Stevan Ridley

[NFLroughdraft]

The two biggest BB overdrafts were, without a doubt, Vollmer and Mankins. They both got picked two to four rounds above where most mock drafts had them going.

Did you laugh at those picks?

No I didn't laugh. Because those two guys weren't overdrafts at all.

 

[Oswlek]

No I didn't laugh. Because those two guys weren't overdrafts at all.

There were reports that San Fran was looking at Mankins at 33, but the consensus was that Vollmer was, in fact, as big a reach as Ridley.

 

[ctpatsfan77]

There were reports that San Fran was looking at Mankins at 33, but the consensus was that Vollmer was, in fact, as big a reach as Ridley.

Jury hasn't even convened on Ridley yet, but it's pretty darn clear that Vollmer was not only not an actual reach, he was a bargain.

 

[Oswlek]

Jury hasn't even convened on Ridley yet, but it's pretty darn clear that Vollmer was not only not an actual reach, he was a bargain.

Agreed. I'm just basing it on the "expert" rankings at the time of the each draft. But you are right, Vollmer would have gone in the top ten if people knew he'd be this good, which is precisely why I don't give any credence to the "reach" and "steal" talk.

 

[cstjohn17]

The more I see of this guy the more Im loving him. I have a feeling this guy is going to be a better player than Vereen....And I like Vereen...Looks like the kind of guy that can get 15-20 carries a game, Bring some balance back to our offense....Corey Dillon Days..

YouTube - Stevan Ridley

If he can have the same JAG type career as Sammy Morris he would meet my expectations.

 

[NFLroughdraft]

There were reports that San Fran was looking at Mankins at 33, but the consensus was that Vollmer was, in fact, as big a reach as Ridley.

I know for a fact that the Raiders really liked Vollmer and considered him in the 3rd round.

Again, I don't base my rankings off of other people's opinions. Our site is always in the top-10 on The Huddle Report's top-100 board rankings. I'm pretty good at figuring out what a player's actual value is.

And BB does a good job most of the time. I just think it's funny that the media turns everything he touches to gold. Any other team would have gotten slammed for taking both of those running backs in the spots that they went. Plus, Nate Solder has a very high ceiling, but he can't pass block right now. Castonzo and Carimi were both still there (not to mention Seymour has been the best overall player on Oakland's roster over the past two seasons).

 

[Oswlek]

I know for a fact that the Raiders really liked Vollmer and considered him in the 3rd round.

Again, I don't base my rankings off of other people's opinions. Our site is always in the top-10 on The Huddle Report's top-100 board rankings. I'm pretty good at figuring out what a player's actual value is.

And BB does a good job most of the time. I just think it's funny that the media turns everything he touches to gold. Any other team would have gotten slammed for taking both of those running backs in the spots that they went. Plus, Nate Solder has a very high ceiling, but he can't pass block right now. Castonzo and Carimi were both still there (not to mention Seymour has been the best overall player on Oakland's roster over the past two seasons).

Carimi is about as bad a fit for NE's offense as you can get. No thanks. Not sure why people keep brining him up to prove that NE could have passed on Solder as it does the opposite for me.

And please don't bring up Seymour again. Jonathan Kraft said the other day that Seymour would have been difficult to sign. BB's trade inidcates he thought he would be difficult to sign. About the only people who think Seymour could have been retained are the fans who look for an excuse to slam the organization.

Beyond that, NE went into the 2009 season knowing they had to re-sign Brady, Wilfork and Mankins and didn't have any cap room to do so then. So, if they retained Seymour, they would have gone into the 2010 offseason with Wilfork, Seymour and Mankins completely unsigned. There is no reasonable way to suggest that Seymour should have been retained.

 

[SanAngeloState]

I like ridley, jury is out for me on vereen still.

But BB has been a horrible drafter at times. That is undeniable. Kareem Brown? Chad Jackson? Ohrn-berger (who some crazy people said was a bust). He's had whole drafts be garbage, so stop with the "he's the best drafter in the world" stuff.

Hopefully he's better at drafting RBs than WRs...well other than of course Maroney-. Maybe he's learned his lessons the hard way.

 

[Oswlek]

I like ridley, jury is out for me on vereen still.

But BB has been a horrible drafter at times. That is undeniable. Kareem Brown? Chad Jackson? Ohrn-berger (who some crazy people said was a bust). He's had whole drafts be garbage, so stop with the "he's the best drafter in the world" stuff.

Hopefully he's better at drafting RBs than WRs...well other than of course Maroney-. Maybe he's learned his lessons the hard way.

Show me a guy who has not made an equal amount of "horrible draft(ing)" and I'll show you a poster at patsfans.com.

 

[Shelterdog]

Show me a guy who has not made an equal amount of "horrible draft(ing)" and I'll show you a poster at patsfans.com.

There's a good pscyhology paper to be written about the cognitive biases of draftniks.

Everybody who's crapping on the Patriots for picking Ridley names 8 guys (not only one, a whole bunch) who the Pats should have taken instead. In three years even if 7 of the 8 guys are out of the NFL and Ridley is an ok pro player, they'll claim that the 8th guy who they thought of who went on to become a pro bowler (say Hankerson) was the one they REALLY wanted instead of Ridley.

 

[NFLroughdraft]

Carimi is about as bad a fit for NE's offense as you can get. No thanks. Not sure why people keep brining him up to prove that NE could have passed on Solder as it does the opposite for me.

And please don't bring up Seymour again. Jonathan Kraft said the other day that Seymour would have been difficult to sign. BB's trade inidcates he thought he would be difficult to sign. About the only people who think Seymour could have been retained are the fans who look for an excuse to slam the organization.

Beyond that, NE went into the 2009 season knowing they had to re-sign Brady, Wilfork and Mankins and didn't have any cap room to do so then. So, if they retained Seymour, they would have gone into the 2010 offseason with Wilfork, Seymour and Mankins completely unsigned. There is no reasonable way to suggest that Seymour should have been retained.

Why is Carimi a bad fit for the offense? Nate Solder is going to get Brady killed if he is relied upon to start.

I didn't say the Pats shouldn't have traded Seymour. My point was that everyone marvels at how New England has so many draft picks every year without stopping to think about what the team gave up. On top of that, you may have lost Seymour this year, but you would have had 2 dominant seasons from him and a 3rd round compensation pick in next year's draft.

 

[NFLroughdraft]

There's a good pscyhology paper to be written about the cognitive biases of draftniks.

Everybody who's crapping on the Patriots for picking Ridley names 8 guys (not only one, a whole bunch) who the Pats should have taken instead. In three years even if 7 of the 8 guys are out of the NFL and Ridley is an ok pro player, they'll claim that the 8th guy who they thought of who went on to become a pro bowler (say Hankerson) was the one they REALLY wanted instead of Ridley.

We're all wrong sometimes. Everyone is. But when dumb picks turn out to be.......well.....dumb picks, there is no defense. The Pats drafted Kevin O'Connell in the 3rd round. Why? He was a late round prospect at best. But everyone talked about how the Pats would turn him into a quality pro QB. That never happened. So yes, I'm going to look back on that and question what the team was thinking.

As for this year, your team had six picks in the first 3 rounds. You drafted a project that isn't ready to play to address OT. I thought the Dowling choice was a really solid value so no problem there. You drafted Vereen over every RB in the draft except Ingram and you took a 4th-5th round prospect to double up on the position in the 3rd round. Then you took Mallett...who helps your team in no way at all. He's basically another lottery ticket toward yet another future draft pick.

 

[dryheat44]

Why is Carimi a bad fit for the offense? Nate Solder is going to get Brady killed if he is relied upon to start.

I didn't say the Pats shouldn't have traded Seymour. My point was that everyone marvels at how New England has so many draft picks every year without stopping to think about what the team gave up. On top of that, you may have lost Seymour this year, but you would have had 2 dominant seasons from him and a 3rd round compensation pick in next year's draft.

That seems like a big assumption. At the time of the trade, Seymour had 1 year left on his contract. He very well may have held out, or sandbagged it to avoid getting hurt. We have no idea whether he'd be "dominant" or not. I'd argue that he hadn't been dominant his last year here.

Then you seem to be assuming he'd get franchised, in the same year that Wilfork and Mankins were also becoming UFAs. Seymour probably would've been the third priority of the three to get tagged. Wilfork's extension didn't come until much later.

So, it seems that we could've kept Seymour for one more year and taken a 3rd round comp pick as compensation, or we could've traded Seymour for Oakland's first round pick, which could well have turned out to be a top 5 pick, gained a lot of cap space which was used to re-sign Wilfork long term.

Can anybody really make a cogent argument that trading Seymour cost us the Super Bowl that year?

I have a hard time being convinced that Belichick made the wrong decision on this one....and that's before we see what Solder can do.

 

[MaineMan]

There's a good pscyhology paper to be written about the cognitive biases of draftniks.

Everybody who's crapping on the Patriots for picking Ridley names 8 guys (not only one, a whole bunch) who the Pats should have taken instead. In three years even if 7 of the 8 guys are out of the NFL and Ridley is an ok pro player, they'll claim that the 8th guy who they thought of who went on to become a pro bowler (say Hankerson) was the one they REALLY wanted instead of Ridley.

I really like Hankerson and think he'll turn out to be very special.

HOWEVER, if the Pats can win the next couple Superbowls with Ridley contributing only 4-5 carries/game for 300-350 yds and 4-5 TDs a season with no fumbles, I won't really care if Hankerson becomes the next Randy Moss.

 

[Oswlek]

Why is Carimi a bad fit for the offense? Nate Solder is going to get Brady killed if he is relied upon to start.

I didn't say the Pats shouldn't have traded Seymour. My point was that everyone marvels at how New England has so many draft picks every year without stopping to think about what the team gave up. On top of that, you may have lost Seymour this year, but you would have had 2 dominant seasons from him and a 3rd round compensation pick in next year's draft.

The two people who I consider the most knowledgeable about the draft (one had NE picking Solder and Dowling) both agreed (seperately) that Carimi doesn't have the feet to handle speed rushers, nor is he good in open space, which NE OL absolutely must be. The guy who had Solder rated very high went as far as pointing out some footage on NFLN where you could see Carimi tripping over his own feet.

Admittedly, it isn't an NFL scout or anything, but rarely does anyone amount to much if both of them are down on him, and they were both WAY down. No thanks.

We're all wrong sometimes. Everyone is. But when dumb picks turn out to be.......well.....dumb picks, there is no defense. The Pats drafted Kevin O'Connell in the 3rd round. Why? He was a late round prospect at best. But everyone talked about how the Pats would turn him into a quality pro QB. That never happened. So yes, I'm going to look back on that and question what the team was thinking.

As for this year, your team had six picks in the first 3 rounds. You drafted a project that isn't ready to play to address OT. I thought the Dowling choice was a really solid value so no problem there. You drafted Vereen over every RB in the draft except Ingram and you took a 4th-5th round prospect to double up on the position in the 3rd round. Then you took Mallett...who helps your team in no way at all. He's basically another lottery ticket toward yet another future draft pick.

No, there is no defense. Except people hold NE accountable as if no other team also has their swings and misses. The defense is when you look at the overall body of work and NE grades out higher than nearly every other team in the league at finding quality players.

I fully expect at least 2 of the guys NE selected to wash out within the next 3 years. But as long as they get two starters and two regular contributors it will be a fine haul.

 

[Shelterdog]

We're all wrong sometimes. Everyone is. But when dumb picks turn out to be.......well.....dumb picks, there is no defense. The Pats drafted Kevin O'Connell in the 3rd round. Why? He was a late round prospect at best. But everyone talked about how the Pats would turn him into a quality pro QB. That never happened. So yes, I'm going to look back on that and question what the team was thinking.

As for this year, your team had six picks in the first 3 rounds. You drafted a project that isn't ready to play to address OT. I thought the Dowling choice was a really solid value so no problem there. You drafted Vereen over every RB in the draft except Ingram and you took a 4th-5th round prospect to double up on the position in the 3rd round. Then you took Mallett...who helps your team in no way at all. He's basically another lottery ticket toward yet another future draft pick.

Two things. First if you have Mankins as a late first and Vollmer as a late second you are really good at this--there's nobody else that I saw that had them rated anywhere close to that high before the draft. Do you have a link from before the draft where you expressed these opinions? The Pats got smacked around a bit by most draftniks for the Mankins and Vollmer picks. Hell, Kiper said that Vollmer might last until the 7th round.

Second, you really don't seem to understand how a market like the draft works. If you think a player is better than the consensus, like the Pats seemd to have thought with Mankins, KOC and Ridley, your options are (a) take the player earlier than the consensus says or (b) wait until closer to when the player is "supposed" to go and risk having another team who also really likes the player swoop in, and you end up getting a guy who you don't like. Unless you know what other teams are going to do you are going to have to overdraft guys who you are particularly fond of every now and then.

The problem with drafting KOC isn't really a problem of drafting tactics, it's a problem of talent evaluation.

 

[patchick]

The problem with drafting KOC isn't really a problem of drafting tactics, it's a problem of talent evaluation.

I totally, totally agree with this. You can see it in the reverse case, too. Imagine a player who's widely projected as 2nd/high 3rd talent, but you manage to nab him in the 5th. Woo-hoo, great pick, right? Sure, unless his name is Ryan O'Callaghan.

I really liked the O'Connell pick at the time. I was surprised it came so early, but the potential of a smart 4-year captain with terrific size and athleticism was terrific. I was wrong, and the Patriots were wrong. But the wrongness was about the player, not the concept.

 

[Off The Grid]

I'll say the same about the Vereen/Ridley combo. Drafting one of those guys where they went is one thing, but there's no reason to take both.

The persistent inability of so many to grasp that Vereen and Ridley clearly have two significantly different roles is astonishing.

 

[Off The Grid]

I know for a fact that the Raiders really liked Vollmer and considered him in the 3rd round.

Oh, REALLY???

 

[Shelterdog]

I totally, totally agree with this. You can see it in the reverse case, too. Imagine a player who's widely projected as 2nd/high 3rd talent, but you manage to nab him in the 5th. Woo-hoo, great pick, right? Sure, unless his name is Ryan O'Callaghan.

I agree, although O'Callaghan was a decent enough player for a fifth round pick.

Matt Leinart and Brady Quinn come to mind. The great value you receive by drafting a top five pick in the middle of the round doesn't really work if the guy can't play.