Reaches?

I don't have a problem with people giving their opinion but there should be some level of expectation of logic behind it. Just saying Sweed is better than all those guys means nothing. Granted he might turn out to be but there has to some reason he lasted so long in the draft and had all those other guys drafted ahead of him.

Jwill1919 said he "shuddered" to think all those guys taken before Sweed would be productive in the league (oh except maybe Royal). Basically doesn't that say that Jwill1919 thinks he is a better judge of talent (smarter) than those coaches, scouts and GMs that make their living making decisions on players (not to mention the big pay checks these kids will be getting)? Bottom line is many more than one GM passed on Sweed and guys taken ahead of him were not guys we expected to see taken so early. Heck, IMO anyone who thinks we should have taken Sweed in the first is basically saying every team from the Titans first round pick until the Steelers 2nd round pick, ALL the NFL teams were simply stupid to pass on this stud WR with first round value. All those teams that did take a WR must have been REAL stupid to actually think another guy was better. What other conclusion can someone have?

 

No it doesn't imply that Jwill1919 thinks that.

It implies that he thinks Sweed is the best of the receivers from this last class. Nowhere does it imply that he is "smarter" than any GMs.

It doesn't make them stupid for passing on him. We could say every NFL team was stupid for passing on Joe Montana, or Jerry Rice.

The pro's do the best they can with the information available to them. Sometimes a simple fan will be more right about a player than the pro's were.

An example, in the stock market I can guarantee that I've done better than some professionals the last few years. It doesn't make them stupid, and it doesn't make me smarter. I just happened to be more right about the stocks I invested in, then the one's they recommended.

My point would be, that just because a fan makes an opinion on a player... "i like this player", "I think these guys will bomb in the pro's", "This guy is the steal of the draft"... isn't the same thing as saying "I am smarter than so and so GM". And a non-professional could get something right that the pro got wrong.


I would also pose this... as fans of the team, shouldn't we question what moves our franchise makes?

 

They ask prospects to do about 10 different drills and tests and they interview them. It is information they are trying to get as much information as they can. If ypou can find a direct coorelation between success in the nfl and that one drill i would be glad to see it. Show me the study that shows the direct coorelation netween 40 time and success.

Hester ran a 4.41 40 in his combine so i guess CJ will be better for sure then.

 

Do you have ANY idea why they make guys take the wonderlic if it doesn't translate exactly to field inteligence?

I took gut's post and changed it a little to prove that our starting QB must be too dumb after all they give the test it must be a perfect indicator right? No!

The purpose of the scouting combine is to gather an information database on players. If CJ is so damn fast why not run every single speed drill? Why not run the 40 again at pro day? Because he is fast only in a straight line? Because he got an unusually fast start and the time was abnormally good for him? I would like to compare his cone time to that of pther players. The 60 yard shuttle he should own that right?

Isn't this exactly the same thing that happened to matt jones? He runs this eye popping sub 4.4 40 and basically packs it in and gets drafted in the first rd?

 

I think Earl Bennett will be one of the best WRs in this draft class (Go Bears). But I'm not going to go off the deep end and proclaim that all the WRs drafted before him won't be productive. There were reason those guys got picked ahead of Sweed and like I said before, it wasn't just one or two teams. Eight teams picked WRs before Sweed got picked. We shall see. Jwill1919 could very well be right. I just think there is something to all these other teams passing on the guy.

As far as Montana and Rice. Yes every team that passed on those guys missed it. Having the insight to pick those guys is the difference in winning SBs and not. Still, I'd hardly compare passing on Rice as being the same thing as passing on Sweed considering Sweed played on the big stage and Rice was a less know player coming out because of where he played. As for QBs who knows? I remember when everyone was debating if Leaf or Manning was the better #1 pick. QB is obviously much harder to predict (see Tom Brady).

Anyway, my whole point is with that many teams passing on Sweed, a guy who played major college ball everyone knew a great deal about says something. Now if the Titans had taken Sweed with their first pick or moved up to get him in the 2nd round maybe I'd feel differently. Even with the Titans lack of WR playmakers they didn't think Sweed was worth it.

 

I think there is another conclusion that can be made. A lot of people are trying to say that the WRs just weren't rated as highly by the teams as many of the draft "experts" thought. I will certainly agree that no team saw a "Calvin Johnson" prototype or that WR wouldn't have been passed up in the first round.

But I'm think that most teams had the WRs rated similar. In other words, there wasn't a team that had Sweed rated way higher than Kelly, Devin Thomas, whoever.

I think that fact helped contribute to the WRs sliding into the 2nd round. Teams probably assumed, hey we can not draft a WR 1st round and still get someone we like in the 2nd.


You know I think the Titans went bat**** crazy, so I'm not saying they would've drafted Sweed even if the Steelers hadn't taken him. But I think the fact there were so many highly rated receivers, that contributed to the slide as much as anything.

 

There were 20 Wrs taken in the first 4 rds. 10 in rd 2 and 10 in rds 3 and 4. What we will see 4 years from now is that there will be little or no correlation between where they were drafted and how good they become.

The top 5 Wrs taken will not be that much more productive than the last 5 of those 20. There are some major reaches in the 2nd rd and not so many in rds 3 and 4. Avery was a huge reach in rd 2 i thought shields the richmond WR taken in the 4th rd at 125 was a reach.

There were some Wrs who were first rd caliber based on their college credentials. Jordy nelson, manningham and bennett all had fabulous college careers and were consistent throughout. Maybe they should have been the top 3.

 

We took a RB with the 2nd pick last year thats what is wrong with taking Chris Johnson in the 1st round.

 

The issue with Wrs in college is if they can be big time producers 2 years in a row. Once a player has that big season the next year defenses are going to try harder to stop you with double teams, using their best corner etc. What happens then will tell you something about a player.

2 top sec Wrs had fantastic seasons in 2006 but fell off some in 07 and that caused them to drop some in the draft. Both earl bennett and keenan burton would have been 2nd rd picks had they duplicated their 2006 stats.

As for sweed he did NOT produce big time in college. One 800 yard season is not big time production. Last year he played 6 games and had one 100 yard game. Bennett and burton were more productive in the sec than he was in the big 12.