patchick

As we wave goodbye to Chad Jackson, has anyone else paused to speculate whether BB was swayed too much by his time with Urban Meyer in Florida? Remember all the reports of him hanging out with the Gators, soaking it all in? Then the Pats drafted two of those Gator players, which was seen at the time as a clear, direct offshoot of his visits there. And neither of those players panned out.

Which got me thinking...Rohan Davey and Marquise Hill came from LSU with a push from good pal Saban. Hmm, maybe we could get by with a little less help from our friends. But then we wouldn't have Logan Mankins and...who?

Would anybody like to pitch in on an analysis of the Patriots' "friends and family" picks? Do the "pipelines" we love to talk about here really help, or hurt?

cstjohn17

I don't have any that jump to mind but I hope he never speaks to Urban Meyer again...

I am sure Meyer, Saban, Groh, Weiss, Hill and the guy at Iowa give a pretty fair description of players in their conferences.

D-cleater

Good topic. Ellis came from Iowa State who's coach BB has a relationship with as well. You can connect the dots with the new T we just picked up from Notre Dame as well.

Unfortunately, either Weiss didn't communicate the value of Greg Jennings enough or the scouts / BB got too googley eyed with Jackson.

I'm guessing the Pats scouting dept, as well other NFL scouts, get as much information regarding players that coaches have coached against as those they have coached. There's probably a lot of good, objective information there. Note how while BB is tight with Meyer, he has drafted more U of M players than UF.

dryheat44

Eric Alexander, Blue Gay

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Ochmed Jones

I think coaches will always rely on pipeline's and connections with college coaches. I think Mankins was a great find and the BB-Pat Hill connection probably has a lot to do with it.

I think the college coaching connection works both ways for pro coaches. It gives them insite into college players, both good and bad. Of course we never hear about the bad and only see some of the good.

FreeTedWilliams

These "pipeline" picks also come in knowing the system. Look for the Pats to pick up some more ND offensive players, as soon as they (ND) no longer suck.

I hated the Johnson pick when they made it, I wanted Fasano, or Jones-Drew (although that wasn't going to happen once they took Maroney, who I liked even more). Looking back we could have had either Fasano, Jones-Drew, or a guy named Hester (without trading up to the spot where they got Johnson).

The LSU guys, Faulk, Green, Gay, have been excellent players. Look for BB to gravitate towards Saban's ALabama guys now. BB has two very trusted guys in very high profile jobs in college, so hopefully they can draft a little better than they have in the last couple of years.

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Ochmed Jones

I could not figure out why BB didn't jump on TE Carlson of ND. I thought he fit our system well and he could block a little, ran decent routes and could catch fairly well. I always thought there was something else going on with Carlson we did not know about.

One more thing on the Urban Meyer pipeline. Someone is going to over draft Tim Tebow and are they in for a huge surprise when they find out Tebow can't read a milk carton let alone an NFL defense. Surprise! Surprise! Surprise!

FreeTedWilliams

I've said all along that Tebow is a TE in the NFL.
(Of course, this coming from a guy with a "Honk if you sacked Tebow" bumpersticker).

Go DAWGS!!

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BelichickFan

I think you're thinking of Kirk Ferentz who is at Iowa, not Iowa State.

Yeah, Florida hasn't been good to us. LSU has been so-so. College coaches do have an agenda to get their players drafted as high as possible. In general, though, it's reasonable to have more confidence in Weis and Saban players as Belichick has a much longer relationship with them and they have more scheme similarities than that thing they play at Florida which isn't much like the Patriots on offense or defense.

captain stone

James Sanders, for what it's worth.

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