the same time, these people are also famous for spotting a potential flaw that is not the overriding factor for success or failure and it derails their analysis. They turn into the nitpicker.

Then there are the data guys who often generate insights, who at their best, provide a fresh, clear-eyed perspective of players and the game that re-frame the questions we should be asking. At their worst, they think any process that involves data is objective while dismissing information that they cannot yet figure out how to analyze with their tools.

I’m not talking about best analytics practitioners that I know who are working behind the scenes in the NFL. These individuals are often the first to tell you that the intuitive and the “subjective” have a place in analysis. These individuals studying the film as much as they study the data.

We all want a silver bullet – an attribute, a stat, or a measurement that will override the imperfection of craft. But player analysis is a craft.

You may not like it. I may not like it. It doesn’t matter.

RSP Rorschach No.3: Cornell QB Jeff Mathews

February 11, 2014 0 Comments read Matt Waldman

Thrown too early or thrown too late? See below.

Some plays are like Rorschach inkblots because there’s no definitive answer to why they unfold the way they do. This new series examines plays that have more than one viable explanation and may be too difficult to draw a single conclusion. The fun part is that you have a voice in it.

RSP Rorschach No.3: Cornell QB Jeff Mathews

This is 3rd-and-14 pass with 6:25 in the first quarter. The Cornell offense is in a 10 personnel shotgun set at the 24 with the ball at the right hash versus a 3-3-5 defensive look from Princeton. The offense faces a five-man blitz – three defenders coming from the left and two up the middle. The defensive end over right tackle is dropping to the right flat.

Princeton plays an aggressive defense that varies looks (nickel, 3-3-5, 2-4-6, and 3-4 looks) and blitz types all day. There is lots of A-gap pressure, layered blitzes to the same gap with two defenders coming in waves, and lineman dropping into coverage as slot defenders fire off the edge.

It’s the kind of pressure that forces a quarterback to play decisive football, which leads to the question about this pass attempt. Mathews drops from the shotgun looking to the middle, sets his feet, and throws the ball up the seam from the 29 to the slot-right receiver up the seam tot he end zone.

The quarterback over throws the receiver by four yards. The commentator tells the audience during the replay that Mathews was too early with his throw because of the pressure forcing the quarterback to rush the throw.

But is the commentator correct? Could Mathews have waited too long and been forced to lob the ball into a spot that could have been avoided with an earlier release?

See below.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnpFHmHy66I&start=106&w=560&h=315]

There’s no doubt that Mathews throws the ball with air under it but there’s no real arc. It looks more like the trajectory of a fade route where the quarterback expects the receiver to high-point the ball.

It’s good touch for a fade but that is not what this play calls for. While the throw being “long” is often an indication that the throw was too early, this is an intermediate-range pass.

Look at Mathews’ drop and it appears that he waits a tick late before making the decision to throw the ball. If the throws the ball in rhythm, the quarterback would have released the ball earlier and thrown the ball on a line to the inside of the receiver.

Instead, the quarterback waits a tick and lofts the ball so it clears the safety, who otherwise might not have been in range if quarterback threw the ball the moment his back foot hit the ground at the conclusion of the drop. The question is which theory do you buy?

Throw the ball earlier and with velocity on a line drive trajectory and the pass threads the needle of the secondary inside the five and the receiver trots into the end zone? Or, as the commentator noted, the pass rush forced a rushed throw and it arrived too early?

[polldaddy poll=7792661]

As always, you may comment below if you have a different take.

Funny Thing Happened at the Senior Bowl . . .

February 9, 2014 0 Comments read 2014 NFL Draft, Walk on the Wild Side

Only I didn’t get the full extent of the punchline until this evening.

Media Night at the Senior Bowl is a loosely organized event. Imagine four long life rafts filled with sailors in a sea filled with twice as many sharks. In case you’re not too swift on the uptake this evening, the sharks aren’t the football players.

If you’re media, you can either wait for a Senior Bowl PR intern to track down the player you want to interview and bring that player to you (the fish move) or you can hunt them down yourself. Unless I don’t know what the player looks like, I don’t bother with the PR staff.

Halfway through my list of interviews was Lorenzo Taliaferro. The Coastal Carolina running back was seated at a table with a few other guys when I approached him for an interview. Before Taliaferro could respond, a player seating across from him interjected.

“Excuse me, I’d like to interview him first.”

I didn’t recognize the player. He had closed cropped hair and he sported a thin mustache with some chin fuzz. His skin was the shade of mocha.

The player leaned across the table towards Taliaferro holding his phone like a tape recorder.

“Uh, hold on a second . . . this is uh . . . my first time interviewing anyone. I can’t seem to get this recorder to work, can you help me?”

I take a seat next to Taliaferro and watch this guy fumble around with his phone. I can appreciate football players making fun of the media. The first press conference I attended as a student was an after-practice interview with former Georgia coach Ray Goff over 20 years ago.

I brought an old Marantz recorder with me – a device meant more for transcribing music than recording interviews. It was the only thing I had.

When I hit the record button, I had the volume too high and feedback blared through the beginning of the press conference. Some reporters laughed, others seemed horrified, and Goff stared a hole through me.

I didn’t ask the coach any questions for the next two weeks. I thought it was best I let that incident fade away.

This mock malfunction of the recorder didn’t dissuade this player-turned-intrepid-beat-reporter to furrow his brow and fire off a facetious, nonsensical question.

“My first question is . . . how is it going to feel to when you get on the field this Saturday, get the ball, square your opponent, and blast his ass?”

The combination of the tone, the expression, and the words were perfect. I couldn’t help but laugh. His teammates were doubled over.

“And what does ‘blast his ass mean’ anyway?”

At this point, the player leaned back in his chair and indicated I had the next set of questions. If I didn’t have three more receivers on my list that I wanted to interview for a story I posted on technique, I would have asked this guy for an interview. He would have been a great source for “crazy things reporters say” material.

Considering I listened to a local reporter ask wide receiver Kevin Norwood if he “hoped to run a 4.7” and then tell Norwood he thought the time sounded pretty fast to him after Norwood said he “hoped not, 4.7 is a slow time,” I don’t have to imagine.

At the end of the night, I told Jene Bramel and Cecil Lammey about the player making fun of reporters. I could only describe him as bigger guy who looked like he could either be a small lineman or bigger linebacker. Since I only study offensive skill players, I don’t recognize all the defensive players at the game.

I saw him again tonight, February 9, 2014. He was telling the world that he is gay. His teammates at Missouri knew all year.

Humor is one of the great signs of intelligence. The funniest people I’ve known or have read about often had to contend with some serious shit in life.

Michael Sam, you’re one funny dude. Good luck out there.

Futures: Senior Bowl Preview

January 15, 2014 0 Comments read Matt Waldman

Is UNC defensive end Quinton Coples the next Jason Pierre-Paul? Jene Bramel says the potential is there but like everything earned in life, he has to put in the work to hone his gifts. — The Senior Bowl practices begin next week on the Martin Luther King holiday. Photo by Jene Bramel.

Another year, another Senior Bowl. What I am looking for, and what does the format of the Senior Bowl help me see?

Futures: Senior Bowl Preview

by Matt Waldman

There will be hundreds of Senior Bowl Previews available within the next seven days. Most of them will explain why the game is important to the NFL and the participating player. Only a few writers won’t provide 3-4 sentence summaries of the prospects.

I have provided this type of preview in one form or another since I began attending five years ago. I’m doing some of that once again this year, but I’m also sharing a more personal preview of the event. In addition to disclosing what I want to see from dozens of players, this preview will cover what else all-star games offer me as an evaluator of talent with my own publication devoted to offensive skill prospects.

Continual Football Education

At its core, studying tape is a solitary pursuit focused on the end product. Attending all-star game practices provides a glimpse into another dimension of the game, its coaches, and its players behind the scenes.

The opportunity to watch two NFL coaching staffs conduct a practice for a week provides insight into not only what’s important to them, but also what I can reasonably expect a player to reveal about his game during these sessions.

There are prospects that arrive in Mobile with a reputation for a certain skill set based on their junior and senior film, but the practices reveal something important about their game that the past two years of tape doesn’t show. I was fortunate enough to see Bengals receiver Marvin Jones showcase his skills as vertical threat during his sophomore year, but because his role at Cal changed after his sophomore year, many observers had their eyes opened for the first time when they witnessed Jones’ big-play ability at the Senior Bowl.

Practices vary in tone, tempo, and detail and it means the type of information one can gain varies from year to year. While I’ve expressed my utopian ideal for the Senior Bowl in the past, the practical approach is to be prepared to take what you can get.

When Buffalo’s staff ran a week of practice a few years ago, special teams had heightened priority and the teaching moments from individual drills were less frequent. There’s still a lot to see, but practices don’t serve as an informal technique clinic, which Bengals and Lions practices often were.

Former Detroit offensive coordinator Scott Linehan’s practice sessions for the offense at the Senior Bowl were especially good. He had an up-tempo style and packed the mornings with a variety of drills that tested and taught details that prospects needed to develop into more complete players.

Learning What’s Valuable (And What’s Not) From Practices

Everyone gets something different from watching practice. My book focuses on skill prospects, so I don’t spend much time . . . (read the rest at Football Outsiders)

“One Good Year” And Other Asinine Thoughts on QB Evaluation

January 13, 2014 0 Comments read 2014 NFL Draft, Players, Quarterback

This guy had "one good year" in college football. Photo by PDA.Photo — This guy had “one good year” in college football. Photo by PDA.Photo

One good year. It’s a cautionary refrain from the chorus of skeptics not sold on Central Florida junior Blake Bortles as a top-flight quarterback prospect (see my evaluation of Bortles vs. South Carolina). In the wee hours of the morning in a video-lit room evaluating quarterbacks, this three-word phrase will strike the fear in the hearts of most veteran scouts.

One good year could be Akili Smith, who like Bortles, was another 6’3″, 220-plus-pound college wonder who the Cincinnati Bengals took third overall in the 1999 NFL Draft. Smith had the arm and the legs to carry team, but according to Smith, who is now coaching quarterbacks at St. Augustine High School in San Diego, he spent more time curling glasses at bars than he did grinding tape in Cincinnati.

However, one good year is also Cam Newton, who took the NFL by storm as a rookie and along with a fine defense has pried open the Panthers’ window of contention. Many scouts were also singing the One good year dirge during the winter of 2011 for this rocket armed athlete who has grown each year as a quarterback and team leader despite concerns he didn’t possess the right kind of potential to handle the role on the field and in the locker room.

More than anything, one good year means NFL scouts don’t have enough evidence to cover their collective assets if a quarterback like Bortles fails. It’s one thing to invest a second, third, or fourth-round pick in players like Colin Kaepernick, Russell Wilson, Drew Brees, Matt Schaub, or Aaron Brooks and spin their development as a surprise or a stroke of scouting/coaching genius. It’s another to anoint first-round picks the future of the franchise and watch them set back a team’s development.

Personally, I think the phrase one good year is just a phrase. Giving those three words anywhere close to the weight of what’s seen in a game, in practice, or during a team interview is asinine.

Let’s go with the popular idea that a first-round quarterback should be more than a “capable starter.” I know what that means to me, but I have no idea what it means to everyone else. The same goes for “he should be a star.”

Then there’s the inevitable truth that stars rise and decline. If you don’t believe me, look in the sky.

There are many ways to define what that either term means. I’m defining a star as a quarterback who has done at least one of the following during his career:

Earned multiple trips to the Pro Bowl.
Led the league in meaningful passing categories (yards, touchdowns, completion percentage, or QB rating) for multiple seasons.
Led his team to multiple conference championship games.

Here is my criteria for capable starter status. A quarterback with this label should have done at least one of the following:

Led his team to the playoffs at least once.
Earned one trip to the Pro Bowl.
Earned top-5 production in meaningful passing categories (see above) for multiple seasons.

Using this criteria on the 51 first-round quarterbacks drafted since 1993, 22 of them are or were at least capable starters. That’s an underwhelming 45 percent success rate. Only 8 of these first-round picks can be considered stars – an appropriate stardom rate of 15 percent even in this day and age where everyone earns a trophy for participating.

Here’s a look at 17 years of first-round quarterbacks courtesy of DraftHistory.com. I’m not counting the 2013 class – even in today’s ever-impatient media-fan-ownership environment of the NFL, they get a pass.

Year	No.	Round	Pick	Name	Star	Capable	Comments
2012	1	1	1	Andrew Luck		x	Quintessential rising star. But by this conservative criteria, a “capable starter.”
	2	1	2	Robert Griffin III		x	Pro-Bowl rookie season, toilet bowl sophomore year. Still, a “capable starter.”
	3	1	8	Ryan Tannehill			Flashes of good work, but jury still out.
	4	1	22	Brandon Weeden			Two years in and the Browns are eyeing the draft for a QB once again.
2011s	1	3	0	Terrelle Pryor			Had moments this year, but regressed and lost the starting job.
2011	1	1	1	Cam Newton		x	On the cusp of stardom accoridng to my simplistic criteria.
	2	1	8	Jake Locker			Injuries and play mean the jury is out.
	3	1	10	Blaine Gabbert			The Jaguars are giving him one more year. I think they mean with the team and not as a starter unless he wows everyone.
	4	1	12	Christian Ponder			Like the coaching staff, out with the old and in with the new.
2010	1	1	1	Sam Bradford			The talent is there but he cannot be considered a capable starter yet.
	2	1	25	Tim Tebow			Italy is calling.
	2	1	5	Mark Sanchez			Sanchez is the fly in my criteria’s ointment, because it considers him a star. Fortunately, I’m not counting it. Common sense is a beautiful thing.
	3	1	17	Josh Freeman			Where will Freeman land?
2008	1	1	3	Matt Ryan		x	Not quite a star, but more than capable.
	2	1	18	Joe Flacco		x	Highly capable.
2007	1	1	1	JaMarcus Russell			Have we heard anything from Jeff Garcia lately?
	2	1	22	Brady Quinn			Storied program, big muscles, QB looks, and holds a clipboard with the best of them.
2006	1	1	3	Vince Young		x	At one time, capable but blew it. Still, it counts.
	2	1	10	Matt Leinart			The next Tom Brady . . .
	3	1	11	Jay Cutler		x	Capable starter.
2005	1	1	1	Alex Smith		x	Capable starter.
	2	1	24	Aaron Rodgers	x		Stud.
	3	1	25	Jason Campbell			Career backup.
2004	1	1	1	Eli Manning		x	Capable starter.
	2	1	4	Philip Rivers	x		Low end of stardom, but qualifies.
	3	1	11	Ben Roethlisberger	x		Stats don’t justify stardom, but the postseason does.
	4	1	22	J.P. Losman			Trent Edwards was better until Adrian Wilson got to him.
2003	1	1	1	Carson Palmer		x	Capable starter.
	2	1	7	Byron Leftwich		x	Low end of capable starter at one time.
	3	1	19	Kyle Boller			Big arm, big-name school, big disappointment.
	4	1	22	Rex Grossman			Low-end of capable starter w/his Super Bowl appearance.
2002	1	1	1	David Carr			Human pin cushion.
	2	1	3	Joey Harrington			Good college quarterback, good at the piano, and decent on FS1 Network.
	3	1	32	Patrick Ramsey			Reserve.
2001	1	1	1	Michael Vick		x	One-time capable starter with exciting gifts.
2000	1	1	18	Chad Pennington			Not healthy enough to earn capable starter status even if he was in spirit.
1999	1	1	1	Tim Couch			Capable SEC commentator for a regional cable network.
	2	1	2	Donovan McNabb	x		One-time star.
	3	1	3	Akili Smith			High school QB coach.
	4	1	11	Daunte Culpepper	x		One-time star.
	5	1	12	Cade McNown			Where are they now?
1998	1	1	1	Peyton Manning	x		Hall of Famer.
	2	1	2	Ryan Leaf			Still in the news on occasion.
1997	1	1	26	Jim Druckenmiller			Big, strong, and UDFA/NFL Europe’s Jeff Garcia much better.
1995	1	1	3	Steve McNair	x		Underrated star. Yes, I’m biased. I don’t care. Don’t argue . . .
	2	1	5	Kerry Collins		x	Capable starter at one point.
1994	1	1	3	Heath Shuler			I wonder what Norv Turner was thinking when he laid eyes on Shuler.
	2	1	6	Trent Dilfer		x	Beginning to remind me of F. Murray Abraham in “Finding Forrester.”
1993	1	1	1	Drew Bledsoe	x		Low-end star at one time.
	2	1	2	Rick Mirer			Goes to show you even Bill Walsh was fallible.

I inadvertently omitted Matt Stafford from this list (capable starter), but I did count him into my calculations. I don’t know about you, but a 45 percent success rate for a first-round quarterback developing into a capable starter tells me that having hard and fast rules about where and when you invest in a quarterback is foolish.

Another acceptable notion of “common sense” is that NFL teams shouldn’t draft a quarterback unless they believe that player sees star potential from that prospect. Using the same sample size and criteria, there are 35 quarterbacks since 1993 that were drafted with one of the top-15 overall picks. Only 6 of those 35 passers became stars – a whopping 17 percent success rate for meeting these organizations’ expectations.

Go easier on these top-15 picks and consider them successful as “capable starters” then that rate jumps to 54 percent. Still, the probability for turning a top-15 overall pick at quarterback has been marginally better than a coin flip. If the NFL hasn’t figured out how to project the talent with more accuracy than it has, then why should anyone listen to a former or current scout, coach, general manager, or owner when they explain their criteria for what makes a good first-round caliber quarterback?

This is not a complete indictment of NFL personnel men. Injuries and surrounding talent can alter the prospects of a young player that teams probably did a fair job of evaluating. However, the idea that the NFL and the draft community should be critiquing what constitutes a potential “bull’s-eye” with an anecdotal theory about “one good year” when it has difficulty hitting the target is putting the Super Bowl before the regular season.

This week, I’ll post some evaluation notes on Bortles. I promise you “one good year,” won’t be a part of my analysis.

For analysis of skill players in this year’s draft class, download the 2013 Rookie Scouting Portfolio.The 2014 RSP will available April 1 and if you pre-order before February 10, you get a 10 percent discount. Better yet, if you’re a fantasy owner the 56-page Post-Draft Add-on comes with the 2012 – 2014 RSPs at no additional charge and available for download within a week after the NFL Draft. Best, yet, 10 percent of every sale is donated to Darkness to Light to combat sexual abuse. You can purchase past editions of the Rookie Scouting Portfolio for just $9.95 apiece.

Reads Listens Views 1/10/2014

January 9, 2014 0 Comments read Reads Listens Views

This Week’s RLV: A jive turkey worth eating, appreciating Klook, a spec at sea, Cyrille Aimee, and tree houses.

Listens

[youtube=http://youtu.be/Nt7UBKF1BQI]

Views – Unbelievable Tree Houses

For more, including an invisible tree house, check out Higher Learning