Seaside NFL Draft Thoughts, 4/23.2
NFL Draft Thoughts
Here are some completion percentage/accuracy numbers for the top-five quarterbacks. Do with it what you will, but stats are misleading and college football stats are capital Miss Leading. Or Mrs. Leading. College stats should draw at least a little bit of a comparison to preseason stats.
With regards to Kyle Pitts, I had this thought: If he turns out to be Vernon Davis, will people be disappointed? Better yet, is that worth a top-five or top-ten pick? There’s no reason to say that Pitts or Davis is a better athlete because they’re both in 98th or 99th percentile, the difference is negligible. They had similar college careers in terms of little value in year one, some in year two, a lot in year three. Davis barely put up numbers over his first three seasons in the NFL, then had a stretch of five years where he was very good, then back to about where he was before. Maybe in today’s NFL, it won’t be as hard to get targets to Pitts, but keep in mind that San Francisco didn’t draft Davis sixth overall with the expectation that he wouldn’t have to be a dangerous weapon. He averaged 34 catches for 377 yards with three touchdowns in his first three seasons. Today, those numbers wouldn’t get Pitts a fifth-year option.
In a league where there are so many busts, so many wasted draft picks, so many regrets that fans have for the selections of their teams, I’m surprised that people still say things like, “I like that guy at 40, but not 30.” Or “I like him at 15, but not top-10.” It’s so hard to find good players, if you like a prospect, just like him. Why are we splitting hairs over a few spots? Ego? Imaginary trade-down scenarios that you have no idea are even there in real life? If you think it’s okay to wait to draft him, okay, but maybe then you don’t like him that much. Because if you’re saying, “I’ll be happy if Gregory Rousseau falls to (my team) in round two,” you’re ignoring the fact that 31 other teams didn’t want him and so. many. players. disappoint that you’d think this alone is a red flag. Essentially, not every player in the draft will succeed, most will “fail” to the degree we expect, yet I see a lot of people treat the draft like an influx of 250-300 new starters and role players. It’s a lot less than that, which is why teams have typically only had 125-player big boards.
Missed this from five days ago…so weird that Louis Riddick would have this take on Trevor Lawrence. The QB made some comments about not having a chip on his shoulder, not feeling that he needs to win a Super Bowl “at all costs.”
I both like Lawrence’s comments and don’t care about them. I can walk into a Hall of Fame ceremony and find you 100 quarterbacks who have the same “Rah Rah” mentality about Super Bowls and still find 95 that never won one. Lawrence has always been described as a hippie. He’s also a true freshman national champion who won almost every game he started and nearly won two more titles. Give me a break.
Lawrence clarified his statement here, thought I don’t know why he had to, that’s insane to me.
I think when you have a player like Lawrence who is guaranteed to go number one and be praised, the media only has one story they can even run on Trevor Lawrence at this point: “What if Trevor Lawrence wasn’t the best player in this draft and didn’t deserve to go number one?” That’s literally the only story that would be considered “interesting” because going number one is a given. So what do we get? Forced feelings about a meaningless quote.
The Jaguars might actually win the AFC South in 2022.
Rashawn Slater and Zack Martin.
How quickly can a first round pick bust in the NFL? Remember Isaiah Wilson? For some draft prospects, it is months, if not years of speculation, and then everything can change the day after they’re picked. It’s like getting married. I hear.
Why aren’t people saying that it is “disrespectful” for the Falcons to even consider drafting a quarterback in the way that they did about the Packers last year? Matt Ryan is 36. Last year, Aaron Rodgers was 37. Green Bay selected the number four QB in the draft, Jordan Love, instead of the number seven receiver on the board. Atlanta can either select the number four QB in the draft, or the number one receiver. The choice, if you were booing the Packers last year for Love, is obvious.
Nevermind, that’s just inviting comments that Justin Fields is “as good as a number one QB” which is not only an opinion I don’t share, it’s factually not true. The Jaguars prefer at least Trevor Lawrence to Fields, but maybe also Zach Wilson and at least one other QB. The Jets prefer at least Wilson, probably, if not also Lawrence and one or two other QBs. The 49ers probably do prefer Lawrence and Wilson to Fields, and we’ll see if they prefer another QB over him too. Yes, a draft can have multiple elite QBs in it, but a) that’s so rare and b) if there were four such quarterbacks, the 49ers wouldn’t have paid such a high cost to get to three. We’ll see if it’s Fields, maybe I am wrong about that, even if I prefer Jones and Trey Lance, at least.
It is possible that the Ravens will trade Orlando Brown prior to the draft, a move that’s just hanging in the air and one that will shake up the first round, at least. DeForest Buckner netted the 13th overall pick a year ago. Speaking of which, would the Chargers be the team to make that move for Brown? Another huge get for Justin Herbert’s impending MVP campaign if they did.
It’s a shame to see Zach Wilson go to the Jets. Good luck. This in the NFL would be great television:
For some context, I wanted to compare watching Wilson’s highlights to watching Johnny Manziel’s. Not saying they’re alike, but in small ways, they are. Then I watched some Manziel (I’d mute the vid, I couldn’t readily find a reel that didn’t suck with too much editing) and I can’t believe this was a first round pick. Wilson is a quarterback. I don’t know what Manziel was, but not an NFL quarterback. That should have been obvious.
Another cornerback who might go earlier than expected and a solid fit for Seattle maybe: Benjamin St-Juste out of Minnesota. If a team gets St-Juste and Bateman, that’s a pairing.
Speaking of which, I saw a PFF guy do a Ravens mock after they traded Orlando Brown today. Oh yeah, they did trade Orlando Brown between the time I first wrote that and publishing, which I’ll do right now. The Chiefs got seemingly a great left tackle and the Ravens get a decent amount of draft picks for a player who wasn’t going to play for them again. Baltimore will now pick 31st, but they gave up their second rounder to get there, while adding a couple of mid-round picks. This is a good year for midround picks. Ravens would be lucky to have a haul like this, I imagine:
Okay, see you again soon.