He traded up for Jones and Hightower. Could have traded up for JJ Watt and Cam Jordan. Or, stood pat and take Wilkerson after trading up for moving up a pick or two for Kerrigan. We needed a WR every bit as much as a rb going into 2011. Torrey Smith and Randall Cobb sitting their for us. 3 years later and they are still better than anyone we've picked in the 2011-2014 drafts. A little creativity and it could have been special.
I can give you yesterday's lottery numbers today and predict yesterday's weather with 100% accuracy. Doesn't mean I have more insights into these things than anyone else.
Obviously we can look back at every draft and find the best players that should have been selected higher up. Doesn't mean a team blew it by not drafting somebody. Players develop or fail for lots of different reasons.
But I don't think you would have felt that way after Watt's rookie season. It was good, but guys like Von Miller and Aldon Smith were battling for DROY and Watt was pretty overlooked. I doubt even Houston knew what he would end up becoming. Ditto Cam Jordan, who only had one sack in his rookie season and would have been booted out of town by half this board before given the chance to blossom.
And it's great to point at every 2nd-round WR we could have had, as if those teams are somehow brilliant and we're morons. Green Bay looks great for drafting Cobb in the 2nd so long as we overlook the fact they took Derek Sherrod over Cobb in the 1st. The Ravens took Jimmy Smith before Torrey Smith, and while Jimmy is finally coming into his own after 3 seasons, they got way more contributions from Torrey initially. The Bears drafted Shea McClellin ahead of Alshon Jeffery. Even when teams hit on players, they miss on others, sometimes even higher up.
Teams routinely miss on guys multiple times and then they get lucky late and then we say, wow, what a great draft because they found a guy in the 5th or 7th. Edelman is obviously going higher than the 7th round if the draft is done again, so does that mean we are good at finding diamonds in the rough, or stupid for letting him slip?
It seems the pattern is if we find someone late, we're stupid for letting him slip that late, a la Brady. But when other teams do it, they're great at drafting. The Seahawks found Richard Sherman in the 5th so they're great. They also selected James Carpenter, John Moffitt, K.J. Wright, and Kris Durham ahead of him, which is ummm...not so good.
The 49ers got NaVorro Bowman in the 3rd, which was good. Of course, they also spent their 2nd that year on Taylor Mays. The Packers took Brian Brohm in the 2nd ahead of Patrick Lee later in the 2nd, Jermichael Finley in the 3rd, Josh Sitton in the 4th, and Matt Flynn in the 7th. The Broncos drafted Rahim Moore, Orlando Franklin, Nate Irving, and Quintin Carter ahead of Julius Thomas.
And these are the GOOD teams.
This isn't to defend BB's record or to say we hit on more picks than anyone or anything of that nature. It's just to state the obvious that the draft can be a bit of a crapshoot, and even the best teams end up surprised at how things turn out. We are not the only team to miss a high pick or get an injury-riddled player or pick a player who ends up failing miserably. It happens to every single team in the league.
But to hold every draft class to such a ridiculously high standard is insane. I know you can do it in Franchise mode on Madden, but real life isn't the same, and no team has done it consistently. Everyone has good drafts and bad drafts. Everyone has hits and misses. It would be nice if people were more realistic about things. Then again, if that were they case, they wouldn't be trolling internet message boards with the same **** over and over and over again.
