Carlos Dunlap vs Jermaine Cunningham

[patsfaninpa]

Dunlap got a DUI after being out drinking Tuesday morning before their SEC Championship Game on Saturday. He played for the top ranked team in the country about to go against a great Alabama team. He got suspended for one of the biggest games in SEC history. Does this not make you question the kid's judgement? Sure, he looks like a better player than Cunningham. But, the draft pick wasn't made on football ability itself. Hope you don't hurt your shoulder patting yourself on the back.

 

[DarrylS]

Dunlap got drafted into a system where he immediately had to make an impact, Cunningham got drafted into a system where he had the luxury to learn how to play in it.

Comparing draft picks from team to team is folly, as there are different philosophies and different needs...

If Cunningham went to the Bengals he may have had better numbers, because they suck...

 

[borg]

BB has screwed us again!!

 

[patchick]

True that. It's amazing to me that other teams besides the Patriots sometimes draft good players.

I think there are a ton of common fallacies behind draft complaints. There's a widespread misunderstanding of how reliable draft picking is and what percentage of picks succeed leaguewide -- the notion that whiffing on a 2nd or 3rd round pick is unusual and unacceptable. (A Pats-specific version of the above: not realizing that making far more high draft picks than any other team means you will inevitably end up with a lot of misses.)

There's the idea that any good player drafted elsewhere constitutes a "miss" and a "mistake" by your team. There's the bias to remember the the prospects you got "righter" than your team, and forget the many, many players you liked who fell flat -- not to mention the Vollmers, Mankins and McCourtys who you were furious about them wasting high picks on.

Etc.

But that doesn't mean that we as fans can NEVER legitimately play I-told-you-so. IMO the key requirement is that you actually had to tell them so! (No, that doesn't mean saying "I really want to come away with Barwin, English, Maybin, Matthews or Brown" and then two years later saying "See, I told you they should have taken Matthews!" )

IMO Cunningham vs. Dunlap is about as fair a case of second-guessing as you'll find. A good chunk of this board really wanted Dunlap, he was generally the more highly regarded player, and the Patriots took the guy playing directly opposite him one pick before him. Note that Dunlap's success doesn't necessarily make Cunningham a "bad pick" -- hopefully Cunningham will continue to develop -- but it is fair to keep an eye on the pair over time and wish for what might have been, if it's what you wanted all along.

Here's a 2010 draftday post in which the OP and I commiserate over BB passing on Dunlap, but hope for the best:
http://www.patsfans.com/new-england...e-cunningham-selection-page2.html#post1801706
Isn't it only natural for us to feel some pangs watching him now?

 

[stcjones]

To hell with Dunlap. At this point i want to see Cunningham actually say healthy and get on the field. Dude was injured all of last year and now he has the same injury before the season has even begun..

This is the biggest problem for the guy....so far he is made of glass. Hard to prove the critics wrong when you can't even stay on the field....

 

[JackBauer]

This is the biggest problem for the guy....so far he is made of glass. Hard to prove the critics wrong when you can't even stay on the field....

He missed 1 game last year. If you are going to rip the guy, at least find accurate reasons to do it.

.....................

 

[patchick]

There's some truth on both sides of the "Cunningham staying healthy" argument. He's missing only his 2nd game this week, but TC injuries both years have held back his development, and IIRC missed some practices throughout last season.

 

[JackBauer]

There's some truth on both sides of the "Cunningham staying healthy" argument. He's missing only his 2nd game this week, but TC injuries both years have held back his development, and IIRC missed some practices throughout last season.

Eh. Not a robust enough sample size for me to assign him the "glass" label.

If he's not healthy in a couple weeks, then I'll start to worry.

 

[Sicilian]

Eh. Not a robust enough sample size for me to assign him the "glass" label.

If he's not healthy in a couple weeks, then I'll start to worry.

Even that won't bother me as much... worse if he comes back and injures something else. Then I'll raise an eyebrow.

 

[folamzz]

Dunlap got drafted into a system where he immediately had to make an impact, Cunningham got drafted into a system where he had the luxury to learn how to play in it.

Comparing draft picks from team to team is folly, as there are different philosophies and different needs...

If Cunningham went to the Bengals he may have had better numbers, because they suck...

You must be one of those so called BB lovers who found many ways to defend Butler, maroney, chad jackson and so on. Cunningham would not have better number on the bengals because he's not a better player than dunlap. Cunningham is a jag. BB the coach is great, but BB the GM is average especially at drafting. I don't drink the coolaid on this board. BB doesn't know more football than everybody in the league like some fans would like us to believe. We have left too many good players on the board in recent years.

 

[JackBauer]

Cunningham is a jag.

Good call, folamzz. It's a well-known rule in professional sports that players don't progress after their rookie season.

 

[SanAngeloState]

Looks like they screwed the pooch AGAIN on this one! No, I'm half kidding. Cunninghamm...well I'll give him some more time...as for Dunlap, the guy fell asleep drunk at a red light the week of his bowl game or something like that. How do you draft someone that nonchalant about football? So I'm not sure if I can blame him for that. "You can't blame him for that animal" (movie reference).

 

[ay-yo]

BB the coach is great, but BB the GM is average especially at drafting.

My take is that BB is a very good GM but only an average drafter. By trading 2nd for 1st, etc, he has given himself an advantage over the rest of the teams in the NFL. By doing so has has come away with more talent the last several years than most teams.

I don't think you can separate GM and coaching when the same man does both. Lets say Bill brings in a bunch of average players. He uses his superior coaching to get them to perform at a high level and win games in spite of being only average players. How long do these players need to perform at this level to be considered good?

 

[patchick]

You must be one of those so called BB lovers who found many ways to defend Butler, maroney, chad jackson and so on. Cunningham would not have better number on the bengals because he's not a better player than dunlap. Cunningham is a jag. BB the coach is great, but BB the GM is average especially at drafting. I don't drink the coolaid on this board. BB doesn't know more football than everybody in the league like some fans would like us to believe. We have left too many good players on the board in recent years.

Please see post 24 above about common draft fallacies.

 

[captain stone]

I was not a big Dunlap fan, because of his poor on-field fit & off-field troubles, both of which have been noted above. Besides, if Bill was looking for more traditional 4-3 DE types who could poss. convert to 3-4 OLBs, then both Everson Griffin & Corey Wootton were better candidates & still available at the end of the 3rd round.

But there was no way in hell I would've drafted Cunningham in the 2nd round. That is At Least a full round before I ever would have begun to consider him. His good but not exceptional athleticism & production demanded nothing better than a late 3rd-early 5th grade. And IIRC, he wasn't exactly a choir boy throughout his college career, either.

 

[patchick]

Dunlap got a DUI after being out drinking Tuesday morning before their SEC Championship Game on Saturday. He played for the top ranked team in the country about to go against a great Alabama team. He got suspended for one of the biggest games in SEC history. Does this not make you question the kid's judgement?

Yep -- as I said above, I think that was a big part of the decision in a year when they loaded up on players known for their commitment and leadership. Cunningham, not Dunlap, was the team captain.

And lest we start thinking too well of ourselves, everybody take a look back on your full OLB wish list for 2010. I really liked Daniel Te'o-Nesheim...who recently cleared waivers. And a whole lot of fans wanted Sergio Kindle most of all. (Sound familiar, Mr. OP? )

 

[jsull87]

Yep -- as I said above, I think that was a big part of the decision in a year when they loaded up on players known for their commitment and leadership. Cunningham, not Dunlap, was the team captain.

And lest we start thinking too well of ourselves, everybody take a look back on your full OLB wish list for 2010. I really liked Daniel Te'o-Nesheim...who recently cleared waivers. And a whole lot of fans wanted Sergio Kindle most of all. (Sound familiar, Mr. OP? )

This is exactly right. Everyone spurts out the success stories that we wanted e.g mathews, dunlap.

What about larry english, aaron maybin, everett brown e.t.c that people on the board were throwing round.

We can't sit back and appreciate the Mayo, mccourty, mankins e.t.c picks then get all in a huff when we pick someone else other than every superstar in the league.

 

[Ochmed Jones]

I really liked Daniel Te'o-Nesheim...who recently cleared waivers.

Don't we have an opening on the PS?

He might come in handy once the veteran retreads, Anderson and Carter, break down in a few weeks.

 

[borg]

Will Cunningham dress for a game this year...so we can have stats to compare?

 

[patchick]

Don't we have an opening on the PS?

He might come in handy once the veteran retreads, Anderson and Carter, break down in a few weeks.

Eagles signed him back to their own PS.