The Long Snapper (4/26/10)
Denver Broncos
head coach
Josh McDaniels
has one vision for
Tim Tebow
and one vision only.
To make him a suitable NFL quarterback
. McDaniels implied the Broncos didn’t draft Tebow to play a different position and intend on playing him at QB. He did say Tebow may get a chance to get on the field early in wildcat packages, but otherwise, he will compete for the quarterback job with the other QBs on the roster. Tebow won’t become an h-back or line up at any other position. Denver drafted him to throw passes and will work on improving his skills along the way. It sounds like McDaniels may be out to prove some of the critics wrong.
Speaking of those critics, I found ESPN’s use of Todd McShay very interesting during the course of the NFL draft. First of all, it appears as if McShay believes he has reached Kirk Herbstreit-level stardom. He hasn’t. Someone needs to tell him this. Second of all, Mel Kiper Jr. is infinitely more valuable during the event. While discussing the draft with One Eyed Willy, we (he mostly, I’ll give credit where credit is due) came up with a realization: while the first round is basically a crapshoot for everyone, Kiper makes his money during the later rounds. He knows the ins and outs of kids drafted deep into the last day. While Kiper is telling you all about the tight end from Abilene Christian your favorite team just drafted, McShay is still bitching about Tebow. And I’m not exaggerating. McShay had very little to bring to the later rounds of the draft, which is unfortunate because that’s when ESPN decided to force feed him to us. During the first round – when McShay’s opinions were at their strongest – we didn’t see a lot of him. But during the later rounds – when he really had nothing of value to add – we had to put up with him still trying to play “I told you so” about first round picks. ESPN, do us a favor and replace this guy with anyone. Heck, every 10 picks or so pull a fan out of the audience and have him give us his two cents. Although many of us may disagree with a lot of what Kiper says, we can put up with him because he really does know a lot about these kids. McShay on the other hand focuses his entire year on a handful of prospects and doesn’t seem to bother to learn a thing about anyone else. One of my favorite interactions was when Mr. Irrelevant was taken and Mel said something to the effect of (these weren’t his exact words): “Not a bad pick. I had him rated as a priority free agent. What about you Todd?” And Todd gave us back this gem: “Uh…um…yeah…uh…me too.” Thanks for your insight McShay. Where would we be without it?
Can you guess who might have had something to do with putting this article together? By now you’ve clicked through and probably already seen the culprit, but my guess is it wouldn’t have taken you long to figure it out anyway. In favor of five super conferences, Dennis Dodd lays out how he thinks it would all work. You’ll realize right away that some of the bigger “small” programs are gone. Most notably, Boise State. Because if you’re putting together super conferences to rule the landscape of college football, why include the program that is the subject to most of the expansion talk year after year? Bulls’ fan be warned, USF is missing too. That’s right. UNLV, Tulsa, Wyoming, and a host of others are deemed good enough to join a super conference, but USF is left out in the cold. And if you really want to talk super conference, take a look at the revamped SEC. It adds Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Texas, and Texas A&M. So the new SEC not only includes the last five national champions, but also includes the last two national championship runner-ups. Nice! Who knows? Maybe it’ll happen, but somehow I doubt we’ll see a 16-team SEC that adds those four schools.
Clemson quarterback Kyle Parker has a goal: become the first division one athlete to throw 20 touchdown passes and hit 20 home runs in the academic year…and he’s almost there. Last week, Parker his a grand slam to become the first member of the 20-15 club. Only two other athletes ever got to 20-10. Pretty darn impressive, even if Parker is doing it with an aluminum bat (disclaimer: as I mentioned, I have one game of baseball under my belt, therefore, I have no idea what the advantages or disadvantages are to aluminum bats, I just know they sound pretty).
The List: I have no idea if these numbers are common or rare, but either way they’re noteworthy. I’ll let you know what they are below.
1. 11
2. 15
3. 12
4. 19
5. 18
6. 16
7. 16
Those are the number of picks in each round of the 2010 NFL Draft that changed hands. And some of those picks changed hands MULTIPLE TIMES! If you add them up, you get 107 total picks that weren’t made by the team originally awarded the selection. If you remove compensatory selections (they can’t be traded), there were 223 picks in the draft. That means 48% of those picks were traded. There was even this scenario in the seventh round (pick 231). In 2009, the Philadelphia Eagles traded their 2010 seventh round pick and wide receiver Greg Lewis to the New England Patriots for a 2009 fifth-round choice. The Pats then traded that pick along with defensive lineman Le Kevin Smith to the Denver Broncos for a 2010 fifth-round choice. In a mind-blowing (sarcasm) move, the Broncos traded it back to the Pats for offensive lineman Russ Hochstein. The Pats then traded it to the Washington Redskins for two other 2010 seventh-round selections. That was a really long way of saying “with the 231st pick in the 2010 NFL Draft, the Washington Redskins select Selvish Capers, offensive lineman, West Virginia.” Cue booing from the New York Giants’ fans that were still in the building at that point.
The Sixth Man: With the draft consuming everyone for the past few days, it’s hard to find an ounce of basketball news (and I’m sure you don’t want me clamoring on about the Montreal Canadiens’ latest exploits), so here’s my prediction for the NBA Finals: Los Angeles Lakers 4, Cleveland Cavaliers 3. It’s especially not college-related considering the two biggest stars in that series (were it to happen), never played a minute of NCAA ball. Oh well.