Back to the Past? -- Mike Detillier (1 Viewer)

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Back to the Past?

By Mike Detillier


The rules in the NFL dictate that the league in the future will be heavily centered on the passing game, but more and more teams are paying attention to the fact that without a strong offensive line and running game you have zero chance of winning a Super Bowl. And you had better be able to match up downfield at the cornerback slots with bigger cover people due to the huge numbers of kingsize wide outs hitting the league.

I have written and spoken about this quite often that with all the "read-option" and "spread" offenses we all see in high school and college football it will affect the NFL in a negative manner. Just think about how the NFL will look in five years with no Drew Brees, no Peyton Manning, no Tom Brady, no Tony Romo and put five more years on Philip Rivers, Ben Roethlisberger and Eli Manning.

There are very few sure things in the league at quarterback from "star" quality young quarterbacks. Andrew Luck has that star feature and so does Russell Wilson, but from a sure thing standpoint, that is it.

We will not go back to 1960's or 1970's football in that teams will rely heavily on the ground game to move the ball, but we are inching in that direction due to the success of what the Seattle Seahawks and Dallas Cowboys have done the past few seasons.

And we saw some evidence of that feature on draft day. In 2015 there were 19 offensive linemen taken in the first 100 picks.

What we see coming out of the high school and college ranks are less quality defensive linemen and pass rush outside linebackers, but more quality offensive linemen and defensive backs.

The NFL has always put a premium on quarterbacks and pass rushers, but the colleges are just not supplying them in the numbers to fully supply 32 teams, but they are pumping out offensive linemen, defensive backs and wide receivers in huge numbers.

In the 2015 NFL draft there were 22 defensive backs selected in the first 100 selections and 14 wide receivers selected in the top 100. In the 2014 NFL draft there were 15 defensive backs selected in the first 100 picks and 15 wide receivers chosen in the top 100. And 22 offensive linemen were taken in the top 100 in 2014.

One AFC director of college player personnel told me this week that his team spent less time scouting this year’s version of quarterbacks than any other year he has spent in the league, but spent considerable time on offensive linemen and cornerbacks.

“After Jameis Winston and Marcus Mariota there was a huge dropoff at quarterback in this draft class,” the AFC personnel director with over 20 years of league experience said. “We went through the other top signal-callers like Bryce Petty, Brett Hundley, Garrett Grayson and Sean Mannion, but we were all in very close range of one another on opinion on those guys. Last year was different. We all felt strongly that Johnny Manziel was risky talent-wise and attitude-wise and we all really liked Blake Bortles, but there was great debate between who was better between Derek Carr and Teddy Bridgewater and we had a couple of area scouts who really pitched for LSU’s Zach Mettenberger, but not from the group of 2015.

"The football reservoir is shallow for quarterbacks today, but look at the offensive linemen. Last year as rookies look at the impact guys like Zack Martin (Cowboys), Bryan Stork (Patriots), Trai Turner (Panthers), Joel Bitonio (Browns), Gabe Jackson (Raiders), John Urschel (Ravens), Jake Matthews (Falcons), Taylor Lewan (Titans), Greg Robinson (Rams), Jack Mewhort (Colts) and Justin Britt (Seahawks) had for their respective teams. It will be the same this year. One of the those top picks will play well and the other will struggle and one might, and I say MIGHT emerge down the line from Petty, Grayson, Hundley and Mannion, but watch how many offensive linemen from this group really work out well. We spent tons of time debating offensive linemen and cornerbacks, but not the quarterbacks as a unit. I think very highly of Leonard Williams, but as a defensive end, not a defensive tackle. It is tough see to see what happened with Dante Fowler- a player I thought a lot of and I think highly of Vic Beasley too, but this group was certainly not overwhelming as pass rushers and it is like that virtually every year over the past five or six other than the 2011 group. Teams are dominating most defensive lines today because they have better offensive linemen than defensive linemen. That suggest teams will run the ball more over the next five to six years than the previous five to six years.”

The Seahawks have been to back to back Super Bowls because they are a complete team, but they have the main cogs in place. They have a signature quarterback, a very stout running game led by Marshawn Lynch and a suffocating secondary led by Richard Sherman, Kam Chancellor and Earl Thomas.

The Cowboys got back into the Super Bowl hunt because they had a good quarterback in Tony Romo, and a signature running back in DeMarco Murray, who signed this off-season with the Philadelphia Eagles. They hit on three signature players along the offensive line, all drafted in Round One, in Tyron Smith, Zack Martin and Andy Frederick and a defense that was opportunistic last season in creating turnovers and getting off the field on third down.

Other teams have taken notice of the success and in a league of copycatting others are doing the same thing. In 2014 the New England Patriots stole a page out of the Seattle Seahawks playbook and they went out and got two "rent" cornerbacks in Darrelle Revis and Brandon Browner and they moved Devin McCourty permanently to his more natural position of free safety. It was a major reason they won the Super Bowl.

And now we see others like the Atlanta Falcons, New York Giants, Kansas City Chiefs, Detroit Lions, San Diego Chargers and the New Orleans Saints trying to do things personnel wise the exact same way.

This off-season the Saints added a premium center in Max Unger and used their first round choice on Stanford offensive tackle Andrus Peat. They spent considerable free agency capital to resign halfback Mark Ingram and they brought in former Buffalo Bills standout runner/receiver C.J. Spiller to team up with a "thumper" interior runner in Khiry Robinson.

And with a hole as big as the Grand Canyon at cornerback the Saints landed Brandon Browner, the top cornerback in the Canadian Football League in Delvin Breaux, who I think will make a huge impact on this team, a former 2010 first round pick of the New York Jets in cornerback Kyle Wilson and used two draft choices to select P.J. Williams and Damian Swann in trying to match up against an avalanche of taller and more physical wide receivers that have hit the league.

Already Breaux and Swann-the rookie from Georgia have impressed the Saints coaching staff in the small time they have had to work with the cornerback duo. And the Saints hope good health returns to former Buffalo Bills All-Pro free safety Jairus Byrd after a season of health ills with the Black and Gold.

Denver, New England, Dallas, San Diego, Green Bay, St. Louis Rams and New Orleans have seen what has won for Seattle and they are trying to duplicate their blueprint with personnel moves to match.

With fewer star quarterbacks and pass rushers entering the league teams are revamping their rosters upfront along the offensive line, getting running backs in numbers and acquiring as many "bigger" cornerbacks as they can get their hands on to match up downfield.

Running backs, defensive backs and offensive linemen you can find those players in college in numbers, you can't say that at quarterback and for top pass rushers.

Recently in speaking to former New Orleans Saints quarterback Bobby Hebert, now a radio commentator for WWL-870 in New Orleans, he backed up those thoughts with his own view.

“When I played in the 1980s and 1990’s there were about 20 to 24 premium pass rushers in the league, but today there are maybe a dozen, at best,” Hebert said. “We talk about it every year at draft time, but they just aren’t there anymore or they do it for one year, get paid and then they are mediocre."

"I know there are more teams using top athletes on offense, but the world has changed on defense and you just don’t find as many guys like a Rickey Jackson, Lawrence Taylor, Keith Millard, Chris Doleman, Reggie White, Jerome Brown, Charles Haley and I can go on with players that had attitudes once they hit the field. Some guys look for ESPN type hits, but they don’t make big plays week in and week out. Those guys did it every week. Today there is no consistency with many of them. There are a handful of players like that, but few and I think it is part a change of philosophy football-wise and part the way some view the game. Some look at it like a personal war each week and others look at it like it is a way to be famous and not a way to be known as good. They are more worried about their social status than how others view them as players on the field. I look at Seattle, New England, Baltimore, Green Bay and I hate to say it, but Dallas today, they come with a chip on their shoulders and they let you know you better bring your lunch because it is a long day at the office. I think the future brings a much more physical brand of football on offense because they can overpower people defensively and the offensive line today is the throwback to what you had defensively 15 to 20 years ago.”


The NFL Way

Much has already been written about the 4-game suspension of New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady and his involvement in "Deflategate" and the $1 million dollar fine and the strip of draft choices (1st in 2016 and 4th in 2017).

I firmly believe the punishment issued out was fair and just.

Had Brady been more forthcoming about his involvement in the deflating of footballs and preferring the footballs in a certain manner for a competitive edge I really think Roger Goodell would not have suspended him even one game, but fined him instead.

In this issue it was not the crime, but the cover-up of the offense that led to the 4-game suspension without pay.

I have worked with enough pro athletes that I can be honest in saying virtually every one of them have spoken openly about either doing something or having someone do something on their behave to gain a competitive edge out on the field.

It is nothing new to the NFL, but in this case the New England Patriots and Tom Brady got caught. And for the Patriots they are not rookies in bending the rules. All they had to do was be honest about it.

Instead, the transcripts, even though there was no smoking gun with Brady's fingerprints on it, it became obvious that he wanted the balls in this way and instructed the folks in possession of the balls to have it pumped up in the manner which best suited him.

And again, the best quarterback I have covered in my time in sports and the best head coach in the free agency world of the NFL, have a finger pointed in their direction for crossing the line of fair play.It does not take away their excellence on the field and in coaching, but we will always refer back to this issue and other situations in the past about both the Patriots and head coach Bill Belichick.

The real issue to me is why didn't the Commissioner of the NFL in handing down the suspension, the fine and stripping of draft choices make the announcement that in the future the NFL would have full control of the footballs played in NFL games from 24 hours before the game until the game is finished.

Instead Roger Goodell said nothing.

How can a multi-billion dollar operation be run like a Five and Dime store when dealing with this issue?

You are kidding yourself if you think this is the first time a team has questioned how another team has handled the pressure of footballs being played with, but it was always swept under the football rug. It had no real affect on the outcome of a game because the Patriots just blew away the Indianapolis Colts, but it was the setting of the AFC Championship game and it was the best team in the league over the past 15 years.

Goodell and others before him did nothing because every team was doing something to gain a small advantage in their home outlet, but now the whole sports world is watching. But for all the talk, Goodell did nothing to solve the problem itself. That is the most stunning part of the week of talk about the whole issue.

In my opinion the stripping of 2 draft choices was Goodell saying, without saying it, that the whole operation was known about by the head coach and he gave his approval of it, but the commissioner has no proof of it. So he strips the team of draft choices to punish the coach and he gets affected by the loss of two premium picks more than anyone.

It has long been rumored that when the first major offense by the New England Patriots went down in "Spygate", in which Bill Belichick was fined and a first round pick taken away, he was not suspended by the league because he was ready to spill the "football beans" on the actions of other NFL head coaches had the league placed a tougher sanction on him.

Was Belichick the first coach to have people spy and film practices of opposing teams? No, but he got caught.

Interesting part on this issue is that there was no mention made of Belichick and he received no sanctions and there was no football footprints leading in his direction anyway, but when Roger Goodell suspended New Orleans Saints head coach Sean Payton for one full season in the Bountygate issue he said that "ignorance of offenses being done by your own staff and players was no excuse". That part was never brought up by Goodell and for him it didn't seem to connect HIS dots, but why not?

Again, a commissioner who has portrayed himself as the biggest and baddest sheriff on the sports block, has made moves that are more reminiscent of Deputy Barney Fife than those of Sheriff Andy Taylor.

The "Finance" commissioner of the NFL has done his job and he has made the 32 owners much richer with his many corporate and television deals, but most of his actions on matters dealing with football matters have stopped short on addressing the real issue.

This week Roger Goodell kept to form.


The Football Factories

Here is the breakdown of teams that have produced the most players into the NFL via the NFL draft from 2006-2015.

1st Round Picks 2006-2015

Alabama - 17
USC - 14
LSU, Florida, Florida State and Ohio State - 13

SEC Players picked from 2006-2015

LSU - 64
Alabama - 56
Georgia - 54
Florida - 51
South Carolina -35
Auburn - 34
Arkansas - 33

Colleges that have produced the most NFL players 2006-2015

USC - 67
LSU - 64
Alabama - 56
Florida State - 55
Georgia and Ohio State - 54
Oklahoma - 52
Florida - 51



Follow Mike on Twitter at @MikeDetillier
 

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