The real calendar…There
is a parallel universe to the reality of the football world (we think reality is
a concept reserved for those that can’t cope with college football). In our own
bizarre existence here at Bucknuts, the calendar remains a month or two off from
that Roman Caesar salad of a calendar that regular civilians use. As an example:
Spring (to a college football fan) really ends when April is done and
spring practice is over - along with the spring game having been played.
Summer starts the first of May with individual workouts, summer recruiting
camp in June and winding down as the players return in July. Then summer is over
and Fall begins in August with the advent of practice resuming. Fall is
made up of August, September, October and November (the longest and best season
of the year!). Finally, there’s Winter: December, January and February.
Winter is reserved for bowl games, playoffs (when they start in 2021…) and
recruiting of course!
Yes, it’s a busy calendar if
you’re just a little bit, well…nuts.
* * * * *
We still
feel a draft in here... The NFL draft has come and gone, the crowds have
dispersed and everyone is back home safely with their families. That doesn’t
stop me from digging up the draft corpse and taking a last look. Of course. And
this is what I see:
1) The number of Northwestern players that got drafted outnumbered the
Michigan draftees 3-2
2) In non-Michigan news... Marcus Vick went through both Saturday and
Sunday undrafted. Then he wasn’t picked early by any team looking to sign
free agents. The character issues just over-shadow the talent too much in his
case
3) From our new friend Dennis Dodd:
“The NFL Draft isn't
always an indicator of a college program's relative strength. But for our notes
column purposes, it is. Read on:
Today's Final Jeopardy answer: Cal Poly, Abilene Christian, Alabama State,
Northwestern State, Grambling.
The question: What teams had more players taken in the NFL Draft before Michigan
saw its first player go off the board in the fourth round?
The draft was
an extension of those woes. Embarrassing? First-day picks: Ohio State 7,
Michigan 0.
Total Michigan draft picks: three. The rest of Big Ten: 38.
Not only that, seven of the league's 10 other teams had as
many or more picks than Michigan.
4) Miami barely kept alive its string of 12 straight seasons with a
first-round choice. Seattle took cornerback Kelly Jennings at No. 31. Miami is
another “M” team taking on water. As their ship starts to capsize, it is worth
noting that there is almost a perfect correlation between the time Coker took
over the rudder and the problems beginning – again.
5) Ohio State seems to be in their own league, at least when it comes
to comparing us to the rest of the Big Ten’s real league. At least when
it comes to the NFL interests. Take a look at how each B-10 school did for the
first day of the draft:
Total players drafted from the Big Ten:
15
Ohio State: 7
Iowa: 2
Wisconsin: 2
Minnesota: 1
Michigan State: 1
Penn State: 1
Purdue: 1
Michigan: 0
Everyone else: 0
Add to that
disparity that three of the Bucks were underclassmen. Those three represent more
first-day picks than anyone else had, in total!
6) Thinking about Ashton Youboty. It’s hard to “feel sorry” for a good kid
that is deserving of some NFL riches. But – in retrospect – he probably would
have served himself better, and the Buckeyes, had he stayed another year. Could
have been a captain – a leader. Could have padded the stats and looked much more
like a first-rounder than a third-rounder. As someone else rightfully pointed
out first: he could have been a Top 20 pick next year. Based off of falling out
of the 1st round, it probably cost him five to twelve million dollars over a 5
to 6 year contract.
7) And how many first-dayers will we have next year? (Realizing that the
median number in the Big Ten this year was about 1.5…) I think we will have at
least three (Pitcock, Troy Smith and Teddy), with additional possibilities being
Patterson, an offensive lineman (either Datish or Downing) and Pittman – if he
leaves early.
Pretty
heady stuff, all that…
* * * * *
Is USC
the new “Michigan”?...For those of us petty enough to reminisce about the
beat-downs that Petty Pete Carroll has given Ohio State in recruiting lately
(Fred Davis, Dwayne Jarrett, Mark Sanchez, Jeff Byers, and Walker Ashley just
off the top of my head…), it’s hard to resist the scratching temptation when
itches are announced at SUC, I mean USC. Then you look at a few of the gaffes of
the past weeks and you see (I mean USC) slips and falls adding up. As one poster
put it:
Final damage estimate on
Matt Leinart staying in school an extra year: $10 million to $13 million. That's
an educated guess on how much less in salary and bonus Leinart forfeited by
sticking around. Had he come out in 2005, Leinart probably would have been the
No. 1 pick in the draft. He slipped to No. 10 (to the Cardinals). Was it worth
it?
Lore has it
that Petey advised both Matt and Reggie Bush to stay in school (it
certainly would have been better for Pete!). That was absurd advice for Bush –
picked second – and doesn’t look so great for Leinert, in retrospect.
Then
there’s the new issues surrounding the upscale apartment Jarrett shared with
Hollywood Matt Leinart. And the Reggie Bush economics. And the quick (and
dismissed” pseudo-scandal with Mark Sanchez. I say in advance to all of you
chortling fans from Ohio, remember that this is how a great program is treated
once they achieve a certain level of prominence. Remember post-2002, anyone?
I actually
like – and respect what Carroll said after this rash of real (and reported)
incidents:
"We needed to see this
coming, and we didn't," Carroll was quoted saying in a column about the recent
spate of trouble facing some of the team's current and former players. "It's
gone beyond all the heads up, all the alerts, all the education we give these
kids. We need to do more."
In the past week, questions have been raised about housing arrangements for the
family of Heisman Trophy winner Reggie Bush, taken No. 2 overall by the New
Orleans Saints in this weekend's NFL draft, and about whether an upscale
apartment that wide receiver Dwayne Jarrett shared with former teammate Matt
Leinart violated NCAA rules. Also, the university has indefinitely suspended
backup quarterback Mark Sanchez, who is under investigation on allegations he
sexually assaulted a female student.
Speaking generally about the recent problems, Carroll told the Times he needs to
better educate his players about outside influences, especially now that USC has
become a college football powerhouse -- and a target.
"Our guys are marked guys, they have had success and there's people trying to
get in on that, and we need to do a better job of making them understand the
problems there," he told the Times. "We have moved into very different territory
now, all the hype, all the distractions, all the people who want to influence
us, and we will be more aware of that. We will work harder to control that."
* * * *
Four more years, four more
years…That’s the chant that goes up when you watch a budding Ted Ginn or a
Chris Wells or a, well…Greg Oden. But can we get more than the minimum out of
these emerging superstars? In football, the legalisms now dictate that a player
will stick around for at least three years (and that’s why you won’t see a Kurt
Coleman or a Ross Homan or a Chris Wells red-shirt anymore…). In basketball? The
new rule is – basically – that they have to stay for at least one year. Which is
a better rule than the old rule which said they didn’t have to show up at all.
Which brings us back to the
promising career of Greg Oden, the best high school basketball player in the
nation and a sure first pick in the NBA draft once he decides to collect that
next $100,000,000 or so. Rumors started (and I think Greg himself started them…)
that he would stay at OSU longer than the one required year. Wow – good stuff.
Then, this past week, both Oden and OSU-bound running mate, Mike Conley, were
quoted in an Indy paper saying:
“We don’t have the mindset that we are freshman, and we need to adjust,”
Conley said of heading to Ohio State in the fall.
“We want to be able to fit right in and have an impact from Day 1.”
That idea was echoed by Oden, who was named Indiana’s 2005 Mr. Basketball
last month.
“Anybody who comes into college, their expectations are high because you
always want to be that person who turns a program around and bring a
championship to that program,” he said. Oden, projected to be the top pick in
the NBA draft before a rules changed meant he had to stay at least a year in
college, is looking to remain at Ohio State for half of his college eligibility.
“I have to get there first,” Oden said. “I will stay longer than two
years, I am pretty sure of that. I want to get my education, that’s always
first.
“That’s the plan.”
A man with a plan. And we like that plan…
* * * * *
From strength to strength…When
previous strength and conditioning coach, Dave Kennedy, left the Buckeyes, there
was a great rending of garments and gnashing of teeth amongst the faithful that
the program would never be the same. That Kennedy was “indispensable”. (Charles
de Gaulle once said, “The cemeteries are full of indispensable people” – now
including Charles de Gaulle, as well…)
Then, some of the Kennedy
criticisms starting coming out post hoc (once had landed a new position at Pitt
and now Nebraska). He favored the NFL-bound players. He was too
traditional in a world of new cutting edge techniques. Yadda yadda yadda. In
came Al Johnson (as well as Mike Cochran and – eventually - Butch Reynolds).
Suddenly, the techniques were too cutting edge and the regimens were
too non-traditional. Except for one thing: the Buckeyes looked great, got
stronger and seemed in better shape than anyone we played.
Point here? The S&C coaches
will come and go. Let’s not get morose about it. The program is bigger than the
people. Cochran came-and-went to Marshall, as an example, when Mark Snyder left
for there. Ohio State under Tressel has proven that there are numerous ways to
skin the cat that we call conditioning (not even counting some of the ways that
Barry Bonds pioneered…). As we add and substitute talent, these guys will
continue to be critical. But they will also continue to change…
* * * * *
Smarting off at the
professional level…Now that the NFL draft is safely behind us, we can look
back languorously at the brouhaha over Vince Young and his “intelligence”
scores. I say, thank god he was smart enough to leave college early and that we
don’t have to face him in Austin on September 9!
Well, as I was saying…The NFL
administers a Wonderlic Personnel Test, for their own peculiar reasons, to
assess the quantifiable smarts of players they are drafting. This test has been
around since 1937 and has been administered to more than 120 million people,
according to an article in the Wall Street Journal. It’s a 12 minute test and
the scores range from 0 to 50. Incidentally, only Bengal punter/receiver Pat
McNally ever got a perfect score in the NFL. Yes, Pat was from Harvard, where
they teach you to do well on tests…
The Journal calculated that –
over the past ten years – the average NFL test-ee received a 19, which compares
with the national average test score of 20. A little nugget that was provided:
offensive linemen scored better then quarterbacks by a 27-25 score (that’s “2”
better, for you quarterbacks out there). The lowest score by position was
defensive backs, with scores just under 18.
Vince Young got the muckrakers
excited by scoring a 16, or the same score that Dan Marino had – not a bad
yardstick there. Other quarterback scores from recent vintages? Tom Brady
had a 33. Eli Manning had a 39. Brett Favre had a 22.
So Vince won’t necessarily
need any pointers on how to sign his name while endorsing large checks. I got a
big kick out of the whole process and the article, which ended with this
cautionary tale: “If a high Wonderlic score doesn’t necessarily guarantee
success, a low one doesn’t sink you either. And if you’re not handy with tools
and can’t play football, don’t despair. There are other career opportunities, as
indicated by a legendary exchange between Joe Namath and a smart-mouthed
sportswriter. “Hey Joe”, the writer supposedly asked the Jets hall of Fame
quarterback, “How did you do in Basket Weaving at Alabama?” “I flunked out,”
Broadway Joe shot back. “I switched to something easier – journalism.”
Now, that smarts…
* * * * *
Which one is Saine, after
all?...There was a great juxtaposition in styles over the last few weeks as
two of the highest profile recruits in the nation made their decisions. First,
you had Jimmy Clausen, the #1 QB in the country. He flew up to the Notre Dame
spring game, held a televised press conference, announced he would be a Weis
Guy, and then went to the game in a stretch limo. Cool. Brandon Saine is Ohio’s
#1 running back and one of the fastest scholastic humans in the country. He and
his Piqua High school coach simply called Jim Tressel privately and then let it
leak out to Bucknuts and some other lesser sites. That was all. That was even
cooler…
A couple of different types of
“brands” for your future superstars, eh? The “Clausen Brand” hopes to be the
greatest ever at Notre Dame, hey - maybe the next Ron Powlus. The “Brand Insane”
- the guy with the insane speed, simply hopes to be the next in a line of great
running backs (or maybe even wide receivers…) at OSU; perhaps a combo guy like
Robert Smith with both great power and speed.
I like his chances. I like
the brand new guy on the Ohio State scene…
Sane? Insane? The Mr. B Brand? It’s all difficult to
sort out. But if you want to talk about Ohio State football, check in with Mr.
Bucknuts at MrBucknuts@yahoo.com