10 Things

10 things

Okay, I’m back. Yes, I have a little “Favre” in me. I was asked to continue to give my thoughts on occasion, so I will.

How the hell did Joe Thomas make the Pro Bowl again? This guy single-handedly got two quarterbacks hurt this season, and he certainly wasn’t consistently dominant in the run game. Yet he’s All-Pro. Ditto for Josh Cribbs. At least Cribbs has a semi-excuse – he was banged up all year.

I heard two nutty things this past week. First, ESPN was doing a promo on fans being able to follow Andrea Kremer’s tweets from the sideline of some Bowl game. What cogent observations could she possibly have? Here’s one possibility – “Hey, the purple team looks nice with that black trim.” Come on. She knows football like I know truck tires. Secondly, Rob Ryan may get an interview for the Panthers’ head coaching gig. Right. This guy has done nothing to earn such respect. When was the last time his defense, either in Cleveland or Oakland, finished in the top-5 in any defensive category? He’s mostly hot air. Mind you, if I were a reporter, I’d want to cover him. He’s fun as hell. But if I were a GM looking for a head coach, you have to be kidding. His act wouldn’t be considered funny if his teams had a.350 winning percentage. Ditto for his brother in NY.

I still don’t know how the Patriots are doing with it kids on both sides of the ball. I know they are the current popular favorites to win the Super Bowl, but I just can’t see it - too much youth/inexperience. The one upside is the play of the offensive line. Those guys are giving Brady a ton of time right now and he’s put up sick numbers because of it – with the exception of the Browns’ game. I’ll root for my boy Manning and the Colts. I love quarterbacks who make “O” coordinators basically useless during a game. It reminds of the good old days when you didn’t have multiple substitutions on every down and you didn’t go to four wides on third and 1.

Those of you who love the Arkansas QB – I have two words for you DA! He looks like a very similar creature to me. Granted, I haven’t seen him that much, but tall QBs tend to flame out in the NFL. Again, I wouldn’t take a QB in the first round unless he was a dead ringer for John Elway. They simply miss more often than not for me to reach just because everyone is looking for the next Peyton Manning in round #1. The odds are against it - big time.

Actually, the kid I do like is probably a second day pick – T. Taylor of Virginia Tech. If I ran a team, I’d team him with my boy Seneca Wallace and put in a few running plays in that system and drive D-coordinators in the NFL crazy. But you know that already.


The Luck kid said he’s staying at Stanford – which is an okay decision this time around since there won’t be big money for high picks anymore after they hammer out a new labor agreement. If this were 2009 and the kid said he was staying, I’d say he’s plain nuts (see Bradford). Still, if he has an off year or gets hurt next year, his pocket book will be affected – although not to the same level as before.

Someone tell Gordon Gee, that moron, that TCU or Boise State would kick his team’s ass 7 out of 10 times if they played this year.

There is nothing like the “Legend” and “Leaders” Conference dominating once again during Bowl season. Once again, the Big 10 showed how mediocre that conference has been in football for the past 15 years or so. On the flip side, congrats to OSU for finally beating an SEC team, even if they needed a “Butterfingers” performance by the Razorback wide receivers to do it.

By the way, if the Browns ended up with Ohio State’s #97 in the draft– Ironhead’s kid – I wouldn’t be disappointed. My only concern for him is his stamina. He came out a lot in that game last week versus Arkansas. He needs to get in better shape if he wants to be a force at the next level. The “O” linemen in the NFL will make him work a hell of a lot harder than the college kids.

As for Mangini, let’s hope MH does the right thing finally in Cleveland and hires a guy who has “been there and done that” (aka: win big at the NFL level). No more experimenting with coordinators in this town please. We have said for over a year that John Gruden would likely be the team’s next head coach and see no reason to change that view. If the fat man doesn’t want the gig himself because he like stealing money – and who can blame him, hire one of your boys who has had mucho success already. That would be JG.

Till next time.