The American
Sideline
Injury questions, character issues, academic problems and suspensions... Richard L Gale tries to prioritize all the perceived negatives of this year’s draft class
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nless the St Louis Rams have been performing a remarkable bluff, by the time you read these words, they will have selected Oklahoma passer Sam Bradford as the no.1 pick of the 2010 NFL Draft. He is considered – at least by consensus – to be far and away the best quarterback prospect in this year’s class. If we were being thorough, however, we might observe that over the past 15 months, Bradford has thrown just 63 passes, completing 37 of them, and started just two games (completing neither of those) due to a shoulder injury. If we fancy being really picky, he also spent much of his career in the shotgun rather than under center. Then again, if NFL war rooms took that kind of attitude with this year’s talent pool (or most year’s, come to that), the draft might never start. By the time late April rolls around, the football reasons for wanting a player have been tempered by workout times, arrests, suspensions, questions of coachability, attitude and desire, flunked wonderlic tests, and every player’s portfolio of injuries. Sounds like more trouble than it’s worth. The Jets only drafted three players last season – no wonder they did so well.
defensive tackles that aren’t considered overweight are considered underweight. Every outsider rusher is a ‘tweener’, every running back who isn’t slow ‘lacks durability’, every receiver has attitude, and from there the details transcend measurables and start getting ugly ... a running back who socked an opponent in the mouth after a loss ... a linebacker who tried to gouge an opponent’s eyes ... another with drinkdriving incidents. Too tall... too troublesome... too religious(!?)... while ex-FSU Seminole safety Myron Rolle, a Rhodes Scholar over here in Oxford this past
year, has some people worried he’s too smart for football. Some of this sounds like paralysis by analysis. Take the case of Oklahoma State’s Dez Bryant, whose pre-draft profiles included his evasiveness with NCAA investigators as much as his evasiveness in the secondary. The NCAA didn’t feel he was being upfront with them when questioned about hanging out with Deion Sanders (apparently a serious infraction), and after missing most of his senior season, he timed surprisingly slowly for a player considered the top receiving prospect in the
Flying high or falling fast? Dez Bryant is the top-rated receiver prospect in the draft despite missing most of his senior season after being suspended by the NCAA. But after posting a slow 40 at his pre-draft workout, did his value slump? PHOTO: OSU ATHLETICS
Reasons to be Cheerless
During my annual pre-draft homework sessions, I’ve read about slow cornerbacks, inconsistent defensive ends, and overaggressive safeties (is there such a thing?), while the
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